Give Me Faith

This past week has been, arguably, one of the hardest that I’ve yet endured in my 23 years. The why’s of it or the how’s of it are not important to the rest of what I have to say, so please take that opening for what it is and then read on to what I’ve come to realize in light of that statement. In the past week I went from a very positive attitude, to a very dark place, to today... where I’m not really sure what I am. But I do know that the faith that I thought I so strongly had is actually not very strong at all.

I helped to lead worship at Trinity CRC today and have been doing so for many years. But over the last couple of months, since hiring a new worship leader, Adam, I’ve been noticing some things. Whenever it is my turn to be upfront helping to lead, Adam and I have been having conversations during the service about what worship is, where Adam and other leadership hope Trinity is going and how we worship can really move and guide things in a particular direction; for example, if we appear bored with worship then that is how, collectively, our worship will appear, but if we not only appear but are genuinely excited with worship then eventually that fire, that excitement for worship and Christ will start to appear in all areas of the Church and life, not just in one person but in many.

One of the conversations that Adam and I have had repeatedly is about being intentional. Intentional in worship, in faith, in prayer. Not just being intentional in the songs that are chosen to sing, or the liturgy that is read, or the sermons that are given. But being intentional about moving from an individualistic style of worship to a corporate style of worship. Where coming to church isn’t only for the purpose of being filled for yourself and then walking out the door until next week; but coming to church, after a whole week of hopefully living for and with Christ, and worshipping our God in a Spirit-filled way. Where we set aside our inhibitions, our complaints, our nitpicky ideas of what Church ‘ought to be’ and we get dirty, we dig deep, we talk about what is hurting us, we turn to the church for help and we ultimately celebrate the hope that is Christ, the hope that we find in Christ, the hope that, as a church, we should be shouting to everyone around us. Because isn’t that what being an intentional Christian is? Isn’t that what we want to be? A body of believers who cannot keep inside the hope of the eternal King but be so excited about the assurance we have that all we can do is proclaim it to the world around us?

This week has been one of the hardest of my life. There were moments when I wanted to pray but had no words. Where I wanted to worship but my heart was too broken. Where I finally came to the realization, that while there will be times in life that praying is too hard to do alone and I need warriors to surround me, that my faith was even weaker than that. I was too weak in my faith and in my prayer and in my trust that I didn’t know what direction was up. It’s been the last few months of conversation with Adam and the happenings of this week that led me to today.

Today I made the decision that I don’t ever want to go through a week like this one again without doing something about my faith and my relationship with Christ. I want to be an intentional Christian. I want to be an intentional disciple of Christ. No longer am I going to sit back and care what people in the Church think of the way I worship. I’m not going to not speak the truth of Christ because I’m afraid that someone will think I’m strange. I want to be excited for Christ. I want to have and feel emotion when I worship, especially if it’s after a week like this one where I’ve been drained by the world, that I come to worship and am filled again with hope of the eternal King, where I am rejuvenated and challenged. I want to be an example to others that worship is good, worship is exciting, worship is intentional, and worship is completely and wholly about bringing praise to God. I want to be an example in my Church that demonstrates that showing emotion and showing that you have a desire to be there is not irreverent or silly or not being serious but that it’s healthy and necessary for the church to grow and multiple. Because that’s where it starts. With one or two or three people saying that they want to be intentional for Christ and then change begins to happen in how they respond to life and events and suddenly there are more and more people catching the contagious fire of being in love with Christ.

When we are before the throne of God in Heaven I imagine dancing, and shouting, and singing, and praying, and laughter and joy. I do not picture a bored congregation of people, singing only because the words are on the screen, not daring to celebrate the God we serve because someone might judge us. I deeply pray that intentional living, intentional worship and intentional discipleship will be something that we see happening everywhere, a contagious fire for a God that is already so deeply on fire for us.

So this was a tough week, but what I’m learning and realizing through worship and through God’s spirit in me is that it’s good to have my eyes opened to the weakness of my faith, that I can do something about it, that I’m OKAY, that I will get through even this because God is good.

“Give me faith to trust what You say. That You're good, and Your love is great. All I am, I surrender.”

Give Me Faith by Elevation Worship:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_Voi3JM8ZA&feature=kp

Coming to a Close

"Coming to a Close" (the heading of this post) and "Unfinished Business" (the title of the blog) seem to be in contradiction with each other, don't they? So many things are coming to end: the end of school, the end of being able to call myself a student, the end of two jobs that have continuously blessed me, the end of seeing friends each day, and the end of  what has been a consecutive 18 or 19 years of education.

