Waiting at a red light

Jonny Lang - Red Light

You sing a song
While sitting at a red light
You think of home
While sitting at a red light
Too slow to roll
Put your life on hold
An open path
With nowhere to go
You start to wonder
While sitting at a red light
You can run a red light
Give up at a red light
You break the mold
When running through the tolls
Speeding through your whole life
A chance to breathe
While sitting at a red light
You look around
Reflecting on your life
A chance to think
Am I drinking too much
Should I keep going
Lose the life that I love
A second glance
When coming to a red light

As I am a big fan of the "Just go" mentality and way of faith, I can't help but notice that God often has to put on the brakes when I try and speed ahead of His plan for me.

Did I mention I'm impatient? My best friend can attest to this. One of the biggest superficial challenges we come up against in our friendship is our differing views of time and/or time management. While I am most definitely a huge procrastinator and lover of the last minute, I get things done, for the most part on time. I hate being late, and try my hardest (with usual success) to honor time commitments. At the same time I don't like to schedule things too far in advance because I want to keep myself available for last minute changes... I'm full of contradictions, I know this. My friend on the other hand is quite the opposite, and it causes me more strife than it causes her. I'm honestly little bias but we love each other and we work around our time management views (most of the time). But back to the whole lack of patience thing...

Every city or town has that one intersection... you know, the one that always seems to turn red when you near it? And the traffic gods have decided that your car would be the unlucky one to sit all by it's lonesome and endure the endless minutes until you have paid penance for running the yellow the past 10 times you've hit that intersection or perhaps it's payment for not quite stopping at the last stop sign. It's inevitable that Murphy's Law and Karma have their role in the intersection, and your friends have even admitted to the strange coincidence of the light and their driving transgressions. Ok, so maybe you don't have one of those intersections, and maybe you're thinking I'm trying too hard on this illustration... but I promise you, if you're ever in Daly City, CA there's an intersection on John Daly Blvd. that I'm making these statements upon. Ok, I'll get on with it (as you can tell I'm having difficulty staying focused)!

Since I won't have a job when I get back to the Bay Area in August, I'm starting the preliminary browsing of job search engines (idealist, craigslist, and a few ministry focused engines). This process is both exciting and exhausting. Hours of reading job positions, organization's websites, reviews, requirements, doctrinal statements and the like. This process is causing quite a bit of mental anxiety. Questions come up, "Will I be able to find a job I love? Will I be qualified? Will I make enough money in this job, to live in my apartment? Will I have to move?" The list of questions continues. As anxious as I get, I keep testing the job outlook waters. Here is the problem... the jobs that I really want to look into cause the most anxiety! Not the good type of anxiety, but the type that causes me to doubt my abilities, my passions, and ultimately my confidence that God has it under control.

Then it hit me, this morning, maybe I need to have a bit of healing in my life before God can hand me the responsibility of doing what I love to do... cultivating relationships, encouraging others, coming alongside people and loving them the way I think Jesus would have wanted me to. I'm a little aggravated that God allows this anxiety to come over me when I think about these things, but I need to let my present relational wounds heal and past emotional scar tissue be broken down again. As with all things, I'm just ready to move on and God's telling me to slow down and wait for a bit. So now I'm stuck at this red light that has no one else around and the only thing keeping me there is sense that God is asking me. No one will catch me if I run through it, but I'll probably feel guilty about it later. So for now I will sit at my red light and consider it as some down time to regain my confidence in God and myself.

Ready, set, go! No really, GO!

"If we wait for the moment when everything, absolutely everything, is ready, we shall never begin."

- Ivan Turgenev, novelist, poet, playwright


I could probably write in metaphors for ages (as some of you know this first hand), or you know, I could just forget wandering aimlessly around the proverbial bush and get staight to the point. Like how I did that??

I find myself, and a lot of the people I know waiting for the right moment. Just waiting, thinking that it will come, that God will provide the exact moment that He wants us to get off of our butt and do something with our lives. Be it, making a career change, writing that paper for class that you were given an undefined extension on, quiting a bad and/or unhealthy habit, having a tough conversation with a friend or loved one, losing weight, the list could go on forever- I think we all have something to make a move on. Some of us are so concerned about waiting for the perfect moment that we forget to actually move. We live in hindsight, thinking, "Oh, maybe that moment, just there, that passed me, was the moment I was supposed to do something. Well, next time I guess."

I can't help but think we only get so many of those "next times" before we completely change the path of life that we're on. This is probably where that whole freewill issue comes into play, and the "plans that God has for us," which many Christians bring up in their conversations when we think about the choices we've made, and those we will have to make in the future.

