Idle and Blessed

There was no heartbreak and no joy in 2013 that God didn't plan for and lead you through. And there won't be any heartbreak or joy in 2014 that God isn't planning for or won't lead you through. We mark time this way, in years, and we make all these resolutions every go-round. But the trick to it all is just plain faithfulness. There's not a whole lot in this life we can plan for. It won't stop us from trying, but it's true. I think there are directions God wants us to travel in, attitudes he wants in our hearts, but he won't measure the success of our years by the resolutions we kept or the goals we attained. He won't count up the times we were derailed by tragedy or failure as through they detract from our grade point average. The world works this way, and so do our heads. But we have life wrong when we count up the wins and losses. We have grace wrong, and growth and meaning and all the really important things. I like New Years. I like reso...

There's a song that goes, "What a glorious day when my heart finally rose from the grave. When you called my name, I came running," The first time I heard it I was walking down Belmont Boulevard on a warm summer night, getting some air before bed and listening to my ipod. And I remember I lifted up my hands like a crazy person, but it was dark so it's ok, and I thanked God so deeply that it's true,  I came running. He called my name and I came running. Praise be to God that we sometimes come running. I never remember a time when I didn't know Jesus. When he wasn't present with me in my inner world. The Lord is a someone who spoke tenderly to me from the beginning and drew me in, and I responded by loving him, somehow. It is only and all grace that allows us to love him. Mark 1 talks about the day Jesus met Simon and Andrew, his first disciples, beside the sea. He simply said, "Follow me," and Mark writes, "Immediately they left th...

Last week I took three days off running, which is something I haven't done since rehabbing a hamstring tear in the spring. I didn't mean to miss three runs, but it was a crazy seven days. Yesterday a new week started, though, and I went out for five miles and it felt a little bit like magic. I was recently reminded that life is very fragile and short. It's not something we deserve or understand, but it has been given to us for now, and it's a miraculous thing. When I finally hit the road again yesterday and got my heart beating more firmly, I was overwhelmed with the feeling that my lungs are working, and the Spirit inside me is sustaining me every second, and how incredible is that. If you are alive today and your body allows you, I beg you to go outside and run. Just run. Long, short, fast, slow, hilly, flat. Because now is the time you have to live and feel it. I beg you to go somewhere you can feel the air on your skin and hear your heartbeat in your ears, and...

I woke up today and realized finally the semester is over. I haven't taken a minute to let that sink in until today. One semester, fully completed. One sixth of this Master's degree. It was easier than I expected in a lot of ways. A few of my classes were more basic than I was used to at Belmont. But the experience itself was such a valley, I hate to admit. It was tough. Will there ever be a day when I don't question if I'm where I want to be? Will there ever be a day when I don't want to start over with Plan B? I'd like to be surrounded by people who really know me. That would be a good start. I was reminded lately how few people in Atlanta know about my time in Russia and my hopes for that place. Of the things that have shaped me, Russia is nearly the top. But I think most of my friends here are under the impression all I do is study ethics and practice yoga. What happens when no one around you fully knows you is that you feel like a freeze-f...

Trouble by Kevin Devine Trouble tracks me down It's been draggin me around Since my feet first touched the ground And I'm kickin like a kid Cause I can't get rid of it And it's never going nowhere now I duck-dodge to my left I side-step to my right But it nails me every time And I'm finished throwin fits Yeah, I've learned to live with it Marching steady, straight, and by my side And trouble makes no seam Just sweeps in surgical and clean Leaves me begging on my hands and knees And she's always on the clock But she doesn't only watch Cause she wrecks me straight into my sleep When I drift into a dream And I'm sailing on some sea Shootin' whiskey with my Irish bride Till Amy Goodman wakes me up I'm alone in Brooklyn broke as fuck Splitting headache and some bloodshot eyes And I've known trouble all my life And I'm sick of asking why It's like screaming at a set of dice They're gonna roll the way they roll And man you're n...

I have a serious problem with people tearing the Bible apart for term papers. I have a problem with the prerequisite of scholasticism being a complete disregard for intuition, mystery, and the movement of the Spirit. I have a serious problem with redaction criticism, because it's worth maybe 15% of our time and demands 90. I have a problem with myself and my peers for sitting in classrooms three days a week thinking we're doing Christianity when we can't name one person living in poverty in our city. If Jesus were sitting in the circle with us, he'd probably discuss the meaning of the scriptures, sure. He was a Rabbi. But he knew plenty of people who did that all day long, and he had a name for them. Hypocrites. It seems very presumptuous of us to make claims like "Proverbs perpetuates an evil system of economic inequality," and get standing ovations from each other. And an A. I don't know, that's probably true about Proverbs, in one sense or...

