Sticks and Stones

This was the alternate post to the last one I posted. I wrote this one first and then decided that putting the same thoughts in story form had more power. I wanted readers to feel the weight of the words and I thought that could be done better in a narrative. I would love to hear thoughts of comparison between the two posts.

"Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me."

Most of us grew up learning this little rhyme, but the problem is it could not be further from true. Words do hurt. They can be as painful and destructive as a machine gun randomly fired into a crowded room.

"You are such a mess."
"You are hopeless."
"You're not good enough."
"I give up on you."
"You are just like...(fill in the blank with any number of hurtful comparisons)"

Words like these stick. They get lodged in a person's psyche, slowly leaking their poison over time. Sometimes they are so loud nothing else can get in as they eat away at self-worth, and confidence, and block out feelings of love and acceptance.

Thankfully, the opposite can also be true. Words can heal. The right word, spoken in the right way and at the right time can be as precise as a surgeon's scalpel.

"You are loved."
"You didn't do anything wrong."
"I believe you."
"You can do it."
"You are a miracle."

These words are sometimes painfully true in the moment they are spoken, especially when spoken into the heart of one who has been poisoned by the opposite. The bad stuff is often easier to believe. However, when we give these positive messages the chance to sink in, when we really allow ourselves to sit and dwell with these things long enough, they become the antidote to the poison. Slowly, over time, we can find healing. It is not a magic formula for healing overnight, but it can happen.

Ultimately, there is one word that is able to heal over all others. The Gospel of John tells us about that Word. It is the Word who was God that became flesh. Jesus, the Incarnate Word came to bring the ultimate healing for forgiveness and abundance. Listen to a few of His words.

"Your sins are forgiven."
"Arise and walk."
"My peace I give to you."
"Come, follow Me."

We have the power to choose the words we abide in and the words that come out of our mouth. Will we choose words of destruction, or words of promise? Will we choose words of pain and hurt, or words of hope and healing? Will we abide in the words of our own flesh, or the Word which became flesh for us? Words are powerful. Choose them wisely.  

Words Have Power

 I do not write a lot of fiction these days. In fact, the last fictional short story I wrote was for Dr. Tony Cartledge's Ministry of Writing class several years ago. It is not that I do not still love to write stories, but simply that I do not often find time and opportunity to craft a good fictional story. I want everything I write to convey important message and meaning for people. The following story is a fictional account, but it is one that, given the number of victims of sexual and physical abuse, could have been played out very similarly in many lives. If you have been touched by abuse in some way, I hope the words of this story are healing to you. Even if you have not been effected personally, I hope that you can learn something from this story. Trigger Warning: Sexual and Physical abuse are discussed in this post.

"You didn't do anything wrong."

The words were almost painful to hear because of their truth. It was even harder to believe. They were as precise as a surgeon's scalpel, penetrating through years of hurtful and abusive words and actions. They were words that, as she would allow herself to dwell in them would allow for healing.

Only one other time had words penetrated so deeply and so accurately into Carlie's painful past. It was in the arms of her husband one night that he uttered the words, "You are loved." Though she knew that Philip had spoken, she felt as though the words came from God directly. It was the first time she ever felt truly loved, truly worthy of love.

Though these words were spoken to a grown woman, married with children of her own, she did not hear them that way. She heard them as a little girl, abused and neglected. The memory that stood out most was when she was nine years old. She told her parents what had happened only to be met by a silent, disapproving glare from her mother. Later she listened as her parents fought over her. Clearly her father believed her, but her mother refused to. She heard her mother call her names that she could not reveal to anyone, or even repeat in her journal. Nevertheless, she did believe the things her mother said. Mothers are supposed to be right after all, and they are supposed to be believed. "I must have done something wrong," she wrote in her journal the next morning after the yelling had stopped. "I brought this on myself and and I really am the whore my mother told my father I am."