See the thing is, trusting God or simply making tough decisions (about things we want to do, or about things we don't) has much more to do with faith. No matter what you believe in, or how you believe, the idea of faith is pretty universal. It's the hope that what ever you're doing, or who ever you believe in is true and right, and some how things will turn out ok. Sometimes making decisions doesn't mean waiting for the "perfect timing" ... that one moment where everything seems to line up. Maybe just maybe it's more about mustering up the faith, gumption, or grabbing onto that tiny thread of hope, and jumping. You may not be ready for it, the people around you may not be expecting it, but the changes that come with whatever you had to do or say, are probably worth the moment of fear that comes with doing it.

With that said, if for any reason, you are waiting for the right moment to do or say something... I challenge you to just Go.

(cross posted from facebook and other such social networking facets)

Changing it up - work, church, summer and beyond

crossposted from my facebook, so it's a little more filtered (so to speak) than this blog tends to be (different audience I suppose).

Hmmm... how do I start this? (I guess I just did...)

So yes, I'm going to be out of town for a couple of months. Why, you ask?

Well, I'm making a few changes in my life. I realized about a month or so ago that where I am is not where I want to be. While I've been where I am for a reason - work, church, and such - I've been struggling with the ever present issue of where does God want me to be? What does God want to do in my life?

Without getting into the nitty gritty of that struggle, I came to realize that while I have been doing what God wanted me to do in my current location and situations, He has been asking me to make a change. You see the thing is, I like the idea of security and stability... alas, not as much as I like the idea of being who I am and most of all what God has in store for me.

With that said, a friend of mine asked me, "What do YOU want to do?" A week later, and kind of out of the blue, and replied "Michigan." Two summers ago I worked at a camp with a team of amazing people. I don't know how to explain it, but it was the most "me" I'd felt in a long time. Long days, short nights, craziness and the sorts.

Thing is making a choice to go back to Michigan for the summer meant leaving my job. So, I'm leaving my job with The Salvation Army, to go back to camp for one more summer (well it's a Salvation Army camp, but different area... it's hard to explain). With this said, I don't know what happens after. I intend on coming back to San Francisco (I'm keeping my apartment), but I don't have a job... there goes that whole idea of security and stability, at least for now.

As far as church, I made the decision to leave my current church and look for a new one. It was a very difficult decision, but through it I am learning a lot about self worth, ministry, and grace. I'm thankful I don't really have to make a commitment until I get back to the city, so it's nice to take my time and enjoy other people's services and find a place where I fit well with the community and leadership. *On a side note to that, if anyone has any church ideas, please let me know.*

So the plan as it stands...
My last day at work is May 16th. May 17th I head out to Michigan by way of Interstate 80... with my mom. I'll be in Michigan by the 22nd and at camp on the 23rd. Camp officially starts (well orientation) on June 1st and closes August 2nd. I'm guessing I'll be back in San Francisco mid August, as I would like to take a little more time in driving back... check out some sights... enjoy the peace. After that... who knows.

say what you need to say

Say by John Mayer

Take all of your wasted honor.
Every little past frustration.
Take all of your so called problems,
Better put 'em in quotations.
Say what you need to say (x8)
Walkin' like a one man army,
Fightin' with the shadows in your head.
Livin' up the same old moment
Knowin' you'd be better off instead
If you could only...Say what you need to say (x8)
Have no fear for givin' in.
Have no fear for giving over
You better know that in the end
It's better to say too much,
than never to say what you need to say again
.Even if your hands are shaking,And your faith is broken.
Even as the eyes are closin',
Do it with a heart wide open.(Wide Heart)
Say what you need to...Say what you need to say.

Somewhere along the line we're told or we learn by example that talking about what's going on in our lives or speaking up for a friend or loved or even for ourselves, is a bad idea. It brings up that big "V" word... vulnerability. Suddenly, by saying something, we open ourselves up to the mercy of others. Unfortunatly for most of us, or at least my peers and the people I come into contact with, the times that we have been vulnerable, we don't get the response we had hoped for. If we're reaching out for help, we get pushed away, or told we're not worth it, or that we don't need help. If we're letting someone know how we feel about a person (especially in a romantic situation), we run the risk of not having those feelings recipricated (in not so pretty terms, we get denied, shot down, etc). In short, when we open ourselves up to another we run the risk of being hurt. If it doesn't go well the first few times, we start to build up walls and become less inclined to "say what we need to say."

