Most nights, I bring a little bit of work home with me. My principal advised me to only take home what I can realistically accomplish. My rule: take what you can carry. My principal says that if you take more than you can actually do, you're carrying more than papers and tests. You physically carry your guilt.
Tonight I brought home a few notebooks and some quizzes about inhalants. They're all graded and done. I'll carry them back to the classroom tomorrow morning and probably never think about them again.
Life isn't always so clean.
This evening, waiting for the youth meeting to begin at Island Lake, I realized how much tension I was physically carrying in my shoulders. I felt compelled to prepare my heart for the night's gathering, knowing the topic would be "Worship God with your Heart." My heart needed to be right with my Maker. My devotion needed to be pure. My arms needed to be emptied, not carrying anything.
So, what do I do when I need to solve big problems in life? I stopped at Starbucks, then went for a walk in the woods. It helps me pray.
It's almost been a year since my heart was broken for the first time, and I'm still carrying around a lot of the pain. My body holds onto the burden, unsure when it will be safe to let go. It's almost like an addiction.
First, I checked out the conditions of the trails around Island Lake camp. In a few weeks I'll be helping with the junior high long distance track team and I'm getting desperate for good running trails near the school. I walked the trails for 20 minutes or so before even saying anything to God. I tried pretty hard to get lost in the woods. I was trying really hard to listen, but the only thing I heard was the skaters at the skate park.
Unfortunately, my trail opened into the road to the skate park. I knew where I needed to go next. I knew where I needed to worship.
November 2007, a dear friend showed me the pathway to the cross at Island Lake camp. You have to know where you're going to find it (or be lost behind the archery range, which consequently is a terrible place to be lost). I needed to sit at the foot of the cross tonight.
The foot of the cross is a phrase that I think has been cheapened by '90s Christian music. It's church jargon that people say without really thinking about sometimes. But tonight, sitting on a rock-laying my hands on the foot of the wooden cross in the forest, I surrendered the pain I'd been carrying around each day for the last year.
No amount of crying will heal my heart. No counselor can restore my joy. No medication can improve my contentment. I can't make things better--but Jesus already has. It's how we let go. Every day.
During the message tonight at the youth gathering, the pastor read Psalm 46:10. It's the verse that stalks my life:
"Be still and know that I am God."
It's not trite. It's true.
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
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Ephesians 5
Therefore, be imitators of God as dearly loved children and live in love, just as Christ also loved us and gave himself for us, a sacrificial and fragrant offering to God. But among you there must not be either sexual immorality, impurity of any kind, or greed, as these are not fitting for the saints. Neither should there be vulgar speech, foolish talk, or coarse jesting – all of which are out of character – but rather thanksgiving. For you can be confident of this one thing: that no person who is immoral, impure, or greedy (such a person is an idolater) has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.
Let nobody deceive you with empty words, for because of these things God’s wrath comes on the sons of disobedience. Therefore do not be partakers with them, for you were at one time darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of the light – for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness, and truth – and find out what pleases the Lord. Do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but rather expose them. For the things they do in secret are shameful even to mention. But all things being exposed by the light are made evident. For everything made evident is light, and for this reason it says:
“Awake, O sleeper!
Rise from the dead,
and Christ will shine on you!”
Therefore be very careful how you live – not as unwise but as wise, taking advantage of every opportunity, because the days are evil. For this reason do not be foolish, but be wise by understanding what the Lord’s will is. And do not get drunk with wine, which is debauchery, but be filled by the Spirit, speaking to one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing and making music in your hearts to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for each other in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, and submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.
Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord, because the husband is the head of the wife as also Christ is the head of the church – he himself being the savior of the body. But as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives just as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her to sanctify her by cleansing her with the washing of the water by the word, so that he may present the church to himself as glorious – not having a stain or wrinkle, or any such blemish, but holy and blameless. In the same way husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one has ever hated his own body but he feeds it and takes care of it, just as Christ also does the church, for we are members of his body. For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and will be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. This mystery is great – but I am actually speaking with reference to Christ and the church. Nevertheless, each one of you must also love his own wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.
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