exodus from fear.

Peeps, I hit the jackpot. Fo shizzle.

That is...friends, I have been extravagantly blessed. Seriously.

I was in Tim Keene's office this afternoon, and I thought, "I could spend days just sitting here, listening to this man tell stories, and talk about his relationship with God." My whole soul smiled, and I thanked Him.

Later, I was sitting in another office at JRA, looking at a seemingly endless list of attender names on a computer screen, when I heard, "Pray for them." And so I prayed for them, name after name after name. And I thought, "Who gets the opportunity to pray specifically for the body like this?" And I thanked Him.

Later still, I was at home, living the perfect Friday night, reading a book I'd been wanting to read (a signed copy! signed copies--such a nerdy pleasure), and as I read, I suddenly felt the deepest sensation of contentedness. And I thanked Him.

It has been a thankful day. Yet, as wonderful as those things all are, as pleasurable as an afternoon chat with Tim, an amazing opportunity to serve, or a great book, I hit the jackpot.

I was reading in Exodus yesterday, where God is telling Moses how Aaron's threads should be made, and it says that the plate of his garment was to be engraved: "Holy to the Lord." Immediately I thought, "Wow, that's a brick ton of responsibility. Holy to the Lord. Lot to live up to." I imagined that I would be so intimidated by such a designation literally displayed on me. Being holy to the Lord: tall order.

Then I realized. I am holy to the Lord. That's a gift. That's grace. I was made holy to Him when I said yes, and am made so continually as I seek Him in humility.

I've been really caught up lately in myself. In how I'm not "Christian enough" for this or that--for approaching the altar, for worshiping in whatever way I want, for taking part in church life, for applying to seminary. It doesn't make much sense, I won't try to explain it here. But, when I read that verse, I remembered who I am. Who He made me.

I am a girl made holy to the Lord. A girl redeemed. A girl set free. Free to worship, free to take her place in the body, free to follow His call, no matter where that leads.

I am Holy to the Lord.

walking newly.

Friends, it has been a week.

Here's a segment of a post from Sunday night that I didn't put up:

Maybe it's time to give all of this up. To accept it as a wonderful experience. A chance to empathize with a culture and a people I didn't understand, and couldn't love. An opportunity to be loved in an incredible way. To learn to accept grace. And to try to give it.

The questions about evolution always do me in. At first, when Lindell answered in a simplistic "yes", a "no", and another "yes" to a three-part question about evolution during the church-wide Q&A, I literally thought he was kidding. I was waiting for the punchline. My shock was the punchline, apparently. No joke.


I slept on the anxiety, and awoke Monday with oddly-little regard for the issue. It'll come back up. I'll have to do the praying, do the reading. Figure things out. Now's not the time.

Here's a clip from an unpublished post on Tuesday, pertaining to Monday's post about the delivering dealer:

In the re-reading, I see judgment. The danger of walking newly in this Grace is seeking His face through legalism. Having gotten a taste of God, I want more, and more, and more, and it would be easy to imagine that not only do the actions matter, they make the moment. To imagine that I can wrap this all up in rules, and bring Him closer on command. But love. Love is magnificent. It's love that saved me--the love of James River people that brought me in, and His love on the cross that forgave me. Love her.

Over and under and in-between, there has been much conversation, and confusion. Some pain, and fear. A lot of running from God. And maybe just as much earnest seeking. There has been hope.

I'm not as unsteady as I once was, and I feel that now. I felt it on Sunday, as I realized that I trust and respect Lindell enough to consider his position on evolution. I felt it as I wrote about my friend from Chicago, knowing that I had turned a corner in my personal desire to put to the side everything that had once distracted me from Him. I feel it as I read this book by Brian Houston on vision and cause, and think to myself that my vision is not as important as Christ's cause.

There is much unsteadiness still. Many places in me that need to be built, and strengthened.

But what a beautiful process that will be. Oh, oh, oh, what an amazing, awe-inspiring, tremendous and great transformation we all have in Christ. To take part each day in such a thing is...it's immeasurable. Its only response is worship. And the worship itself becomes yet another thing for which we are grateful, in an unending cycle of joy in Christ.

This is good. God is good.

race you!

Confession: My self-consciousness is getting in the way. It's getting in the way of my building new friendships, and being honest in old friendships. It's getting in the way of my feeling free to worship in the way I want to. Most dangerously, it's getting in the way of my dropping everything to follow Him fully.

The practical outcome of that is living in a place of willful, and knowing disobedience. That's no place I want to be.

I was having the longest conversation of my life last night, and as this friend talked on about the implications of living in His freedom, I kept seeing this silly moment from the week before. I was at the River fitness center with a couple of friends, and as we walked out of a Zumba class, en route to showing one of them the weight room, a spark of playful over-confidence hit me. "Race you!", I shouted to her, dropped everything, and burst forward towards the other end of the track.

The effect was actually far more fantastical--as though I just threw down my purse, and sprinted. She was like some sort of high school track super-star (and I get lapped in the park by women jogging double-strollers), so my illusion of speed only held until she started running, and passed me in about 2.3 seconds. But for a moment, it was all very dramatic, and awesome, and hopeful.

That moment, though, played through my mind again and again during this ginormous conversation last night, I think because of the forcefulness of it. I dropped everything. Didn't just drop. Threw everything to the side, and not to run. To sprint.

I have a pretty living personal relationship with God. I love the prayer We have. I read about Him (you would not believe what the Israelites are [were] up to!). I spend time in His body. But I'm afraid that in the same way that I've created a god for myself in the past, I am running that same risk now.