Over the past few weeks I've realized that I haven't really been saying what I need to say. I've had a pretty tough few months. Like most if not all recent college graduates, I'm still trying to figure out what on Earth I want to do with my life. This past year has lead me through many "growing expereinces," and in the past month I have made the choice to change my job, my church, and temporarily my location. Call it my quarterlife crisis if you want, but I have had to do some serious life inventory and spring cleaning. I'm absolutely petrified, and like a good Christian, I'm struggling through by being completely inconsistant in my prayer life, grumpy about going to church, and basically wallowing in my fear. Ok, so maybe I'm being a little mellow dramatic about it, but honestly I'm freaking out about all the change I've just thrown upon myself. However, through all these changes I'm finding my voice again. I'm learning how to speak up for myself, and the people around me. I'm facing conflict, and to be honest I might be stirring up a few people's lives by being honest about the hardships I've faced, but I'm saying what I need to say. I'm doing what I think I need to do, and I'm trying to be respectful but honest in the process. So, thank you John Mayer, for yet again putting another song in my soundtrack of life.

Sheep!

My mom has many stories about me when I was little. Most parents do. As I have heard them, some more than others, my mind has warped stories with brief memories and infused them into a hybrid of what I heard and what I could remember. One particular story that I seem to remember whenever a topic near to it comes up, is about sheep and driving.

When I was young, probably two or three, but no older than four, I must have been obsessed with sheep. Perhaps it was just that I was at the age where I was able to point at things and give them names, and sheep was just one of them I had learned that week. Needless to say, my mom has commented (more than once) on a particular drive through the countryside of England, in the "lellow" car. I must have sheep in one of the fields, and in one of those young, excited voices, I screamed " Sheeeeeep! Mummy, sheeeeep!" Apparently I must have scared her sufficiently enough to retell the story, and therefore have it firmly placed in my memory. Little Leya sitting on cushions in the passenger seat of an old "lellow" car screaming at the sheep as we passed by.

Somewhere in my younger Christian years, mid-high school I would guess, I grew fascinated with the idea that we, human beings, are continually referred to as sheep. Dumb, in fact ridiculously stupid animals. I mean, they drown on their backs in the rain, they always want the grass elsewhere (usually on the other side of the fence) even if the grass is better where they are, and they are always prone to wander. They need to be watched over constantly. They cannot defend themselves. And we are referred to as sheep... I can see the resemblance. When Jesus entered the picture (on Earth, that is), he talked some about sheep, and about shepherding. He was after all, referred to as the good shepherd, so it would make sense... even though he was a carpenter by trade... but I digress. One of my favorite parables is about the lost sheep (the beginning of Luke 15). Jesus explains that if one sheep out of a hundred sheep is lost, a good shepherd will leave the 99 to find the one missing one. What's worse leaving one dumb animal by itself or leaving 99 for the sake of the one that probably wandered off? This parable used to confuse me. Why on earth would you put the 99 sheep in danger, for one? You have 99 more! One sheep isn't going to make a huge difference on the amount of wool you're going to get at sheering time. I don't think I ever piped up about my questions in bible study when we talked about this, so it took time for me to realize the significance of it all. Apparently shepherds know their sheep... by name, even. If one goes missing, it's akin to one of my kids at day camp missing. 99 sheep probably aren't going to bolt and their's strength in numbers, even if they aren't the smartest and well equipped animals, but one sheep by itself can get seriously lost and hurt without someone watching over it. Ends started to meet and I was left with the understanding that no matter the number of sheep, or anything special to us, if we care enough about it, we are going to seek out the lost or missing. More over God is going to seek out the lost or missing, not because He isn't concerned about the rest, but because he cares that much about me, or He cares that much about the individual. There are more than 6 billion people roaming this world and He knows us by name, and He cares enough to seek us out.

I don't think I will fully understand the reality of God's compassion.

Great things

I want to do great things. It's hard to sit still, and I don't do it very often, need I say often enough. I'm about to start a job that isn't my dream, and I wonder what God has in store for me. What is he preparing me for? After the earthquake in Peru and the mine mishap in Utah, I wonder. I am drawn to disaster, I am drawn to those who are hurting. It's hard to be where I am, mentally. I am bitter toward those who have so much yet give so little - building their own palaces. Yet I do this personally, not in a million dollar type of way, but with my time and with what money I have, I build an empire of my own, neglecting the Kingdom God has established for me! Why should I be so haughty and proud to believe that I could build something greater than He?
I'm sure some of my friends call me cynical and sarcastic, heck! I call myself those things, but I think they are starting to be more negative influences in my life - in my relationship with God. I struggle to see the church and people represented in a positive light. I doubt any goodness I see in people, and I am unsurprised by the poor decisions other Christians make. I struggle to see the fruit that my life bares when I neglect my prayer time or time reading my Bible. Instead I grab a novel or watch some TV. Each season I convince myself to read a little more, pray a little more, and all in vain as I sit back down to the TV and grab my book of choice. It's not to say that I can't watch TV and I think I might go a little crazy with out a novel in progress. However, my priorities are skewed. It's that constant struggle to keep God first others second, and myself at the end of that line, while not neglecting my personal sanity.