I didn't think it was possible, but autumn has come and made the east side of Atlanta pretty. These trees turn colors too, it turns out. Not like the Tennessee ones, but in their own way. Instead of pollen my car is now covered in yellow and red crunchy things, and soon there will be nothing to cover it, which is great news for someone who never washes her car but bad news for someone who isn't ready to admit winter is coming. I don't have the luxury of time anymore. My weeks are never ending, speeding along like Marta trains on infinity loops that begin where they are supposed to end. The to-do lists grow long each day and no moment can be wasted until night comes back around. It's a busy life, this work-and-school life, trying to make sure neither one screeches to a halt or goes up in flames. I don't have the luxury of shopping anywhere except Walmart and the world market, because there is a foreseeable future in which I will be unable to pay rent. I part with...

I think God wants us to walk in the rain sometimes without an umbrella. Let our skin get cold after a long hot summer. Feel a part of the elements of the earth, covered in them, breathing them in like mist or an inhaler. I think it involves surrender and simplicity because your hair gets wet and clothes stick to skin, and it's hard to keep your eyes fully open to see. I think God wants us to watch the sun wake up some mornings and realize how fast it happens. Watch how the night flees from it. Let it teach us something about waking. -JAY

I wrote recently about my inkling that running could be prayer. Like anything that unites body, mind, and spirit under one intention, it brings a meditativeness that goes straight to the core of us. I know running is prayer because I am my most generous self out there. By generous I mean my heart is open to people; I mean my heart chooses to think the best of people. You know that feeling when you drive down I-285 in the traffic and suddenly you realize these people probably all had long days too? Or when someone flips out on you at work and you notice it's just been too way long since they took a yoga class? That feeling is generosity. Your soul is making enough space for theirs. And when I run, about four miles in, I feel this generosity and thankfulness and love toward the people in my life and I think up extravagant ways to thank them. I wish I followed through more, really. I always think I solve the world's problems on runs and then promptly forget. Anyway, I know r...

A story is like water that you heat for your bath. It takes messages between the fire and your skin. It lets them meet, and it cleans you! Very few can sit down in the middle of the fire itself like a salamander or Abraham. We need intermediaries. A feeling of fullness comes, but usually it takes some bread to bring it. Beauty surrounds us, but usually we need to be walking in a garden to know it. The body itself is a screen to shield and partially reveal the light that's blazing inside your presence. Water, stories, the body, all the things we do, are mediums that hide and show what's hidden. Study them, and enjoy this being washed with a secret we sometimes know, and then not. Rumi

Dr. Allen has been the second most helpful professor to me here so far. We all know who the first is. I'm still doing a good job not stalking him though, by the way. So anyway, Dr. Allen is really earning my trust, which is the only reason I would listen to someone talk about calling God by feminine terms at this particular time of my life. We were in class talking about the names we use for God while praying. I said I wasn't comfortable calling God feminine names like 'Mother' and I don't do it. It's not that my theology prevents it. I know God is neither male nor female. I know God is masculine and feminine together. I just can't pray to my God as She. He affirmed me by saying we can have all the right theology about how God isn't masculine and still have a hard time not picturing God as a man. Right? I mean, I don't care how theologically progressive you are, if you pray to the Christian God as 'Mother' you're in the minority. ...

Running down Henderson Mill yesterday I started thinking about how running is prayer. Prayer has been defined (by Richard Rohr maybe? Robert Benson?) as what happens in the moment when your body, mind, and spirit are all in accord and working toward a singular purpose. When I run and running is good, or even when it's really super hard, there are split seconds when I feel what I feel in prayer. Body, mind, spirit dwelling intently on one reality. I think running, done well, can be prayer. And while I was thinking this, a parallel conversation was happening in another part of my brain. It was debating how heretical it is to call running prayer. I have this parallel conversation at least once a day as a seminary student. At least 38% of the time I conclude what I'm hearing, saying, or thinking in class is heretical. But I've decided that most of us are silently heretical, and if I'm going to be a heretic, I want to at least know why. Like Martin Luther, I want...

Because Nashville and its people make me smile bigger and laugh harder than I knew I could. Because there's nothing more soothing than 32 miles as the sun rises in Leiper's Fork. Because these are days I'll never get back. "I'm gonna raise my sail; God knows what I'm headed towards."

How are you going to provide? Here is my need. Here is my fear. Here is the space for a miracle. How are you going to redeem this into my "best?" How are you going to make my story more beautiful because of these three years? Here is my heart's ache and confusion, its sadness and brokenness over the lack of visible good. Here is the space for you to rewrite it. Here is the space for a miracle. How are you going to create a dream with me for my future? How are you going to use McAfee to give me a vision of vocation and ministry in the next step? Here is my full attention. Here are my time, my efforts, my resources. Here is the space for a miracle.

"Hope" is the thing with feathers - That perches in the soul - It's maybe the only Emily Dickinson poem I like, but I have a special affinity for it. It could be because I identify with all things related to birds, a fact only my best friends know about me. Or it could be because it so succinctly and profoundly gives a visual for the illusive idea of hope. Hope. I've been mulling over the concept for a few days now because things are going so badly and life is so hard that my hope in the goodness of the Lord's plan for me is weakening. My own running definition of hope has always been, "the confidence that God has not forsaken me." These days it's not enough to keep me going. God may not have forsaken me, but is his presence good , and is it good enough to make the end worth it ? Today my hope is looking a lot more like this: "This will not destroy me." "I am not being destroyed," right up to the very end. "One ...