But while so much seems to be coming to a fast close, there are also things that are beginning! (unfinished business, ya know?)

• While I am no longer a student in the formal sense, I am still a learner.

• While I am ending jobs that I have loved, I am also beginning new opportunities in areas that will hopefully enhance what I have learned in the classroom. 

• While I wont get to see friends everyday, I will have more time to strengthen the friendships that I hold dear to my heart

• and while my education is ending, I now have the chance to start using what I have learned in the work place.

There is also another very noteworthy new beginning... When I started this blog back in January (how has it been 4 months already?!) I was 4.5 months away from being a married woman. I am now a mere 37 days away from hearing those wedding bells chime and walking down the aisle to marry the greatest man I know. Out of all of the new beginnings that I am going to experience in the next couple of weeks, this is the one I most anticipate.

Life is good. I am blessed. I am graduating. I am done. I am beginning new things. I have options. I have freedom. I have opportunities. the world is mine to explore, experience and influence. I cannot wait to see where God is going to lead me.

(and while school is done, this blog is not! stay tuned in the next weeks and months for updates about jobs, wedding plans and any random pieces of information I might want to share :))

But for now, that's all folks. Have a blessed day.

Silent Retreat

In Revelation chapter 8 verse 1 we read, "When he opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour." 

Close your eyes for five minutes. 300 seconds. Turn off your music. Turn off the TV. Close your books, your homework. Put down your phone, set aside that email that needs to be written. And just sit. For 300 seconds. In silence.

Five minutes doesn't seem like too much time in the scheme of things. But silence is something that unnerves us. We live in a world that "stop"  isn't a word in our vocabulary, where sitting with others in a room, not talking, is uncomfortable; and where reflection and times of silent confession causes nervous laughter, coughing and shuffling as we try as hard as we can to sit still.

So imagine what it might have been like to sit in silence for a half an hour, in heaven no less. Our view and ideas of heaven always include singing praises, worshiping and joyfully participating in fellowship with our brothers and sisters in Christ, but never do we really imagine silence. But there it was, Jesus, the Lamb who was slain, was opening the seven seals that would soon deliver consequences to the earthly kingdom. All the attention, all eyes were focused on the Son of God. I can only speculate what happened in that moment, can only wonder what they felt as they silently focused completely on Jesus. 

For class we were encouraged to take 3 hours. Yes 3 hours. to sit in silence with God. To put down our phones, set aside our computers, turn off our TVs and sit with God. We were encouraged to read our Bible, to spend time in prayer and to contemplate on how God is trying to speak to us.

I will be the first to admit that my reaction to this assignment was not a positive one. It was more of a "really, when do you think I have 3 consecutive hours to give to sit in silence? I already find myself needing extra hours in the day to get things done." But there was something about the way that Professor Hoogeboom talked about this Silent Retreat of sorts that intrigued me, enough to give it a try.

Participating in my own Silent Retreat was something that I had to really be active about having happen. I decided that the best way for me to be able to spend 3 hours with God, without doing anything else, was to get up early before class and work one day and so that is what I did. I wish that I could say it was the best 3 hours of my week, that it was a time of enlightenment in my relationship with God, but I can't. Don't get me wrong, it was a blessing, but it was frustrating before it was a blessing. I am not used to sitting still, to being quiet and I am certainly not used to doing those things while not being busy with something else at the same time. 

I walked away from that time with an understanding of the importance of spending time with God while limiting the distractions around me; and I think that if I practiced this habit, this practice more often, it would get easier and not only easier but it would be something that I would want to do, not something that I did only because I was assigned it. That is my hope for the future.

I challenge you. Try spending a half hour in silence with God. If you have time for it, spend an hour or two. Read your Bible, pray, meditate and revel in the love and awe that comes from being in the presence of God.

Psalm 23

My professor for this Spiritual Formation class gave us an assignment this week to read and pray a psalm. Throughout the semester, before we begin each class, the prof opens our time together by reading a specific verse, or passage, prays that passage and then asks us to spend a few minutes contemplating how it speaks to us in that moment.

It didn't take me much time to know what Psalm I wanted to use for this blog. It is a very well known Psalm, one that is read in many different situations. So here it is:

Psalm 23

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.

He makes me lie down in green pastures,

he leads me beside quiet waters,

he restores my soul.

He guides me along paths of righteousness

for his name's sake.

Even though I walk

through the valley of the shadow of death

I will fear no evil,

for you are with me;

your rod and staff

they comfort me.

You prepare a table before me

in the presence of my enemies.

You anoint my head with oil; 

my cup overflows

Surely your love and mercy will follow me

all the days of my life,

and I will dwell in the house of the Lord

forever.