What does it mean to seek God if I won't then throw everything to the side to join Him, to worship Him, to love Him? And what does it mean to say that I've accepted salvation if the reality is that I am too uncertain and self-conscious to trust that He thought I was worth saving?

One of the more interesting and difficult points to navigate through in all of this has been the "new creation" part of being "born again." Born again (no quotes). In the two years between college, and moving here, I had become this incredibly confident and strong person with such a clear vision, even if I didn't know exactly what the future would hold. I had everything worked out--this whole moral, philosophical system, that fit so well into my peer group, and my academic reaches. It was perfect. I had such complete trust in myself to come through any situation, to handle anything. I had laid to rest most of my religious insecurity in this beautiful metaphorical version of Christianity. Golden. So good.

Then I moved here, and, planning to find a church that fit MY specifications, I instead found one that has caused me to fit myself to God. Now, I don't have that identity that I had. And I'm not sure what's happening with a new one. My self seems to be in transit.

That is, I think, one of the great uncertainties of salvation. You say yes without fully knowing. You give up who you are without a solid plan for who you'll become. And you trust that He'll take care of that. And He does.

He does. He is.

Unaccustomed to trusting outside of myself, I forget that. But, now in the middle of a transformation, I turn to myself on uncertain footing. I'm not solid. But He is. Not to the left, nor the right, but forward is the Truth. Better to drop everything and sprint towards His safety, than to sit in danger.

his name was foxy; he was a dealer.

Her drug dealer delivers. And that convenience makes it hard to quit.

So said a friend of mine this morning when, after she told me she needed to cut down on the pot, I asked her what was holding her back.

Delivery.

My mind is boggled. And the tiniest bit impressed. How did she get her "druggist" to deliver?? Do you pay extra for that? Or is it just a brilliant tactical move on his part, to keep clients hooked? After all, I've seen some shady drug deals, and delivery is a far more attractive option. In college, this same friend got her drugs from a guy named "Foxy" who would pull his pimped-out, "antique", burgundy-colored boat of a Buick into an empty lot on the corner of a seedy street in our college town. Open for business.

No more Foxy for her.

The tone of the conversation was really strange. It was semi-clear (which I think means slightly opaque) that she felt judged, despite my lack of judgment. I got this impression from her assertion that "And, I don't think there's anything wrong with marijuana", and the question "Why are you trying to turn this into a therapy session?" That last one because I asked her the afore-mentioned "What do you think is holding you back from quitting," and also "Why do you want to stop?"

So, her reaction took me by surprise. It clued me in to a couple of things.

1. I'm being judged for stuff I'm not doing. And..

2. I'm being judged for stuff I'm not doing, but maybe should be doing.

One of the hardest parts of this transition from the loosey-goosey, philosophically-suspect theology of Christ as the greatest moral leader ever (dude), to Christ as the Savior, and son of an exacting God, is in molding my responses to the world.

So far, my response has been completely hands-off. Everything's OK, and anything goes. You want to tell me about your weekend sexual escapades--how you wound up in some guy's bed, not knowing his name or address? Bring it, oh ha ha, that's a funny story, hope you had cab fare back from the western burbs. You got outrageously drunk last weekend, and are planning on it again tomorrow night? Keep me posted, by heinously un-readable drunk texts, if possible.

I've taken this approach because I don't want to seem judgmental. The slightest whiff of judgmentalism in that world could throw a testimony out the window. Also, as a wise friend passed on from a wise friend, what's the behavior when the soul is messed?

And yet...I'm hiding what I really think. On colder issues, I would just say, "Dude, that is so massively uncool. Really? They deliver pizza, too. Maybe you should start weaning. Domino's is the new methadone."

But these issues are so hot. And as much as I'd like to believe that my friends respect my mind (and by extension, my faith), I'm starting to realize that when it comes to the big-box sins, the chains are heavy (something I should know well enough).

So, what do I do? Do I shoot straight on the fact that I do think there's something wrong with the drugs? Or, do I pad around it? How do I have these conversations in which I will (no matter what I say) be "the Christian"? How do I show love, and honesty simultaneously?

I have no interest in convincing anyone of anything, or laying down a set of unalterable edicts about how people ought to behave. God will do the convincing, and the edicts are His (and understood in His time). My job is to love, and support. But, I feel dishonest laughing along in conversations in which I find little humor. If it's messed up, it's messed up.

How are these conversations over drugs any different than my early conversations with James River folk about how I felt that atonement was unnecessary, and the Bible mythical? How did they respond to me? They were open and unapologetic about the truth. But, they loved through, and trusted God to come in. Generally a great model. Does it work here?

I pray for wisdom.

blessed be that benediction.

"Cheese. I would like some cheese. But what kind? A little dill havarti sounds good. Ooh oh, or Irish cheddar. Mmm. Or some of that mushroom and leek business we had at that winery last year. Yeah, that'd be good. What about Fatboy Slim? How come I haven't heard anything from them lately? I mean, come on...Praise You?!? GREAT song! I wonder what Lindell's favorite cheese is. And if he's ever heard Fatboy Slim..."

Such was the devolved state of my thought processes during the third and final sermon point at tonight's Joyce Meyer conference. I have dead relatives with greater mental acuity and focus than I had during that last stretch.

