Anthony de Mello. 
Jesuit Priest. 
1931-1987. 
Google him. 
It'll change your life.

One of his thousands of excerpts, which has grabbed me this week:

"A man found an eagle's egg and put it in a nest of a barnyard hen. The eaglet hatched with the brood of chicks and grew up with them. All his life the eagle did what the barnyard chicks did, thinking he was a barnyard chicken. He scratched the earth for worms and insects. He clucked and cackled. And he would thrash his wings and fly a few feet into the air.

Years passed and the eagle grew very old. One day he saw a magnificent bird above him in the cloudless sky. It glided in graceful majesty among the powerful wind currents, with scarcely a beat on his strong golden wings. The old eagle looked up in awe. "Who's that?" he asked. "That's the eagle, the king of the birds," said his neighbour. "He belongs to the sky. We belong to the earth - we're chickens." So the eagle lived and died a chicken, for that's what he thought he was."

If you happen to be in LA for one of these evenings, I'd highly suggest your attendance.  The speakers and topics are monumental.

http://www.biola.edu/spiritualformation/cssc/

I don't mean to pick political sides here, but appreciated all sides of Don Miller's Benediction at the Democratic Convention Monday night.  Here's the verbiage, and if you get a chance his latest blog entry is pretty interesting.  PEACE 

http://www.donaldmillerwords.com/

The past few months have had too many conversations with students, friends and myself regarding the sloppy, unusually destructive world of guy/girl “Christian friendships” (I specify Christian because I’ve not found those choosing otherwise to consider chastity, purity, or “guarding their hearts,” to the degree of we holy rollers).  Granted, it’s different in different life-stages, and done for different reasons, and done differently in different regions (ENOUGH of the plays on words), but at the end of the day, “Christian guy/girl relationships” are still one of the weakest areas of today’s Bridal gallery.

One of my professors calls it “emotional penetration.”  In so many words, it’s the often selfish, almost always self-gratifying, notion of emotionally engaging with a member of the opposite sex, to the degree that you leave, or are left, with a residue of greater longing and gross amounts of heart intimacy, sans any commitment.  It’s as though we rate ourselves as being so caked with purity and self-control physically, that we figure a little emotional icing won’t harm the halo.  Whether it’s talking on the phone till wee hours, or sharing meals five times a week, it’s this idea of “emotionally dating” and kidding yourself that, “I really don’t like him…he’s just a friend!”  (When I ask the person at this point what happens when their “friend” starts dating someone (else), the conversation always turns a lot more intersting.)  It seems like the best of both worlds...you get to be flirty and flamboyant, while avoiding risk and heartbreak, right?  Wrong.  I’ve found these emotionally intimate and penetrating friendships to be even more painful than those where “dating” was owned and commitment had a necessary degree of meaning.

There’s a cauldron of thought and theory and need for more answers here, but for tonight, I'm gonna leave the cauldron open.  Irishman musician, Damien Rice, lyrics this quandary in a deeply meaningful way.  His voice cries loud at the loss of a friend and lover, and his heart cries even louder at the cost of feeling used (by her emotional and physical needs) in her process.  The heart is a delicate vessel—a wellspring of worth and worthy of delicate guarding and deliberate honesty.

We might kiss when we are alone
When nobody's watching
We might take it home
We might make out when nobody's there
It's not that we're scared
It's just that it's delicate

So why do you fill my sorrow
With the words you've borrowed
From the only place you've know
And why do you sing Hallelujah
If it means nothing to you
Why do you sing with me at all?

We might live like never before
When there's nothing to give
Well how can we ask for more
We might make love in some sacred place
The look on your face is delicate

So why do you fill my sorrow
With the words you've borrowed
From the only place you've know
And why do you sing Hallelujah
If it means nothing to you
Why do you sing with me at all?

Trusting Rest

It’s Sunday morning and I’m working, in order to rest tomorrow during a much needed retreat.  The gal across the coffee shop is working, too, and by the spread of her papers and seriousness of her face, she’s been at it for awhile.  I remember a similar context last Sunday, when I returned from an early morning walk and found my retired, single neighbor heavily entrusted in yard work.  

