November has come gently. Blue skies most days, sunlight brighter than days this deep in the year usually allow. Golden leaves still hanging on trees until just this week or so. Even now, with bare skeletons of trees the light is just colorful and full- the clouds are still billowy- more voluminous than November and winter usually allow. Even today the sunset was spectacular. Days have been warm- so many 60 degree days, even a few in the 70s. What happened to my grey frigid dark Novembers? If God is giving me a reprieve from my 5 Novembers/winters or trials, He's sure being clear about it- making it look like the safe summers I've always known. But He knows me, He knows I'm too dense to take anything but overt signals that everything will be ok.
And so, gently came November 18th, the last day of the seventieth week. It came up quietly, I did not realize it had come until I walked outside that morning and faced the sun. Something about the light reminded me. I suppose you're ready for some answers now, huh?
I prayed for 70 weeks about what God wanted me to do next, who I should do it with, where he wanted me to go, who he wanted me to be. I was looking for definitive answers, some clear cut logistical, obvious answers. The who, what, when, where, why or at least one of those.
But this was a journey rather than a destination so there's more to say than just a simple resolution. Upon arriving at November 18th there was nothing eventful, no specific revelation on that day- it has been continually evolving. And so I find myself at the end of quite the trip, but when faced with the end we find ourselves
means going back to the beginning. In fact, we find that where we began has completely defined where we have landed. Let's not forget that these 70 weeks began with 70 days of focusing on loving God properly- beginning here makes all the difference in the world and now I see so clearly why I've come to the answer I've come to.
In re-reading all my old posts I now clearly see the line between everything I was learning these 70 days/weeks and the conclusion I reached. The answer has been here all along. In fact, it's amazing that it took 70 weeks to get here when I had already stumbled upon this simple notion in week FIVE. Like I said, I'm dense.
I began these 70 weeks of prayer with less than open and completely God centered ideas. While I had open ended prayers on where God wanted me, who he wanted me to be, I had a very specific selfish question related to where I should go that I wanted answered. I had planned to deal with it at the end of my 70 weeks, so in these past few days, if God had given me the answer I wanted.
Heh.
Here's the thing about God- He almost never gives you the answer you wanted because you were too blind to know that it wasn't really want you wanted in the first place. God will give you the desires of your heart if you ask but often, God knows the desires of your heart better than you do.
Throughout the course of my 70 weeks I found myself completely leaving behind the idea that backed my original selfish twist on my overall "where am I going/who should I be/what should I do" prayer. My faith was tested, I went through some of the hardest things I have ever had to deal with emotionally, I had to kill idols and work to rebuild holes in my heart, and realized that 70 days wasn't enough to love God properly and, looking back, the entirety of my 70 weeks was learning about loving God properly. And of course, I still don't- but my relationship with God has changed drastically from where I started in July of 2010- in fact, while learning about agape in bible study last week we analyzed if our love for God was agape love. I was surprised to see that if it wasn't there, it was pretty close. I take so much more joy in God now that I did 70 weeks ago. More daily, momentary joy. I talk to Him so much more, I feel His peace so much more, He is with me all the time and I am much more aware of it than I used to be. Our relationship is less one sided and more, well, relationship-y.
Last year, the primary idol that kept me from loving God in this way was in its death throes as I heard the song, "I want you to be my love" by Over the Rhine. This is one of their lyrically simpler songs and I think people like it because it's a seemingly sweet and simple ode to a human love. I remember this song breaking my heart because I couldn't feel it- I couldn't say it to someone rightfully.
I think you need a reference point as this is the crux of the point that I'm making:
I want you to be my love
I want you to be my love
'Neath the moon and the stars above
I want you to be my love
I want you to know me now
I want you to know me now
Break a promise make a vow
I know you want me now
Like I want you
I want you to be my love
I want you to be my love
'Neath the moon and the stars above
I want you to be my love
'Cause I want you
I know all you--
All you've been through
Recently, I took a long drive through New England autumn and put on the album that contained that song- an album that once was very hard for me to listen to. And this time, when I heard "I want you to be my love" instead of thinking of trying to be able to feel and sing the words to someone, I heard them the way I think they are best expressed- in perhaps Over the Rhine meant them- as God singing to me, saying all of those words to me. And there it was.