It wasn't her. She was great! She was fine. I just hit the wall. I had clapped and whooped enthusiastically through the front end of the thing, controlled my eye-rolling and brow-wrinkling for the benefit of the constantly roving cameras (they tell people not to chew gum so it doesn't mess up the TV shot!), and even considered joining the standing section for Matt Redman's worship warm-up. I was tired. Exhausted. Done.

Mostly, I was just thinking, What the h**k am I doing here? And not just here. What the h**k am I doing in general?

Matt made me philosophical. I somehow fell in love with Redman's music years ago, and still have this CD with the ubiquitous "Blessed Be Your Name." To remember that CD, and that time, and then to look at my life, and find myself now fully in the fold, and singing this song in Springfield, MO, after having spent the afternoon volunteering at a megachurch full of people who speak bizarre languages and hop up and down...I don't know.

I laugh as I think about it, but God, what are You doing to me?

I want to run because it's too much, too different. There's too large a margin for error. My friends are never going to understand this. What will happen after I leave? Is this sustainable?

But it's also too true. Aside from the glitzy lights, and this raspy-voiced preacher saying things like "Claim it in the blood!" (which just sounds gross, by the way), and the women whose arms seem to shoot up randomly throughout, and the cameras, and the noise, and the Redman--it's true. I imagine God across the table from me, pushing all of that to the side with a sweep of His enormous arm (does God have arms?), and We sit, quietly with one another. And it's good.

It is good.

I don't understand all of this. I don't like all of it. Some days, I wake up and my goal is just to keep my faith until night fall. But I want to believe that His plan is greater than my dream.

That's all.

prayer floods.

I pray like a Pentecostal in my soul.

I've been having these weird sorts of prayer moments. (Can I talk openly about prayer? Oh my gosh, I'm about to talk openly about prayer.) I can only describe them as prayer floods.

I'll be praying. God, You are so good. This, and that, and the other. Rocking it, rocking it. Yes, yes, save the Real Housewives.

And then, bam! My mouth goes silent. My soul explodes. And I hear a raging torrent of prayer rip through my heart, shouting and hopping and all sorts of groovy things, like Lindell, or Keene on the Wednesday nights that make me nervous.

These Pentecostals, they have a way of getting louder and louder throughout prayer--when I first came here, I derisively called it "praying for the hearing-impaired" (now I use the term lovingly)--until your ears start to hurt, and you wonder, "Will it look like I'm praying if I bend over and muffle the sound with my hands? Should I rock back and forth a little to seal the deal?" Related tip: If you like to fall asleep to sermons, as I do, make sure to turn the sound down on your headphones, or you will wake up with a headache, and the vague sense that someone has been shouting at you in your dreams.

But in these moments of mine, I hear my soul pray in the same way. It shouts to God. Crying out to Him, not in that lame way we have of using that term, but in truth, voraciously, with desperation.

I don't understand it. They're not my prayers. I mean, they must be, right? I am me. Me am I. I is Ashley. Ashley's me. That could be indefinitely silly.

So they're my prayers. They're deep, real, and raw. But somehow...I don't know. Do you know? That moment where God just takes over? It's like that. My prayer floods through my mind and soul, leaving only a desire for God so strong that I cannot stop praying. And in the midst of that, I find myself praying for a different kind of prayer--one that scares me, and confuses me, and makes me blush.

I can understand why those in secular camps will claim that Christianity is a form of insanity. To believe that the God, the Most High, is in intimate relation with us, is alive in our hearts, guiding prayer, and placing grace... Wow.

Yet, that is the case. I feel its truth in these prayers I can't explain. I've lived so long denying Him. I trusted in a reality unreal, and unreal even to my own heart. I created a lovely god, in place of the powerful God. But now, He makes His power known. Flooding torrentially through me, carving and smoothing, and cleaning. And praying.

Papa don't raise no fools.

I've always loved the altar of a silent sanctuary.

In Galesburg, Illinois, where I went to college, there's scarce an altar at which I haven't knelt. I would walk in the afternoons to clear my head, all over, stopping at the churches, trying their doors, and--finding them open--taking a moment in prayer at the altar.

My life was otherwise in disarray. I thought I was living life fully, being adventurous. Interesting euphemisms for binge drinking. At any rate, my behavior was on the mild end, for a liberal, hard-studying, hard-drinking bunch of nerdy kids. But I knew it was off. Though, who really cares about the behavior when the heart was so lost?

Some nights, I would wander away from a party, messed up and drunk, and sobbing out to God. I knew there was a corner to turn, and just didn't get it, couldn't see it, wouldn't take it. I wanted Him or whatever I thought He was, so badly. But I couldn't seem to make it all fit. My heart cried out for God. My mind said there was no such thing.

I'm a little bit older now. A little bit smarter, maybe. Little bit wiser, hopefully. And I can see that I was entrenched in a postmodern paradigm without understanding it to be only a paradigm. I saw only reality, or what I thought was real. Something in me told me that there was this God who loved a certain way, and whose love called forth a particular question (maybe..."will you?"). But everything around me suggested something else, something different. It all said, "Any love that's love doesn't exact a price--if there is a God, He is okay with your exploration."

And in a sense, He is. But I doubt that He's a foolish God, or one who harbors fools.

As I walk with Him, the greatest reality is His sovereignty. Consistently, His power comes out to meet me, shifting, and molding, and re-shaping my heart and mind in ways I didn't, or couldn't have known, to expect. It is as though He is rooting out all of the old misunderstandings, replacing them with a living knowledge of His absolute Grace.