“Wow, you don’t waste any time do ya, Paul?”

“Well, you know, there’s really nothing else to do, so I figured why not start working.”  Busyness has always seemed an obvious deterrent from rest, but this made me remember that boredom is, too.  

I’m spending today in sort-of “planning mode,” looking over my semester and trying to get a handle on these next five months.  Then tomorrow I’ll head on a 48-hour solitude retreat, where I’ll have a Bible, blank pages and probably a lot of wishes that boredom and busyness could find escapes.  Thank God my program requires these 48-hours each semester, or else I’d surely find every excuse against it.  Why is it that the ideas of resting/sabbath/retreat are some of the most overlooked and undervalued vitalities in attempting to follow the Trinity?  Furthermore, how is it that the pathway to God’s Spirit gets so quickly squelched by our own pathways?  Too bad when I try to find a Biblical rationale on this note, I lose.  If I had to represent it, I guess I’d say, “Something of me, or God, or our relationship, has become so solid that I no longer need His (command/gift of) rest.  I’m beyond it, if you will.” 

Somehow my view of God got tainted into this slave-driver of sorts, who only wants me to work until I pass-out, or die (“for His glory,” of course).  Unfortunately, again, however, I’ve not found His Scriptures (or self) to affirm me here.  As a wise spiritual director once said, “Abbie, there’s only room for one person on the Cross.”  Living and dying for God’s sake is an understandable (and often commendable) pursuit, but it can also too quickly become a dangerous one.  What would it look like for us to transfer our relentless passion to reach and reflect and refer others to the glory of God, to actually rest in the glory of God, ourselves?  Or to trust in the glory of the God, because we rest—to rest in the glory of God, because we trust?  I wonder what it would look like to choose a mindset of Sabbath this day?  Or block-out a set of retreat-esque hours this week—where it can just be about you and God—learning to love yourself, as much as you’ve learned to love your neighbor.  For some of us the thought of just being with God is too overwhelming.  It’s easier to usher someone else toward Him, or find a way to serve Him.  Or for some of us, we’re scared that if we choose to retreat, God won’t show-up, or will, and that scares the hell out of us.  What I’m slowly learning though, is that retreating and resting is about being present.  It’s about showing-up.  That’s all.  And that’s everything. 

The sabbath is a gift—we don’t have to take it, but we can.  

Maybe some of you have avoided a Sabbath (or twenty) because there’s too much to be done.  And here again, I wonder what it might look like to explore with God His preference for you, versus what you produce.  At the start of a new semester, I think it would do us all well to ask these tough questions and ask the courage to hear their answers. 

What might it look like for us to allow ourselves rest, because we trust…and allow ourselves to trust, because our soul is at rest?

*Sidenote: The idea of Sabbath, or retreat, is often assumed as a mountaintop space of bliss where life is carefree and easy. That idea isn’t reality.  Intentional “resting” is rarely easy and seldom fun.  The contemplative “high,” or entrance into peace, is a gift of grace that happens on occasion, often after a series of hours, or days in strife.  Resting is a “discipline,” meaning it should expect a process of training pains and weakness, before it feels confident in its practice.  I remember the first 48-hour retreat I took—after like 45 minutes of journaling, I freaked-out because now I had 47 hours and 15 untold minutes left.  It didn’t take long to realize how tired I was, meaning a good 24 of them were spent sleeping, and the rest somehow happened, even amidst my silence.  Anyway, email me here if you want further thought, or more specific suggestions.  

*Sidenote #2: There are a number of healthy resources on this topic, but one that I’ve found extremely helpful and practical is “The Rest of God,” by Mark Buchanan.  

I’m usually the brat on plane-rides who gives-off the demeanor of being deaf and mute so you won’t talk to me.  Part of this is because I get scared and feel like if I “stay focused” the plane might not crash or face turbulence (I know—killer logic).  But the larger part is that is that I’m just stingy with down time and love that flying forces space for that.  Plus, isn’t it pointless to strike-up a couple houred friendship, when our descent is within  hours and you’ll never see me again.  Anyway, I didn’t realize I had such a cauldron of flying philosophy, but lest I make you think I’m a complete (expletive), I’ll digress.