70 weeks of prayer asking Where I should go, What I should do, Who I should be and God said, "I want you to be my love."
I want to laugh and cry and scream in relief and frustration and love all at the same time. I know this is God's answer and I know it's from God because, well, it's SO like God to do something like that.
Here I come to him asking for all these human-like answers- logistical answers, specific answers. I want to know what I need to DO to please Him and do his will? And does he give me anything particular, no. He just tells me to be His. This is particularly big for a person like me whose relationship with God is so based on doing/action fulfilling His will for me (almost in a prideful sense, thinking God has given me gifts for the purpose of using them for His glory- which is true- but to the point that I think He needs me, which He certainly does not)that for Him to answer a prayer like this in a way the involves me doing nothing but being with Him, has nothing to do with teaching, my calling, work, etc. is huge. I've said before that I'm more of a Martha than a Mary. I also talked in that post about my working on loving God properly in my 70 weeks because 70 days hadn't been sufficient. And here was God telling me, "Audrey, more than all the work you could do with all the gifts I've given you, with all the ways you've been growing in me, more than all the ways I'd like you to show my glory, I just want you to be my love." What is more beautiful and amazing than that? Sure, God has plans for me, sure God wants me to do things, but more than all of that- He just wants to be with me- even with "all (I've) been through"-only He can truly know all that- and yet loves me anyway.
Not only is this answer amazing for that reason, it's amazing because it builds off of what my 70 weeks turned out to really be about and how it started- loving God properly. All God really wants for me in my next phase of life- in my entire life, here and in eternity, is to have a relationship with Him and love Him with all my heart, my soul, my might.
Not only that, it builds on what I've felt especially convicted about recently: "do not worry about tomorrow for today has enough worries of its own." I heard the idea in bible study that if we knew exactly what was going to happen we wouldn't check with God all the time- we wouldn't be in as close a relationship with Him.
God is telling me right now that I don't need to worry about the specifics- He is the important part, the rest will come.
From a logistical stand point, I'm going to apply everywhere- IL/WI within 3 hour radius of Chicago and that dream school in Seattle. God has given me some clearer answers throughout my 70 weeks on just enough of the logistical things. He's basically saying that Chicago/IL/WI area is where I need to end up, although I don't know if it's for right now or later. All I know is it's in the future sometime and that New England is done after this year no matter how much I love and will miss my life here in a way I can't express. It's like God's singing that Sonic Youth song, "closing time"- "you don't have to go Home, but you can't stay here." Sorry New England, I don't mean to compare you to a seedy bar. So there's the most specificity I can give you, in case you really needed some of it after reading my blabbering blogs for so long.
But even if I don't know where I'll be in 9 months, in the next phase of my life, I know, better than I did when I began (and that's all I can ask for, really), who I will be in this next phase and forever- His beloved. And every day is filled with moments- love letters God is writing to me, reminding me over and over again,
I want you to be my love
'Neath the moon and the stars above
I want you to be my love
'Cause I want you
I know all you--
All you've been through.
Sunday, November 20, 2011
Sunday, November 13, 2011
Week 69: All Things Bright and Beautiful
Sometimes I feel like I'm fighting a war. Sometimes, the darkness that just wants to overtake everything perfect and everyone beautiful just overwhelms. Sometimes, I feel like love and loss just ebb and flow like the tide as does the surge of beauty and the pulling away as darkness sets in. I am eternally the shore at the mercy of the waves- but at least they're a thing to behold, an amazing thing to feel against you.
Lately, I've been closing my eyes and just listening to the sounds around me, opening my ears to the beauty whizzing by. Sometimes, if I just shut out all the distractions to my eyes, I can hear beauty so much better: laughter, the fluttering of papers, the rustling of the trees, the wind through the window, all the teachers and students voices all around the house, music coming from somewhere. Everything tinkles and rattles and rumbles around into some harmonic cacophony crafted by an eccentric yet wise Composer.
