We have a saying around the church office that goes something like: Life begging for structure, not structure begging for life.
We use this phrase when we are facing necessary innovation, struggling to come up with structure as we see the craziness of life that comes with, well, people.
But let’s not dig too deeply into that.
The whole point is that I’m also seeing moments where life is begging for art. Where profundity sneaks up on us and can only be properly captured and properly framed through art.
Just a few weeks ago, in response to Gitz’ decline, Jen commented: ”I dug out my old prayer book from my Anglican days, and let the most beautifully worded prayers speak the grief and longing of my heart. But I have none of my own.”
In that moment, her heart and emotions begged for art.
Moments like those–the great milemarkers of life and death and growth and memory and significance–need art. They need words and images of beauty to help the soul express what is sitting and stirring and rising inside.
I’m realizing how we, as a people of faith, in our stripped down warehouses of contemporary worship, have lost the beauty and transcendence that those true moments of worship deserve.
And our artists are awkwardly worship and wait in the corners of the sanctuaries, hoping to paint murals on the walls.
Thankfully, they are picking up their paintbrushes. Watch the beauty unfold.
About a year ago my therapist told me to start over.
So I am. I’m taking stock of what I’ve been told. And of what I think I know and think I don’t know. And of what I can stomach.
And I’m starting with “Invisible.”
It’s the only word I’m comfortable with right now. It’s the only word that peaceably integrates my faith and my reality, my outsides and my insides. They can all come and sit at the same love feast of Invisible. And they can get along.
I’m so thankful that Walter Chalmers Smith was brave and honest and poetic in his use of Invisible. He carefully put into our mouths significant words that now roll off faithful tongues without a thought. Oh but we would do well to pause and feel their weight and ask their questions.
We would do well to let Invisible be what It is. Without explanation or footnote or disclaimer.
And we would do well to hold off the buts of “you can’t see the wind, but you can see it’s effects” or the quick go-to of “faith is … being certain of what we do not see.”
I don’t want rationalizations.
I want admittance.
I want to find a brave gray-haired robe-wearing faith-filled Billy-Graham lookalike who will stand here with me in the stillness and quiet and surrender the same confession: “Yeah… I can’t see Him either.“
They sat in my living room last night, all seven of them. And they listened to me as I shared one way I need to grow as we prepare to start this new campus.
Drew gave us that question as our homework last week, and honestly I hadn’t thought it through until sitting there. And, when it was my turn to share, it was all I could do to keep from bawling on the spot.
So, I reminded him that when I got married, I didn’t want to marry a pastor. I just wanted to marry Drew.
And here he is starting this new campus for The Chapel. And I’ve spent the past 4 months saying “This is Drew’s dream. This is Drew’s baby. This is Drew’s project.” And it is. But I think I’ve been using those words as a buffer; as a way for me to separate myself from what it means to be a preacher’s wife.
I’ve been in denial.
And this whole process feels a lot like standing in front of a mirror and finally seeing myself. Or like walking into a party painfully underdressed. And now here we are meeting each week and gearing up spiritually and mentally, and people are calling Drew their pastor and they are our parents’ ages, and I just want to slip out of the room mumbling “I’m not ready. I’m not ready.”
Because I’m not ready.
I’m not even ready for church from Sunday to Sunday right now. And I’m certainly not qualified to be a pastor’s wife. And there’s this tiny curled up part of me that is scared he’s going to figure this out soon and tell me I need to get it together. But I know better. He never will. He knows I don’t like me, either.
But I love him.
And that is my confession. And it is enough. For now.
Do you have anything you need to confess?
We all have them… Those “haunts” that keep us up at night or make our heart pound or make us cringe in guilt after a wrong decision.
And man they get on my nerves.
I want to start getting on their nerves. Yeah. Yeah. I want to fight them in my own life… But, I can’t if I don’t know what they are. Right?
I think that’s the first step in fighting our demons: Find out what they are. Identify them. What’s that proverb (not Biblical, just proverbial)? Know thy enemy; thy enemy is self.
Or something like that. Maybe Sun Tzu and Pogo fell in love and got married and had some sort of quote-baby in my brain. But, you get what I’m saying…
If we don’t know our enemy (which may be within) then we won’t be able to smack it in the face with a wet glove and spit and walk away.
So, I’m out to discover mine. Call them out from hiding. It’s time for them to show their faces (I’m speaking rather figuratively here, y’all. Nobody panic.) I’m on the hunt for those things that just fray me. That wear me down. That tempt me and try me and test me and make me feel weak and weary.
Things like:
That’s a start. And there are more. And some of them may be easier to beat than others. And, you know, some of them just might be around for life. But if I know these “demons” and can see them for what they are, I’ve already begun to strip their power.
So, take that, demons. I acknowledge that you annoy me. And I’m not interested in cooperating.
What are some of your demons? Can you identify one or two? Even in that, you’re stripping their power!
I totally changed my mind on the interaction in this post. You know what I really want to see happen in the comments? Y’all share how you’ve fought particular demons in your own life. There are others who face the same, and could really benefit from your stories.
Feel free to be anonymous, just be sure to change your email: anon@anonymous.com works well.
Thanks y’all!