With the above paragraph in mind, however, you can imagine my five-hour redeye this week wasn’t about to entertain convos with sidekicks in Row 17.  I wanted to sleep.  So when Seat C asked me a start-up question on the runway, I got squeamish.  Very quickly though, he squelched my anxieties and in fact, became quickly intriguing.

His skin showed a tanned hue of eastern ethnicity and his vocabulary quickly revealed a healthy education.  He looked about his 21 years and yet rattled off his unpretentious, “I’m a pre-med junior at James Madison” like he’d experienced 40.  Seat C quickly unloaded his current state, as if he’d been waiting to dump for about two years.  I was a captive audience at this point, and by the time we hit take-off (we sat on the runway for awhile), he’d already divulged pendulums swinging from cocaine and the givens of frat-house porn, to coastal differences and his girlfriend’s “lack of physicality” (which eventually spoke more specifically as: “I don’t understand the big deal about sex after dating seven months?”).  I was really enjoying Seat C at this point, and certainly the candid window into a college student’s world.

And then we met Seat A.

I don’t remember how he tilted his way into the conversation, but I do remember that one of his first topics covered shared the following. 

“I’m getting married in 3 months.” 
“Wow,” Seat C and I concurred, “you don’t look that old.” 
“I’m 15,” he responded in his deep North Carolina drawl, and then went on to share about his experiences with sex, drugs and drag-racing in the backwoods.  

Suffice it to say, two hours of upper class banter to that point were sidetracked.  A tobacco-chewing lad had quickly turned our attention to his window seat.  Seat C and him quickly saw eye-to-eye.  They shared levels of testosterone untethered to any sort of faith cuffing.  (Seat C comes from a Muslim family, but has never chosen to practice, and Seat A comes from the southern culture of most going to church, but few knowing God).  I ended-up representing the token gal in the Mars versus Venus conundrum.

At this point they still assumed I was about 21 (do I really look that young!? :)) and certainly had little idea of my faith association.  They learned quickly, however, that I camped with the chaste crowd and “studied philosophies of religion as an undergrad and now graduate student.”  But what they never learned (until facebooking me after we landed) were the extremes of my camps.  And I’m honestly really glad.  Had I stated upfront that I was a seminary student who writes books about Jesus, I highly doubt Seats C or A would’ve talked to me, let alone talked so freely with adjectives starting with “f,” or assertions of unfiltered reasoning.  I’m not saying our stance as Christians should always pull the silent card, but I am saying that, in this case, “evangelism” spoke a lot more loudly, and clearly, through a quieted existence, versus one that felt obliged to talk.  Parts of me still landed at LAX wondering the point of five and a half hours that never laid-out my full story.  But part of me also landed with a sense of wonder at the profound mysteries in just plain listening.

I’ve lived in LA for a couple years now and had yet to experience an earthquake.  Until last week.  I’ll own to the morbidity here, but I’d honestly been looking forward to it.  Thought it would be like riding a metro and trying to balance when the train comes to a hault—sans guard-rails of course.  It really wasn’t though.  More like slow-motion body surfing in the dark, or amatuer skateboarding with your eyes closed.  No…even those aren’t cutting it.  Bottom line, earthquakes are scarier than I’d imagined.  And this one wasn’t even that big.

It’s been a hard week in my family.  Courtney and Ian had little Avery last Thursday, and the road since has been less than smooth.  Avery’s heart rate has been sketchy since the start.  Doctors discovered a hole between her valves, requiring her 5lb frame to undergo surgery asap.  This situation has clearly brought-up a lot in me, but much of it has revolved around longing for my family to know Jesus.  I don’t say that as a  Christianese, evangelical, crowd-pleaser, but more so because it breaks my heart to see my sister fighting so hard against a tide that is beyond her.  She asked me yesterday, between sobs, if I thought her ½ glass of wine prior to even knowing she was pregnant caused all this?  I sadly said, “No, Courtney.  Avery is sick and it’s not your fault.”   