Piece by piece, the world slides into place. What I didn't understand, I come to see. What seemed outrageous or intolerant takes its place in Godly wisdom. I panic. Brainwashing? Yes, or no. Always one or the other. Backtrack, or keep moving forward. He helps me to discern.

But the sovereignty--it is at the core of the reality. A world ruled by a loving God looks very different than a world ruled by no God at all, or worse, ruled by our own individual hearts. How do you teach that to someone? How can you show someone something she can't see?

I suppose you can't. I learned from Tim Keene during that first meeting so many months ago, that God does the saving. We do the living, and the loving. He does the changing. The sighting.

Then sometimes, He is already giving the vision. Strongly, and clearly, and with breathtaking vividness. We just don't trust ourselves to see whatever it is He has. So, we walk, and walk, and walk, kneeling at the altar, crying out for help when the answer is already there. His love is there.

finding an un-ruffled faith.

You probably don't like me. Seriously. Most likely, you think I am massively unfunny, ten different kinds of snobby, or (usually and) outrageously uninteresting.

Or so I will tell myself, as we're (if we're ever) talking. I have a mind-numbing sense of social inferiority. Particularly for a very social, very confident person. I love to talk. And yet, I spend most of most conversations pushing past a wall of negative self talk: "They're going to think you're crazy. You are so not funny. Wince! You sound so snobby! Man, just shut up already."

I was thinking about this today while on a quick trip for a pair of yoga pants, and hair ties. Scanning the store for the active wear, I saw it. The most ridiculous skirt on the face of the planet. Tier after tier of ruffled pink gauziness. Beckoning me.

Then, immediately, "You can't wear that. Are you kidding me? You could never pull that off. You're not a cool girl, Ash. Jeans, and sweaters. That's where you live."

I like to think that I'm some sort of trail-blazing iconoclast. And, if argumentativeness were any proof of individuality, I would be. But it's not, and I'm not. So, I'm forced to wonder...how much of a follower am I really? How much do I care what other people think?

An unexpected lesson from Christ is that I care quite a lot. I thought I was so avant-garde because I stood on the fringes of Christianity between the nay-sayers, and the devout. I could wag a finger at both, acting as though I was some sort of modern-day prophet. Then I realized that much of my resistance to the devout was emotional, was tied to that image of myself as the stand-alone. Bombshell! I wasn't quite as out there as I thought!

I'm not quite as out there as I think! As I stood in the fitting room, staring at myself in this hot mess of a skirt I love, it occurred to me that this skirt is like my social complex is like my faith. Across all three areas, I'm scared to be who I am, out of fear of the judgment of others. If I buy the skirt, someone will think I look silly, and then I'll feel silly. If I open my mouth, I'll say something that someone doesn't like, and regardless of whether I should have said it or not, I'm afraid I'll be judged on those words. If I share my faith with my friends in a real, raw, and heart-felt way, they may begin to feel uncomfortable around me, to hold me at arm's length.

So I hold back. I play it safe. I pretend not to like things I like. I have to be really tired to talk openly. I share tiny corners of my faith, justifying that stinginess in the name of strategic evangelism, or, more gently, street-smart love.

But I don't want to live that way.

I bought the skirt. I'm going to stop over-analyzing every word I say to people. And I pray for the courage to be open about my faith.

When I met Nancy Alcorn, I rambled my way through three or four unintelligible minutes about freedom, and faith, and Christ, and only He remembers what else, and she wrote something fabulous in the book I had her sign.

It says, "Ashley-- Christ paid for our freedom. Live in it!"

I wonder if that freedom extends not only to my eternal soul, but to these earthly moments. If, in my cross-bought freedom, I am enveloped by a love that washes out the self-consciousness that binds me to myself. If, in His love, I am free to love outside my lines of doubt and fear.

I am bound only to Him, and I can't be tied by ruffles.

real Housewives, real hearts.

I justify watching "Real Housewives of New Jersey" by praying for them all after each episode.

I do.

I watch, saying crazy things like "She should respect her husband enough not to hang out with that woman," and "Ooohhh, she'll wish she had shown more compassion..."

I know. Who says stuff like that during trash television? I do, now.

I watch. Then I pray. I pray for Jacqueline's daughter, that she would be safe, and wise. And for Danielle, that she would heal, and grow. For Caroline, that her heart would be softened. And Dina, that she'd find whatever spiritual truth she's looking for. I don't even know about Teresa.

But I never pray that they'd come to know Christ.

Smack. Down. On me, that is.

This is hard to write about. I'm wondering if I think too hard about it, if the whole thing will collapse on me. Months ago, I was intent on asking every question possible. Then I tempered that to try to help push the church forward, noting (correctly, at the time) that most of my questions weren't of real consequence to Truth. When I tempered, I found a joy in faith that my constant doubt and criticism had not allowed. And now I wonder if I've avoided serious and necessary questions so as to hold that joy. But a false joy is no joy at all. Wisdom allows questions. It allows doubts. I trust that God won't let me fall.

So I never pray salvation for the Real Housewives of New Jersey.

I'm wondering why. Do I pray for the salvation of my friends? I pray for them to know God, to know joy. But never specifically to know Christ, to accept the necessity of His sacrifice.

I feel panic in my heart right now. Because I know the next question. But I don't want to know my answer. If I go forward, I have to accept the danger of collapse. If I quit now in a cutesy, writer-ish way, I can push it all away, and keep my Lambert's and Plus One-induced haze of 9-month anniversary happiness.