Carlie was nine years old on the night she wrote that journal entry, but the abuse began long before that. She was abused sexually by her uncle, physically by her mother, and emotionally by her mother, grandmother, and even her older brothers on occasion who were constantly critical of everything from her appearance to the way she walked and talked. The years of abuse had damaged her self worth, and her ability to feel loved.

When Carlie became a Christian as a young teenager, she thought she had found a way out of the criticism and abuse. The promise of "all things becoming new" meant that she had a chance of escaping the labels that had been put on her. For awhile it helped a little for her to feel better about herself. Eventually she even enrolled in a Christian college where she caught the attention of Phillip, a young man studying to be a pastor. The two were engaged within a year.

When they returned home to share the news, the nightmare began again. Her mother found her alone and began her attack. "What makes you think you're good enough to be a pastor's wife? You are too selfish and spoiled. You'll never be good enough."

Those words would haunt Carlie. They opened the door and brought back all the insecurities and pain from childhood. The physical abuse from her mother and the sexual abuse from her uncle all came flooding back, as did the feelings that it was her fault because of the words which served to constantly tear her down. Words hurt. They can tear into the heart and mind of a person like a machine gun carelessly fired into a crowded room, and they are much more difficult to remove than a stray bullet. They stay lodged in, slowly and steadily leaking their poison into the soul.

Words can also be the antidote, but only when the poisonous words are quieted enough to hear the healing ones. "You are loved," penetrated into the soul of a little girl who felt unlovable. "You didn't do anything wrong," spoke directly to a five year old who could not say "no" to an uncle who was much bigger and stronger than her, and to the eight year old who was slapped around and called names by her mother.

Words have power to wound and to heal. Sometimes we use too many words, and they lose their power. My hope is that this story reminds us all that we are responsible for what comes out of our mouths. We never know what another person has endured. The Bible tells us that, "Out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks." I hope that my mouth overflows with words of healing, restoration, and peace today.  

Steal Your Life Back

Donald Miller posed this question on his twitter yesterday, “How can the suffering you’ve experienced become an unintended blessing? What is good about the pain you’ve known?”

As I read that tweet, I thought, “I could write a blog, no make that a book, on this question.”

The problem is, so often people think the best response to pain is to ignore it, avoid it, bury it, and most importantly hide it from the rest of the world. We all tend to put a show on for the world of our perfect life, hiding our scars, and especially our gaping wounds, as much as possible, whenever possible. We think, “As long as everything looks good from the outside, I can ignore what is happening on the inside and it will just go away.” I am just as guilty of feeling and thinking this way as anyone else out there.

I am learning, however, how crippling and foolish it is to try to bury the painful things in our lives. Keeping our pain secret is like having an infection that could be cured with simple antibiotics, but we refuse to take them. Instead, we let it spread and grow until we cannot bear the symptoms any longer, and by then it is going to take a lot more than a simple pill. It becomes exhausting as it eats us away from the inside out. We end up suffering from even more things we try to hide like anxiety and depression.

When we reveal our wounds, admit our struggles, and drop the charade of perfection, only then can we begin to heal. Do we need to be careful who to reveal our pain to? Of course we do, especially at first, while the wounds are still gaping and the infection is still raging. Healing comes from sharing with those who can offer empathy and understanding, not those who are sympathetic and withdraw.

Once those open wounds begin to heal, they become scars. Our scars are beautiful. They become our strength, and they can be used to strengthen others. Our scars say to others, “You are not alone.” Sympathy says, “Oh, you poor thing, I am so sorry for you. I will never understand.” They say with genuine empathy, “I have been where you are and I know it hurts, but I am with you.”

None of our scars are exactly the same, but all of us have scars. The good comes in using our scars to help others. The good comes in being transparent, real, and authentic. The good comes when we realize that pain is a part of what binds us as humans. The good comes when we remember that God himself took on human flesh, including its pain so that he could understand and empathize with us. The good comes when we realize that by His stripes we are healed, because his scars let us know we have a God who can accept us, scars and all. Is it scary to let others see our scars? Yes. Am I completely there yet? No, but I am working on it, and I am finding my wounds healing and my scars making me stronger, more confident, and more compassionate every day as I walk the journey.