Today, all the sensations around me seemed to hold still so I could just see- true still lifes. I sat in church in groggy peace, so glad to sit through an entire worship service despite exhaustion/lack of sleep that I sleepily reveled in just being in God's presence. I got up to go to the bathroom and found a door open to our church backyard. No cold November air came in, I could feel no difference with the door being open. Only the sound of the church choir drifted into my consciousness- otherwise it was just me and this still, sharp colorful scene- a line of pine trees, so green, their bark so red and brown, the ground a rich earthy color, the sky somehow sharply grey. Everything was so clear- I felt as though I could just see. Then while driving home I stopped at a stop light and spotted a field of tall grass, their cottony tops waving in the breeze amongst grey skeletons of long dead and bare trees. Behind them was a backdrop of a pale blue sky- the color you only get when the light changes to winter light. It looked like some beautiful, barren blue wasteland. Yet so sharp, crisp and clear- everything contrasting and standing out against itself. The Painter truly has good composition.
I spend so much time looking at the future, I forget to take in all the moments that are right here right now- the good and the bad, silence and noise, brightness, clarity, color, blackness. Camaraderie as I watch grown women play a game with a monitor, crawling on stairs in weird positions so it doesn't go off. Friendship as I sleep over at a friend's and together we laugh about her trip to hell and back. Darkness as it turns a happy person into one who cannot function anymore. Curiosity across faces that long for God. Peace that comes in soft afternoon sunlight. Joy across teacher's faces at student progress. Relief at laughter that follows the screaming, normalcy that follows the madness. Meaning in conversations full of connection between people across generations, across cultures.
Sometimes it's not about where you'd going, it's about being present in where you are.
I walked through the grocery store parking lot like I was walking through the scene of some epic war movie. Orange dry oak leaves tumbled all around me epically in the wind and I heard cans rattle on the pavement, echoing inside their tin shells. All this week it feels like we've been walking in darkness, learning how much we need redemption- but all this darkness awakens me to open my ears, focus my eyes, sharpen my soul and truly experience all things bright and beautiful even when the night seems so long.
\
Lately, I've been closing my eyes and just listening to the sounds around me, opening my ears to the beauty whizzing by. Sometimes, if I just shut out all the distractions to my eyes, I can hear beauty so much better: laughter, the fluttering of papers, the rustling of the trees, the wind through the window, all the teachers and students voices all around the house, music coming from somewhere. Everything tinkles and rattles and rumbles around into some harmonic cacophony crafted by an eccentric yet wise Composer.
Today, all the sensations around me seemed to hold still so I could just see- true still lifes. I sat in church in groggy peace, so glad to sit through an entire worship service despite exhaustion/lack of sleep that I sleepily reveled in just being in God's presence. I got up to go to the bathroom and found a door open to our church backyard. No cold November air came in, I could feel no difference with the door being open. Only the sound of the church choir drifted into my consciousness- otherwise it was just me and this still, sharp colorful scene- a line of pine trees, so green, their bark so red and brown, the ground a rich earthy color, the sky somehow sharply grey. Everything was so clear- I felt as though I could just see. Then while driving home I stopped at a stop light and spotted a field of tall grass, their cottony tops waving in the breeze amongst grey skeletons of long dead and bare trees. Behind them was a backdrop of a pale blue sky- the color you only get when the light changes to winter light. It looked like some beautiful, barren blue wasteland. Yet so sharp, crisp and clear- everything contrasting and standing out against itself. The Painter truly has good composition.
I spend so much time looking at the future, I forget to take in all the moments that are right here right now- the good and the bad, silence and noise, brightness, clarity, color, blackness. Camaraderie as I watch grown women play a game with a monitor, crawling on stairs in weird positions so it doesn't go off. Friendship as I sleep over at a friend's and together we laugh about her trip to hell and back. Darkness as it turns a happy person into one who cannot function anymore. Curiosity across faces that long for God. Peace that comes in soft afternoon sunlight. Joy across teacher's faces at student progress. Relief at laughter that follows the screaming, normalcy that follows the madness. Meaning in conversations full of connection between people across generations, across cultures.