(He promised me everything. So much more than tongues, but those as well. It won't be my intelligence, or reasoning that pulls it all together, but His grace. And he promised it all.)

The questions are, do I believe that accepting our sinfulness, and His sacrifice is necessary to real life? To eternal life? For everyone? At all times?

In the answer to those questions lies the bent of my prayers. If I understood those things more wholly than I do at this moment, my prayer life would change. My life would change. I've been avoiding the questions, to stave off the change.

But even as I ask them, I know the answers. In one sense, I've known the answers. I accepted the truth of my sinfulness, and Christ's atonement some time ago. And in the abstract, I accepted that as true for all, at all. But I live so thoroughly in a world that rejects those truths, that I've compartmentalized, so as not to consider the spiritual lives and fates of the people who surround me.

I've been more comfortable saying, "I don't know what will happen to that person," than saying, "She will spend eternity separated from God." I've been afraid of the seeming judgmentalism, while missing this truth: That from Christ's greatest act of love comes my ability to love others, but that apart from Him, my love is futile. After all, what does it mean to say, "I stand for loving all," if ultimately, my love speaks of something earthly, leaving those on whom it falls still firmly planted on the ground?

Father, let always my love send hearts up to you. Let me walk in wisdom and incredible compassion for those I meet, while always remembering that love separated from Your truths isn't love at all.

As for the housewives, Father, let them fall to You. Let them give up everything to love You. Let them accept their sin, and Your love, in one breath, with one mind, madly taken by Your grace.

a praising soul.

Some days, it's like living a fairy tale.

I look up in a crowded room, and, amidst the voices rising, mingling, with the joy and laughter and love...I stop for a moment, and feel. My heart smiles, sometimes my lips smile, and I thank God with every part of me that though I don't understand it, and though I was nervous, and though I feel like I've lost my footing--He knew the whole. He knew this beautiful moment, as He knew the last, and knows the next.

Tonight, surrounded by some of the more amazing people I've known, God smiled on me. I sat in the room, and thought, "Really? But I don't deserve this. Thank you." That is, "Really, God? This is amazing. These people are amazing. I don't understand this. Why would You give all of it to me?" And, "I'm just a girl here for research--a snarky, kind of rambling, sometimes snobby suburbanite. I don't deserve these kinds of moments." And, "Adding one more to many, thank You for this Grace."

I look up, in a crowded room, and wonder if they all see it, too--if they see the unspeakable beauty of our shared lives, or if that joy is mine alone. I pray that I never stop seeing it. That though I'll not be "new" forever, my heart is always new. Always ready to still the moment, pull it close, and smile in my praising soul.

Christ-like cameo.

I can't sleep.

I'm thinking about the people I've met here. Most of them have no idea how they've touched my life, about how I think of them, and some ten-second segment or other of our interaction plays through my mind, reminding me of the great privilege it is to live alongside of them.

As I turn to leave a pastor's office, he says, "I know you want this, Ashley. It's clear where your heart is." Dinner with a mother and son, struggling through a place unknown, but filled with grace and humor. Someone looking through me, calling me out of shock tactics and fakery. A stranger willing to stand, freezing, outside of a coffee shop on the first night we'd met, stepping up to guide me, with incredible compassion.

The moments go on. A moment spent in prayer in a woman's home where prayer sustains. Another in an early-morning email from yet another stranger. On and on.

Makes me wonder about my own ten-second cameos?

I live a divided life. Christianity is so unpopular in academia, and my church so misconstrued in my peer group, that I am usually pretty quiet about all of it. Only those closest to me know that I go to church, and even they don't know how seriously I regard spiritual issues. That's such a pansy way of saying it. Even they don't know how much I love God, and what it means to me that Christ died for me.

I'm afraid that my moments in the minds of others are less than uplifting, less than insightful.

I pray for a couple of things consistently--the first is wisdom. The second is that His great and unfathomable love would settle inside of me, such that it spills out around me to anyone I meet.

His love is perfect. I am not. And so I keep trying to make the kinds of cameos that these people have made in me.

sold out.

Today, I am bowled over by His goodness.

I'm on a roll this week, with the thankfulness, because Sunday marks nine months to the day I first walked into James River. So, more often than usual, I've been thinking about what has happened since last August.

I've been thinking about how I moved to this town in which I'd spent a total of 2 or 3 hours, knowing no one, without expectation, and wondering who I'd become. Thinking about this interesting little faith I had, and how small my god was. About how grateful I am to come to know how big my God is.

Sometimes, throughout the day, I'll be thinking about life, and God, and I'll hear myself saying "Yes, God, You are so good. Thank You." It always reminds me of the gently hissed prayers of those at church, said aloud at times I hadn't been accustomed to hearing prayer aloud.

I realize that this blog has become a little kinder, a little gentler. A lot less...divisive. I struggle with that, because I have strong opinions, and so many of them. I wonder if I've lost my voice, as I've silenced my words.

It has been an interesting journey. At first, I believed strongly that no one should be silent, in or out of the church. Non-Christians need to hear what really happens, so they know it's not an unrealistic faith, and Christians of all stripes need to hash it out so they catch unTruths. Then, I believed that not all things were beneficial to speak or hear--that non-Christians can get hurt in the crossfire, and so much of what is hashed out is inconsequential. Now, I'm a little past that even, as I see Christians getting hurt in disagreements about...nothing, about trash, about the refuse of the church agenda, stuff that doesn't need discussing.