I choose this Psalm because there have been many instances where I have had to lean so heavily on the promise that God, as our shepherd, would lead me through each circumstance that I was facing. I love the reminder that David gives us through this writing and find it so comforting to be able to relate to a person in Biblical times and know that not only does it apply to me but it has applied to people throughout the ages as well; in other words, it never loses its relevance. 

What we can take away from this Psalm is that God is faithful and will remain faithful to his people. He restores us, gives us strength, and leads us through the darkest valleys. 

Over this past semester, in class, we have had small groups meeting together each Thursday morning. In these groups we have been doing short Bible studies and getting to know one another better. What I have already been learning is that we can't know another persons story without getting to know the person, that we can't only look at someones outward appearance and also know what is in their heart. I have really appreciated coming to that realization and knowing that the God who has been faithful to me has also been faithful to so many of my classmates.

Martin Luther

Believe it or not there is more than one guy by the name of Martin Luther in our history! There may have been more, Martin seems like a pretty common name, but these two were famously known, hundreds of years apart. The Martin Luther focused on in this blog was born in 1483 and is one of the most significant figures in the history of the Protestant Reformation. (Reformation Day anyone?)

Luther was born in 1483 and lived to the age of 63 and in those years he studied, taught, and lived out his biblical studies. Luther was very much a theologian and ecclesiastical activist, but beyond that he also had a deep pastoral care and concern for the spirituality of fellow believers of Jesus Christ! Luther was so passionate about this subject that in his writing "The Freedom of a Christian" he emphasizes the critical role of faith in establishing this intimate relationship between Christ and believer.

A small section from that writing says, 

"Faith does not merely mean that the soul realizes that the divine word is full of all grace, free and holy; it also unites the soul with Christ, as a bride is united with her bridegroom. From such a marriage, as St Paul says, it follows that Christ and the soul become one body, so that they hold all things in common, whether for better or worse. "

Julian of Norwich

Today. We finally hear from a female writer. Anyone else feel like this time period and the writing profession was overrun by males? Well probably because females haven't always been so highly regarded as they are today... (ha ha).

Anyways. Julian of Norwich. This is not her real name, some think it might have been Juliana, but no one knows for sure completely. Other things that are unknown are the date of her death, and her birth year, which is only assumed based on her writing that she was "30 in 1373". Interesting, to know so little about someone who's writing is so known.

In the section that we were asked to read today was Julian's take on prayer. I found this to be very interesting because right now this is a topic that is very close to my heart. I'll be the first to admit that my prayer life is not where I would like it to be, and I can guarantee that my Father is also not overly pleased with my lack of dedication as of late. What caught my attention in this reading is how much Julian of Norwich truly desired to have a prayer life that was not just a conversation between her and God, but something that she could experience physically, emotionally, spiritually, mentally.

I don't know a lot of people who desire to embody prayer in the manner that she speaks of, but I do think it is important to be so in love with God that prayer inhabits your life so completely that it becomes a liturgy in your every day life. I pray that I can be like that one day, so on fire for God that my prayer life knows no bounds. 

Francis of Assisi

This week our assignment was to read about Francis of Assisi. I struggled with this blog for a few reasons. 

First. His name. Assisi. How do you even begin to know how to pronounce that. Staring at the word right now I can come up with at least 3 different ways of sounding it out. Ass-is-i. As-si-si. A-ssi-si. It's a mystery to me, probably  not as hard as I'm making it out to be. But that's besides that point.

Second. What we read about was the Canticle of the Sun which is an affirmation of a positive attitude toward the creation, which is typical of Franciscan spirituality. Why is this a problem you ask? Well let me share with you a small section of this canticle.

Be praised, my Lord, by brother wind

and by air and cloud and sky and every weather

through whom you give life to all your creatures.

Be praised, my Lord, by sister water

for she is useful and humble and precious and chaste

Be praised by brother fire

by him we are lightened at night

and he is fair and cheerful and sturdy and strong.

Alright, so some might be thinking. Just sounds like a poetic choice of words to describe his feelings towards creation. But, seriously. What does that even mean. To me, as I read this with my "reformed theology way of thinking", I notice Francis of Assisi making a connection between natural creation and human creatures themselves. What I think we need to be careful about is the notion of placing too much value on creation in regards to comparing it to living creatures. Creation, as stated in the beginning, was something to be loved and to be cared for but not something that is to be put on the same level as the human creature.

Anyway, just some confused thoughts and ramblings as I try to make sense out of what I just read. If you have any ideas. Please don't hold back. :)