Sometimes it's not about where you'd going, it's about being present in where you are.
I walked through the grocery store parking lot like I was walking through the scene of some epic war movie. Orange dry oak leaves tumbled all around me epically in the wind and I heard cans rattle on the pavement, echoing inside their tin shells. All this week it feels like we've been walking in darkness, learning how much we need redemption- but all this darkness awakens me to open my ears, focus my eyes, sharpen my soul and truly experience all things bright and beautiful even when the night seems so long.
\
Weeks 65 & 66: The Direction is West.
Apologies for getting less philosophical and more down to business but as we're approaching the end of these 70 weeks I should update you on the logistical aspects of the options that seem to be appearing for my next phase of life.
As I've said before, I feel called to go back to the Midwest- IL/WI to teach but circumstances changed where I felt that, in the first time in a long time, it didn't have to be now- I could take another year or two somewhere else. Between my mother's somewhat improved health and potential future plans developing for starting a school down the road, I felt led, especially after attending a behavior analysis conference where I saw some amazing research on instructional design, to consider dedicating more years to learning rather than serving. Granted, I'm always serving, but as I've said, these years on the East Coast are focused on learning skills to be a better teacher rather than making a difference in kid's lives. Not that what I'm doing isn't impactual, it's just that the kids I work with are getting pretty much the same level of treatment/instruction whether I'm there or not because they're in a great program while this isn't necessarily the case for kids in the public schools where they don't have access to behavioral technology if there aren't behavior analysts in their district/acting as their teachers.
So, I've learned a lot out here but primarily in dealing with problem behavior and less in terms of instruction- especially how to teach large groups of more typically developing kids. So, there's a school in Seattle- my dream school that I had been in love with long before I even heard about the school where I'm working now- would be a good option because it's focus is on all of the types of instructional methods that I would like to learn more about. My mother loves this idea because she wants me to try out the west coast and honestly, I think I'm a west coast girl in my soul.
Thing is, I know I'm called back to Chicago and I honestly don't want to spend just a year somewhere where I know no one and go a year without much of community because by the time I develop it, it will be time to leave. And how much do I need to go all the way to Seattle to learn these things I feel are lacking? How much do I need another learning year and is it more time to serve students and just jump in with both feet? Something to pray about and I think I will at least apply to the school in Seattle as well as back in the Midwest.
I have a friend who likes to say that the direction he is headed is West even though he's going geographically East because "West" refers to moving toward God.
Well, being on the east coast, regardless of where I decide to move- home or Seattle, at least I know the direction is West- spiritually and geographically.
As I've said before, I feel called to go back to the Midwest- IL/WI to teach but circumstances changed where I felt that, in the first time in a long time, it didn't have to be now- I could take another year or two somewhere else. Between my mother's somewhat improved health and potential future plans developing for starting a school down the road, I felt led, especially after attending a behavior analysis conference where I saw some amazing research on instructional design, to consider dedicating more years to learning rather than serving. Granted, I'm always serving, but as I've said, these years on the East Coast are focused on learning skills to be a better teacher rather than making a difference in kid's lives. Not that what I'm doing isn't impactual, it's just that the kids I work with are getting pretty much the same level of treatment/instruction whether I'm there or not because they're in a great program while this isn't necessarily the case for kids in the public schools where they don't have access to behavioral technology if there aren't behavior analysts in their district/acting as their teachers.
So, I've learned a lot out here but primarily in dealing with problem behavior and less in terms of instruction- especially how to teach large groups of more typically developing kids. So, there's a school in Seattle- my dream school that I had been in love with long before I even heard about the school where I'm working now- would be a good option because it's focus is on all of the types of instructional methods that I would like to learn more about. My mother loves this idea because she wants me to try out the west coast and honestly, I think I'm a west coast girl in my soul.
Thing is, I know I'm called back to Chicago and I honestly don't want to spend just a year somewhere where I know no one and go a year without much of community because by the time I develop it, it will be time to leave. And how much do I need to go all the way to Seattle to learn these things I feel are lacking? How much do I need another learning year and is it more time to serve students and just jump in with both feet? Something to pray about and I think I will at least apply to the school in Seattle as well as back in the Midwest.