I was thinking about this last night as I spotted across the sanctuary a friend of mine who feels a little burned by church. He disagrees with some things the church does, and feels let down by the faith of those around him, and as I eye-stalked him from a few rows back, I wondered, so what's the answer? Given that there is some validity to his concerns, what should he do?

My answer to that question comes at some discomfort to me. I've been thinking about his problem, and the part that makes me most sad is the behind-the-scenes discussions that are going on around the issues. I wonder if his discontentedness, and the fact that he has gathered a little support for himself around it, are healthy, and of course, I know neither is. I catch myself thinking something shocking. Though he has a fabulous heart, and an incredible faith, his choice to discuss the issue with anyone beside God, a pastor, and a best friend, is a harmful one to the church.

And this is where I find my friction. I think twice about most everything I post now, and in fact, have a number of never-published posts, because I worry that what I say will harm a church and a God I love. But I still see things I don't agree with--not just in the church, but out in the blogosphere, and the twitter hub. And I think, "Someone needs to say something about that. That's just wrong." But then I get nervous. Can I say that? Should I? What's the best way to to deal with my dissension?

And the answer comes back...live. Live the life you think is right. Show grace to what you think is wrong. Do what attracted you to this church to begin with. You can blog, and talk, and rally all you'd like. About that blogger you think is vicious. Or that megapastor who said some weird stuff. You can even do it "in love", and your voice will be out there, joining the din. But no one is changed by words alone, least of all by critical, unknowledgeable words. Love. Love ferociously.

I do have many, and strong, opinions, but it surprises me that that's not as true as it once was. Or maybe it's true in a different way. The love has softened me. Somehow made me less quick to judge (though I'm still pretty quick). And the overwhelming good I've seen done in this church has caused me to still most of my criticism.

In a sense, I am choosing to push imperfectly forward, past the dissent, because I love this church, and I trust the vision. So I wonder if I've lost my voice, if I have become a follower, or sell-out, and I ask, "If you don't speak out on things, who will?" But then, "If no one does, who cares?"

I am refining my focus. Ultimately, it's not "the church" that suffers when I elevate the trash. It's people. People who need a hand towards God. And at one point, I was one of them (in a greater sense, we are all "one" of them, always). I spoke and wrote as one of them, and that was okay. But at some point, I think it stops being okay. We have to choose more carefully our battles, and change the way we fight them.

It's funny how one Truth changes everything.

stolen by grace.

I'm done. Exhale.

I handed in my last final this morning, emailed a set of summer plans to my professor, and the official end of my first-year of graduate school is here. I am free.

All I can think is-- I moved here for one thing, and got something entirely different. And I am grateful, and I am overwhelmed, and I am...well, I'm changed.

You know in the movies when something fabulous happens, and the girl gets up and spins around and around in such ecstatic joy that you can just see it shimmering off of her? (That does happen in the movies, right?) That's how I feel. Like I could spin around and around, shimmering and glad-hearted, and stolen by grace.

I feel as though I talk too often of how surprised I am to be where I am. Of how startled I am to see this life I have. But I think I like to remember it, because the contrast makes me joyful. I don't look back with melancholy or missing, but because I want to marvel. I want to plop myself down in His love, and say, "Look, Father, You did this, and this, and this, and oh my You, look at what you did with this!"

That's silly, I guess. I sound un-knowing. Fanciful. Naive.

I like it. I have spent a lot of time pretending to be all-knowing, and it had made me cynical. Jaded. I had become afraid (I am afraid) to delight, and to discover. Maybe, of all the gifts He has given me, this is the greatest:

That I would give up the control I never had, and learn at last to trust in the one thing I always had.

glossy God.

My prayers are getting crazy.

I'm rooting back through blog posts, and memories, and...ohhemmgee.

As I write this, I can see a brochure from Dallas Theological Seminary on my table--I was flipping through it this afternoon. I'm kind of scared of it. I'm afraid of glossy God paper. I sort of circle it every couple of days. Then I'll pick it up, by one corner, laugh nervously to break the tension between me and the paper-good, and crack a joke to God, something like "Well, they'd have no idea what hit them. Ha. Ha." Lame, I know. Not really even a joke. More of a truth. The anxiety keeps me from the top of my game.

So the DTS graduate catalogue mocks me.

Yet...why should it? I'm not who I was. And I get the right to change! I have license, and in fact, the greatest justification of all, to be someone new. To want new things, and to live different moments.

I was talking to someone a couple of weeks ago, I can't remember who now, and he was saying that he wanted to be a youth pastor, but felt an apprehension--why would he think he could be that? But then, he pointed out, why couldn't he? And, as I pointed out, if he truly felt a pleasure and "call", his hesitance wasn't only "bad" for him, but dangerous. If that's his plan, he's got things to do. Peoples' lives are marked for him to change. And by shrinking from God's gifts, and His grace, we not only harm ourselves, but others.

Sometimes, people seem to have the idea that God is a warm and fuzzy understand-er of our feelings of inadequacy and fear, and that passing up His directives are a victim-less crime. Neither could be further from the truth. Yes, He loves, and He understands, and He grabs our hands (like Lot!) and pulls us out. But I wonder (I am SO not qualified to be talking about God, really, so take with a grain of salt), if He's not quite so warm and fuzzy about this topic as we think. If at some point, He sees our apprehension for what it is: self-centeredness. And says, "Step. I told you to do it, and I meant it, and I love you, and I'm a wonderful God, but I am also a God to fear, and step. I said step."