Conforming Corporations or Transforming Lives

I have a confession to make. Since I finished Divinity School I have become a read-a-holic. This new addiction actually started the summer before my final semester of Divinity School, but since completing the final assignment for school it has taken on a new life. I am not only addicted to reading books, some of which I may blog about in another post. I am addicted to following and reading blogs by many of my favorite authors/bloggers including Rachel Held Evans, Donald Miller, Brene Brown just to name a few. I am also addicted to reading articles that many of my friends are posting on Facebook and Twitter and the comments that are often generated by such articles. Today has been a day full of interesting posts.

Two posts in particular, and the debates they generated, caught my attention. Both centered around one of my favorite places to pull through to get a Grande White Chocolate Mocha Frappuccino, you guessed it, Starbucks! The question of the day appears to be, "Should Christians Boycott Starbucks?" and apparently my friends are answering with mixed reviews. Seeing the popularity of this conversation today, I felt compelled to weigh in with my opinion, which I am certain will be met with mixed reviews as well.

I am disturbed by the fact that being right, and believing right has become the most important thing in some Christian circles. I am disturbed by the fact that some Christians feel it is more important to the Kingdom of God to take a political stance, and to make a power play with a company than to reach out and love people. I am disturbed by the fact that we are more concerned with the moral rightness of same-sex marriage than we are with the moral wrongness of childhood sexual and physical abuse. I am concerned because I don't believe any of these things are consistent with Jesus' teachings or the Kingdom of God.

Jesus was never concerned with politics. In fact, when the religious leaders tried to engage him on matters of politics, he replied by saying, "Give to Caeser what is Caeser's and to God what is God's." When the children were brought to him and the disciples tried to send them away, he took them in his arms and blessed them. When he encountered a woman with a questionable past in a land that Jews simply avoided because of prejudice, he offered her love, grace, and life, not condemnation. When Jesus rode in to Jerusalem on Palm Sunday the people wanted him to take his rightful place as king and leader, instead he took the place of a criminal and bore the cross, "despising the shame." Many times Christians want to heap that shame on others, shame that says, "You are not good enough, you will never be good enough." The truth is Jesus is the only one who was good enough, and he hung out with those who were constantly excluded from society.

The Christian life is not about making the world, or the government, or major corporations conform to our standards, morals, or beliefs. The Christian life is about transformation of lives of people who God calls us to. Paul says, "All things are lawful for me, but not all things are profitable." He goes on to say that if anything that we, as mature believers, do causes a weaker brother or sister to stumble, we should not do it. He also takes this one step further, he says if anything we do causes the gospel to be hindered, we should not do it either. If my attitude towards a particular company causes me to not be able to share Christ with the young college student who has to work there because it is the only job she can find, then it is my attitude that needs adjusting. The Gospel is by definition "Good News" but the goodness can be drowned out by our attitudes and actions as Christ's ambassadors. We are called to be servants of the least of these, not leaders of the privileged. Are we about forcing companies to conform or helping lives be transformed?

Beauty for Ashes

My family and I always enjoy interactive museum exhibits. We love hands on activities involving building things, playing with magnets, and even touching animals of all kinds. Such displays make for great opportunities for learning. Once, while exploring a museum in Washington DC, we came across just such a display for hands on learning. The display highlighted American inventions, and one of the things highlighted was synthetic rope verses it's predecessor steal cable. The interactive learning experience showed how the lightweight rope was not only lighter and more pliable than steal, but it was also safer, stronger, and more durable. Steal cable is strong, no doubt, but it is susceptible to developing rust and kinks that weaken the structure, and when it snaps, it is quite dangerous and potentially destructive to anyone or anything that might be nearby.