A similar, but less tragic scenario, regards my Christian landlord. Florica is in her late 60’s and spends much of her Romanian Orthodox days trying to please God.  I admire this much of the time, but tonight her tenacity made me sad.  She was exhausted from trying and still convinced she’d not tried enough.  The short of the long is, Florica loves her daughter.  And her daughter doesn’t seem to love her, or God.  And Florica wants her to.  So she’s trying to pray and weep and fast her daughter into eternity.  “But it’s not working,” said complains, in her thick accent (which reminds me of other times she’s told me I’m single because I’m not praying enough). Though a sincere lover of God, it’s as though the shackles of the Law have put Florica in a similar predicament to my unbelieving sister.

There’s something to be said for the link between tenacity and the Kingdom.  I’m reading through the journals of Mother Teresa (Come Be My Light), and good god, that woman had fight.  But it seems there’s something equally if not more important that we can’t miss.  Before we were called God’s servants, we were called His children.  Thus, before we are called to minister toward broken souls, we are called to our own—to the humble task of giving our brokenness back to Him—back to the Cross.  I had a spiritual director call me out on this misunderstood predicament once.  He said, “Abbie, keep remembering only one person who had to be crucified.”

Doing is easier than not doing.  It feels more spiritual to produce, than wade in what looks like nothing.  Furthermore, tenacity is great, but not when it’s trumped by fatigue, effort and guilt on its road to Calvary.  Such “signs,” I think, reveal wrong tethering.  When you becomes the reason he, she, or it isn’t changing, you’re teetering in shackles of religious Law.

Call it coincidence, but for some reason I’ve been seeing a lot of transsexuals lately.  Granted, I live in LA, but still—even here, they’re not the norm.  The one I’m touched by this hour is sharing a coffee shop and sitting across the room.  He’s dressed in cowboy boots and I guess what you’d call a midriff showing tube-top,” alongside a thong accented backside, wrapped in a mini-skirt.  Suffice it to say, he stands out a bit.  Minding his own business and reading a wedding magazine, of all things, but his demeanor is as gentle and unbothersome as they come.  And yet most who’ve crossed into our vicinity the past twenty minutes or so, have been visibly bothered.  How can a man so quiet open a story so loud?

Last night I watched Amistad.  (Yeah, I know.  A decade late.  So it goes in my life.  I still don’t have a digital camera.)  Actor Anthony Hopkins played what I’d consider a brilliant role of Former President John Quincy Adams.  In a most telling scene, he taught of stories and that in the end, regardless of the journey, it’s the better man’s story who’ll win the race.  (I actually found the film to speak a quiet obvious message of Jesus’ story being that which wins, but maybe I’m biased.)  

“Story” isn’t a word or concept foreign to us as go’ers of this generation, but at the same time, I find its territories of insight ceaseless in a constant readiness to tell anew.  I guess part of that follows the idea of a larger Story being eternally in motion, so that no story we know ever holds the full, or final chapter.  God is always at work, and always at work on a larger Story than we could know.

My first niece was born last night at 12:01am.  Avery Elizabeth.  I’m ecstatic, and have already been the possessive aunt who calls every five minutes for the update (sadly, Rhode Island isn’t close to California).  I want every chapter.  Every page.  Every new twist of this new life’s story.  And right now, I have similar emotions to the man across the room.  I curious what his story is?  I wonder what he’s wanting to say, or wishing he’d said, or wishing someone had said to him at this point in his story?  I wonder what he wants?  And I wonder if what he wants seemed so beyond words that drastically changing his identity seemed a helpful end, and beginning, to telling his story?

I think one of the greatest mysteries we've been invited into is hearing another’s story.  But the temptation seems to be already knowing it—we think we know what to expect and what such outfits usually unfold.  But I wonder what it would look like see every story and every hour as a new Avery?  As a new page of content.  As a new life.  A new chapter ushering us into new ways of Love.