From Jesus and the Disinherited, by Howard Therman, pp. 105-106: One day a woman was brought to Jesus. She has been caught in the act of adultery. The spokesman for the group who brought her said she was caught red-handed and that according to the law she should be stoned to death. "What is your judgement?" was their searching question. To them the woman was not a woman, or even a person, but an adulteress, stripped of her essential dignity and worth. Said Jesus: "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone." After that, he implied, any person may throw. The quiet words exploded the situation, and in the piercing glare each man saw himself in his literal substance. In that moment each was not a judge of another's deeds, but of his own. In the same glare the adulteress saw herself as merely a woman involved in the meshes in a struggle with her own elemental passion. Jesus, always the gentleman, did not look at the woman as she stood before him...

Despite a summer full of reasons to think it wouldn't happen, it is actually the case that I have been living in Georgia for 11 days. It is also the case that I have a great house, great job, great car, and really great classes starting tomorrow. Dear self three months ago: you have no idea. It really is a miracle that I am here. This summer was disastrous and hard and discouraging, full of mountains to climb and clouds covering the sun. I couldn't find an affordable apartment in all of Atlanta and I didn't have a way to support myself when I got here. My Jetta was breaking down for a different reason every week, and I was already out of money to repair it. My cat got fleas again and they invaded our apartment. I had to get rid of the cat. It was my first summer in 8 years not going to Russia. There were flat tires, coolant leaks, unexpected bills, overheating in traffic, a bad alternator, sad goodbyes, family tension, and uncertainty. I'll suffice it to say it ...

I didn't necessarily think this day would come, but it did. The day I would really hate to leave all the kids I've taken care of this summer. As many times as I gave endless "underdogs" on the swings, as many times as I built lego cars and tucked in baby dolls, as many times as I heated bottles and rocked to sleep, I'm sad it's over. I'll miss questions like, "Miss Jordan, if I touch poison ivy with my Spiderman glove on, will it still hurt me?" And, "If I swing really high, will I touch God?" I'll miss Coen's insistence that the "trees and sky and house talk to him." What do they say, Coen? "Just, like, hi and stuff." I believe the sky probably does talk to him, and I wish I would pay attention enough to hear like that. I'll miss you little ones.

The Russia team is currently somewhere in the space between Nashville International and the foothills of the Caucasus Mountains. If I close my eyes I can see what they’re seeing, as they get off that cramped 9-hour flight and make their way through customs in a dim fluorescent hallway. They hear a foreign language; they search for luggage with sleepy eyes. They count heads and move out toward the sunlight and mild summer air of Moscow, trying to decide between sleep and exploring the new-yet-familiar world of the Capital City. I can see what those gray streets look like, what the Kremlin looks like at night all lit up in lights; I can hear the Red Square clock chiming. I can feel the whoosh of air in the underground Metro, and the embrace of dear friends I’ve not seen in a year. The dear Moscow-dwelling friends who’ve been the hands of God to me since before I understood a word of their language, or they of mine. I know the terror of the Aeroflot plane...

The best thing about running a loop is starting and ending in the same spot. The best thing about starting and ending in the same spot is that you know no matter how steep the hills, no matter how hard, you always get to go down the other side. Net elevation gain zero. Right now I'm running up a life hill, steep and rocky. I can't see the top and it feels like I've been doing more uphill than downhill lately. But the Bible says the story started in a place called Eden, and it says we'll end up in Eden too. I believe God means to tell us it will all be made right and all these uphills have other sides to them. Net elevation gain zero. "And the Lord God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed. And out of the ground the Lord God make to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was in the midst of the garden , and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil." Genesis 2:8...

If you're ever wondering if God exists, go outside when the air gets cool, when the crickets start singing, and sit still. Look out over the earth, to the horizon where the black trees have for their outline a sky that's halfway between night and day, and sit still. Watch the blackness get deeper and hear the bullfrogs start talking down by the water and notice how the world lights up with tiny fireflies everywhere. See the fireflies? Then, believe.

Sometimes I walk dogs and sometimes I take care of children and what I have realized is we have a lot to learn from them. For instance, when I’m holding onto a leash and I say it’s safe to cross the street, the dog doesn’t question that; he crosses. He doesn’t start to get creative and independent in the thinking and decide I might be tricking him. He doesn’t think I’m probably leading him into danger because he needs to learn a lesson; he doesn’t assume getting run over by a car is my hope for him. Maybe he’s just clued into the fact that I would get hit by the car too, so I’ll be really careful. I don’t know. I just know he trusts my timing. Also, he follows me around the house. I’m talking everywhere . I put my glass in the sink, he comes. I brush my teeth, he comes. I go to the table to study, he comes. Watching TV, he’s at my feet. Go make dinner, at my feet. This is a creature completely in tune with my presence, completely in tune with my actions and voice a...