Have you ever met anyone whose faith is like that steal cable? Their faith appears strong, rigid, and unshakable. They never bend or waiver in what they believe. There is a problem with faith like that. It doesn't stand up to the wear and tear it comes against. Often this type of faith is the kind that has to have an answer for everything. if something bad happens, there must be a reason for it, someone's sin must be to blame. This is the kind of faith the Pharisees had in Jesus' day. There was no room in their faith for someone to say, "You have heard it said...but I say to you..." When they brought a man born blind before Jesus, they asked, "Whose sin is to blame for this?" They had no room in their system of belief for suffering without sin. Faith that appears rigid and unshakable is sometimes so weakened by the kinks and rust that all it takes is one good wind for it to snap, and when it does, it is not easily repaired.

The stronger faith is the one that is more flexible. Like the newer skyscrapers that are built in areas of the world where earthquakes are common, it will sway, but not collapse easily. It is a faith that can allow for difficult things to happen, even when there is no good explanation of why. It is a faith that is okay with the answer, "I don't know, but I still trust in God." Casting Crowns is one of my favorite groups, and they have a song entitled, "Love Them Like Jesus." The song tells the stories of people who find themselves in situations that could be devastating to a person's faith. One of my favorite lines in the song says this, "You don't need the answers to all of life's questions, just show that you love them and stand by their side. Love them like Jesus."

How strong is your faith? Is it strong enough to endure the loss of a loved one? Is it strong enough to not be broken even when your prayers aren't answered the way you want? Is it strong enough to obey God, even when your friends and family question your decisions? Can it absorb the impact of a life-changing 7.0 earthquake, or would it crumble into rubble with a quake half as strong? Do you always have to have an answer? I encourage you during this season of Lent to reflect on the things that could shake our faith. Reflect on the things for which we may not have an answer, and remember that we do not have to explain why the ashes were created. Sometimes we just need to go to the tomb to weep, like Mary and the other women, without hope, without understanding why, only to get there and discover that God has turned the ashes into something beautiful.

The Human Connection

My family and I went to dinner a few nights ago and we were disturbed by something that seems to be becoming a trend in American families. It was like a scene from a bad science fiction movie. You know those movies where the aliens plant some device into the culture that gradually eats away at the higher reasoning of the people, in an effort to take over the world and enslave all humanity...Well, maybe it isn't quite that bad, but sometimes is feels that way.

The restaurant was crowded, being the weekend before Valentine's Day, and like many other parties, we had to wait for a table. As we were waiting, we began to notice others around us. One family in particular caught our attention. It was a family of three, a mom, dad, and son, who were seated on the bench near the door of the restaurant. The reason this family caught our attention was because, unlike the other parties waiting who were noisily chatting away, this family was quiet. They were not talking to each other or to anyone else. The son was on his personal tablet, playing video games, lost In his own world. Mom and dad were no better, lost in their own smart phone worlds, paying no attention to one another.

This prompted me to look around some more. The party sitting on the other side of me were talking together, while at the same time having their eyes glued to the screen of their own mobile devices. I even noticed a couple, clearly on a date sitting alone at a nearby booth, who appeared to be texting rather than talking to the person across the table.

Now I will grant you, I am guilty as well. I occasionally find myself more focused on a screen than another person. In many ways these mobile devices are meant to connect us. They allow us to stay in contact 24 hours a day. Facebook and Twitter even allow us to find and reconnect with old friends who we had long ago lost touch with. However, I am finding myself more and more wondering if the value of such things outweighs the cost.

If the price we are paying is face to face conversation, the smiles and giggles of our children, and the joy, peace, and comfort that can come from actually looking into the eyes of the one we love, is it worth it? I am not saying, or evening implying that we should give up technology all together, but maybe we should think before we mindlessly answer a text or check our Facebook page during dinner. Maybe we need to start being intentional about operating, or even turning off our mobile devices instead of letting them run our lives every minute of every day.