I sometimes think that self-centeredness must be a most serious sin to a God whose greatest act of love was a death to self. He gave Himself fully to death for our lives. The very essence of our faith is self-sacrifice. Our unwillingness to give of ourselves must be so painful to Him.

I have found that when I'm afraid, or offended, or apprehensive, it's because I'm thinking too much of me, and not enough of Him, and His other children. That when I say "no" to an impulse or a pull, I lose not only my own growth, but I pain God with a couple of realities. Firstly, that I don't trust Him enough to move. That's a matchless remorse. Secondly, that I don't really care about the plan He has for others, and the role I am to play in those plans.

I know there's some debate around the issue of God's plan for our lives, and the detail with which that plan can be known and acted on, but I do believe that God is an intricate Creator. And though He sees all time, and knows all moments, there's a mystery wherein He lives our moments with us. I don't know how it works, and I don't need to, but I know that when we allow fear or anxiety to derail us from the direction we know to be His, there are victims. The girl who would have read your book, whose life would have been moved towards Christ. The man who needed a pastor who understood where he'd been. The kid who needed someone, just one person, to think the world of him like his Father does. And I'm not saying that God won't still work in those lives. That He can't spin your disobedience into something beautiful, regardless. But there are victims.

You know, we understand this in the physical. We get the math. We know that if we don't step out to support missionaries, they can't go be missionaries. And if we don't give of our money to support kids in Haiti, they will starve to death. But there's something seemingly less tangible about His will, and His way with regards to our personal call.

In a sense, our fear is our sin. We've been given a promise. When we live outside of that promise, we mess up His will. We lose our way.

I don't know what to do about that DTS brochure. It is a Will? It is a whim?

I'm praying for it. Praying for seminary along with all the other crazy, funky things I've found myself praying for recently.

late-night nothings.

Life is sensational.

Fabulous, and phenomenal.

Sometimes, when I wake up in the morning, I think "Who am I?" And not as in, "Who am I today--a student, or a seeker, or a solitary thinker?" But, "Who am I to rate another day? Who am I that I should wake up, and breath, and live again to praise you?"

Unrelated Secret: I got over my fear. I worshiped, Wednesday, wholly, and in the way I felt my heart leading me. And it was good. I smile, in the remembering.

I don't put a fine point on my worship because I think that outwardly expressive worship is necessary. But because when I feel an impulse to worship, and I deny it out of fear of judgment, or seeming "silly," it's as though I'm denying God. So I've asked myself, "Ash, if you won't submit to God here in front of these people in a way so simple, will you follow the way He leads your heart in matters much larger?" That is, if I want to lift my arms to him in submission and praise, but refuse to do so in front of others, what else will I keep from Him?

Not good. But We're moving in the right direction.

Thursday night. Unbelievable prayer lesson: be silent. Not my strong suit. I was finishing up some writing, about to head, and I just felt that I needed to put down the papers, turn down the lights, and meet Him. So I did. Sometimes, I think I'm not really great at prayer, because I don't understand it. I end up just sort of.. chatting, with God. I have needs, and I bring those, but I feel funny asking for specifics. God's gonna do what God's gonna do. I guess. I don't know. So my prayers are kind of like, "Well, Father, I'm really worried about this, and You know how I'd like it to end, but I trust in however You're gonna play this thing, so..."

I get an 'F' for pious prayer.

There was something different on Thursday, though. I felt the stilling of my needful prayer, and instead found myself seeking just to be. To be with Him. My lips fell silent, but my heart spoke. Does that make sense? And in that moment, I understood the reality of God as I never have.

Sometimes, I think that I create god. I've written here before about the distinction I make between my created god, and the Creator God. And at times, I wonder if when I pray, or chat, or be, I am directing that energy towards something fabricated, something unreal. I wonder how I connect with God. But Thursday, He became real. The room changed. The air moved. The world shifted. Something happened.

God showed Himself to me in a way He had not. And that comes with joy. And with fear. And with responsibility.

I am debating whether to write these next lines. If you're reading them, you know the verdict. As We were together, I felt a distinct question. He was asking me, "Will you pray in my spirit?" Now, if you've read this blog before, you probably know that I am somewhat apprehensive about tongues. I am. It's true. Not something I grew up with. Still a little sensational. Definitely an anxious topic for me. But I felt the question, and I understood the request, and I opened up my heart to Him. And, though, I did not in fact, receive that gift, I felt a promise.

I don't know how I feel about that. I don't know that I think it's important to pray in the spirit. I'm not sure that a promise is necessary. But regardless, He gave me one. It was as though He was saying, "If you continue to open your heart, I will bring much more than tongues, but those as well." And I felt calm. Not worried, not anxious, not scared, or apprehensive, or self-conscious, or even desperate.

I don't think the promise is specific, though. So, if you continue to open your heart to Him, He will bring you much more than tongues. Those too.

the magnificent mundane.

I am supposed to be writing a 19-page paper. It's due tomorrow morning, 9:30 sharp. I have one page, and I am too bored to continue. Seriously. I am bored by 95% of my homework. Because it's boring. When I teach, nothing will be boring. Every minute will be awesome and action-packed--even that one minute between the last note, and the end of the class, where everybody's looking at their watches, like, "Is this teach about to wrap it up? Because I could use a cola..." Yeah, even that minute will be exciting. Kids will linger in their seats, just hoping that I'll start teaching again. There will be general sadness when I end the lecture, like when Lindell cues the band during his closing statements on Wednesdays.

And then I'll wake up.

I've been thinking lately about the notion that I was deposited into this boredom purposely. God chose southern Missouri as the cradle of my faith (oh, I did just say that). He chose this place, and these people, for me. I was worrying about whether I'd go at grad school in "Party Mode 2.0," and He was chuckling. He knew. He knew I'd be changed by the Love. He knew I'd say yes. He knew I'd falter. He knew I'd see. That's radical.

And I need to honor it.

I wrote earlier this week about how I have a tendency to separate the physical from the spiritual, and thus, miss some of the joy of knowing Him. I think there's another danger in that separation, and it is missing the responsibility of the mundane.

God is great, and awesome, and I take joy in knowing Him. He brought me to southern Missouri to find Him. And I have taken that call gladly, if tumultuously. But there's a second call. I was brought here, and given opportunities to advance myself academically and professionally, and in those are calls to glorify Him.

I'd be a fool, I'm being a fool, in treating them lightly. In separating myself from them, as though patting them atop their metaphorical heads, saying "There, there, you're unimportant in comparison to my spiritual life, and that's in order." Though it's true--they are unimportant in comparison to the spiritual realities--they are not unimportant.

Obedience is complex, and I think far greater than simply checking all the boxes off. Prayer--done. Bible--done. Church--done. Refraining from all inappropriate Obama references in small group--done. He is sovereign, and He is great, and if my life is not an accident, then my circumstances are not accidents, and my obedience becomes complete in my dedication to the life in which He has placed me.

I love Him less fully when I blow off the tasks He has given me?

Paper time.

gave me a revelation.

This blog has an unpublished sister, started over a year ago. I don't often look back through those entries, but I did this afternoon, struck by how marked my life has been by God. I wrote this entry, entitled "Give me a Revelation," last July, a couple of weeks before moving to southern Missouri. At the time, I was passionate about the example and spirit of Christ, as I had been for some time, but didn't believe in the necessity, or the power, of a savior. I didn't see a life dedicated to God in any real sense, and I was worried about falling back into the more negative activities of my college existence. But He knew me. I read this, and I think, clearly--He knew me.


I like to imagine what my life will be like. Both in a big sense (will I become a chic-ish city-dweller with my writer husband and throw wicked pretentious parties? or, more likely, buy a one-hundred year old house and fill it with eclectic objects and people?), and in a smaller sense (next year, will I hang out with the Christian group, or the scientists?).

Right now, as I face the reality of moving on from my home, and my past, towards the next phase of my life, I have plenty to ponder.

What will my life be like? Will I be the same bouncy, outgoing me? How do I be a 24-year-old who has lived so much amidst a sea of 25,000 undergraduates? Will I party? Will I make friends? How will I live my faith? Will I find someone I'd like to date? Some day, will I live my faith through my marriage? Will we pray together? Will I ever start quilting? How will I spend my Friday nights? In which direction do I want to go?

I feel so solidly me. My greatest wish is to find others who have similarly found themselves. The truth is that I know what I want. Those questions aren't so big. I want to work hard, to do well in my research. To have fun with a group of friends who share at least some of my values. To meet someone with whom a bond can be made that ripples out into this crazy world. To find a church that we can give to. To get my Ph.D. and always learn. To teach. To find my favorite Thai restaurant. To buy an old house, and spend Saturday afternoons with my husband, jointly flubbing its repairs. To have and adopt some kids to chase around this house, filled with books, and handmade quilts, and hardwood, and bold colors. To fill the house with knowledge, music, and people. To spend many a night around the kitchen table with those we love, talking about life, and God, and how both are good, in the end. To love so much that loss is overwhelmingly painful, and in that pain to find our love all over again. To live fully in the Lord, not as an individual because I don't believe that's possible in marriage, but as two become one, in His spirit.

I'm not sure that any of that is God's will. I pray often that it is. I feel sometimes as though He doesn't really understand how important all of that is to me. I beg him not to choose for me a solitary life, or anything that involves moving to where there are lots of spiders and snakes. Silly requests, I guess, in the big picture. Sillier still if you don't believe that God has plans for us.

ecstatically statistical.

I once read a psych study about how no matter how happy you thought something would make you, and without regard to promises of how you'd be "happy forever just as soon as" you had this or that, you've got three days.

Three days of joy.

After three days, your happiness fades, and you live again to wait, and expect, and worry, and exhale, and rejoice, or cry.

I'm thinking about this because last week, I was made joyful. I had been waiting for weeks, months really, to hear about a teaching position. Then, bam, it's mine. I am teaching undergraduate statistics at MSU next year. I love to teach. I mean, I LOVE to teach. And I get to plan every corner of the class--the syllabus, the lectures, the assignments, the tests. All mine. Those kids have never had so much fun.

So, I was happy. I am happy. But within a day or so of the decision, life crowded in. I went back to worrying about the other big issues still up in the air. I tried to remind myself, "Ash, you just got what you've been waiting for months to get--who cares about this other stuff??" But I thought, "Yeah, well...as soon as this next thing gets cleared up, it'll all be good."

Wrong. Wroooooong.

I worry that that kind of thinking does something funky to my understanding of, and relationship with, God. I'm afraid that I sometimes live a life divorced from the reality of God as the provider. That I think of my spiritual life, and my physical life as separate entities. They're not.

I can't live as though true peace is around the next bend. He's the peace, and He's always here.

Though it pains me to say it, psychologists can be wrong. With regards to happiness, they should be wrong. My joy in Him is greater than three days can contain. I pray for the wisdom, and heart to live in that joy.