Obeying God, Not Man

As a lifelong Southern Baptist, I was taught certain principles. For example, I was taught unapologetically that faith in Jesus is the only sure way to heaven. I was taught that every believer is responsible to share the love of God with the entire world. I was taught that as a Baptist I was to have a great deal of reverence for the Bible as the inspired Word of God. I was also taught about the priesthood of the believer, a doctrine that says each believer has opportunity to go directly to God for help, has the responsibility of reading, studying, and interpreting scripture, and is commanded to serve in the church and world in the way that God has called and gifted them to do so. I cherish many of the things that Southern Baptists have taught me, and I especially have embraced the passion for missions that is such a rich part of my Southern Baptist heritage.

Unfortunately as a Southern Baptist, I was also taught things that always troubled me because they did not seem to fit with the doctrine of the priesthood of the believer. I hold a very high view of the Bible, but I believe that God used the personalities and experience of the writers, allowing them to choose words that would speak to the people in their own context. However, if my understanding or interpretation of a particlar passage differs from the pastor or Sunday school teacher, or curriculum does that make it misguided and incorrect? Does God's inspiration only apply to the writer of scripture, and not to the reader also? Understanding how only certain people's interpretation of scripture could be correct has been one of my struggles for I find that there is no ONE  way to understand all scripture passages. Instead, I think God speaks through scripture in multiple ways, and the tension and diversity of scripture has power.

When we select only certain stories to be read and leave out other stories or aspects of stories, we are specifically promoting a particular view point. Selective reading does make it easy to create a "biblical" argument for just about anything. For example, a Bible study on the early life of Jesus from Luke's gospel that highlights Simeon and Zacharias but overlooks Anna and Elizabeth makes a statement to girls that their role is unimportant. I find that troubling.

The Bible has been used in this way in many churches, teaching girls that, though they are equal in salvation, they are not equal in the church. Just because I was born female, I could not be called by God in certain tasks. I am not seeking to argue a biblical case even, though I know some of you will want to engage me in such a debate. I could give scripture after scripture and example after example from the Bible to support my beliefs,  and many of you could do the same, but I do not want to debate. Instead, I want to share a personal struggle, and how I have come to terms with it.

For much of my life as a Christian, I have been caught between the person that my imbedded theology told me to be and the person I believe God called me to be. My Southern Baptist heritage has told me that my goal in life should be to glorify God as a wife and mother. I could work with children, sing in the choir, and make a divine casserole dish for homecoming supper. Maybe, once in a while, I could pray in church, or sing a solo. When I showed promise as a writer and better than average skills at studying the Bible, I could be encouraged to write a study for women or lead a youth Sunday School class. Certain things, however, I was not allowed to even consider, including preaching or teaching a mixed group of adults. I most especially should never aspire to be ordained. For years I tried to fit in to this mold. I suffered from severe depression in part because I never experienced peace. I never felt satisfied with the roles I was given.I never found contentment but instead was miserable. So I begged God to help me love my life.

Over the years, I also felt that God had called me and gifted me for something more than what I was allowed to do. As much as I tried to fight it, I knew I wanted to preach. As difficult and nervous as it was for me to speak in public, the Holy Spirit inside me compelled me to want to teach, and much like Jeremiah I felt the Word of God as a fire in my bones. The harder I tried to hold it in the more miserable I became. I also felt a call to do more than preach and teach. I felt a call to reach out to others with the presence of God in the midst of their hurts. Along with all of this, I felt God’s leading of me to be ordained, to be recognized and set apart by the church as having a call from God in my life.

I believe that God can use anybody and can and does call whoever God wills. My job, our job, is not stifle the Holy Spirit, but to live in the call. The road has not been an easy one for me, or for my husband, who is also a called, ordained minister of the gospel, but God has now put us in a place where we can both work out our callings and giftedness.

I have determinded that from this point forward in my life I will not try to fit myself in the mold some would try to place on me of "biblical womanhood." Instead I will celebrate the woman that God called me to be, happy in Jesus as I trust and obey.As of today, I am making the official announcement. In addition to my other titles of wife, mother, daughter, friend, sister, neighbor, I am adding one other: Reverend.