I have a friend who likes to say that the direction he is headed is West even though he's going geographically East because "West" refers to moving toward God.
Well, being on the east coast, regardless of where I decide to move- home or Seattle, at least I know the direction is West- spiritually and geographically.
Weeks 55-59 & 63- 64, & 67-68: When do you really get to go home?
Allow me to fill in the gaps of weeks I have missed with this- the explanation of a gap I wish to fill.
I write this to cover all of these weeks because honestly, thoughts on home have been preoccupying my mind many of these 70 weeks- and frequently around the weeks I listed above- if not the entire time. Really, isn't that the question I'm asking with these weeks of prayer when I ask God where he wants me to go next? What I really mean in my selfish heart is, "where is home, God? Where can I go next that can be an earthly home to me and can it be the place that I can really call home, at least in this lifetime?"
I find more and more I have been asking this question: when do we really get to go home?
Alexi Murdoch says first we must go walking on our own. Well, I've done that. He then says, "maybe then we already are home."
Hmm, I suppose in some ways, wherever I am is home to me so in a way he's right. But I want more.
A friend of mine says if we're ever truly satisfied with our earthly home we will never be satisfied with our eternal home. I agree, I'd just like to be more satisfied with my earthly home than I am. I do want a place on earth to call home- a place that just feels right. I feel like I'm always searching for it, always have been, and always will be. Perhaps that feeling is the searching I feel for my eternal home. But there must be some place here where I can be for a while- a place that feels like it's where I'm supposed to be for a while. A place where, after a few years I don't feel the pull, the call to move on again. A place where I feel called to stay a while, establish a community, have ministry I am involved with, and an educational program I am involved with where I can actually make a difference for students.
Besides that, home is not just a place- home is a group of people- a family. Here is one of my biggest gaps- a thing I have always longed for and yet I only am realizing this now. All my life I have longed for community and attempted to create it everywhere I went. I joined clubs and groups in school and tried to create "families" and camaraderie within them. In college I made a particular organization my family, out here, my co-workers and students are my family and I am known as the one who is always planning bonding events, trying to make us more of a community. I find, while I generally find/create close communities, others involved in them treat them as secondary. Their families come first or perhaps a special group of friends. Since I feel that I never really had a family- only my mom- and always wanted a bigger one- I think I try to create one for myself everywhere I go.
One Christmas eve my mother and I drove around by ourselves looking at Christmas lights. We drove by best friend's house and saw her whole huge Italian family laughing and gathered around the tree. We felt like little frozen children or puppies or something sad in some Christmas movie peeking in a window longingly because it felt alone on Christmas. I've always wanted more of a family and I see now all the manifestations of that desire. Now I realize that something I want in the next phase of my life is a family and honestly, my desire for it scares me. I don't want to seek a relationship simply because I want a family out of someone- I don't want to be that girl. I want to meet someone who makes me want to get married and have a family. Just something to pray about, I suppose.
So the question becomes, what is home? At least on earth? A place? A group of people? A group of people in a place? Another one of my friends and I talk extensively about finding home- and how we have it while still keeping the wings we desire, the freedom to travel, the adventure. I find, while I want those things, what I want more is community and I'd give them up and stay in one place to get it. In the end- I think community is a key part of home (and our eternal home, as well, in a way) and thus, to me at least, it's a group of people. In a way then, I've had many homes, everywhere I've roamed. That sounds much more satisfying- we can't disregard every meaningful community and group of people we have in our life simply because we are looking for some place to call home. Everywhere is home. I just want an everywhere that can be home for a long time-longer than anywhere else, so all the other "homes" I've known pale in comparison. I want a long time community- a family. A place that feels right wouldn't hurt either.
And still, I realize, even as I write this- that while it may satisfy this specific desire- even if I find something I would call a prominent earth home- no matter where I go, no matter what job I find, no matter who I could find to marry or what children I could have, no matter who I could meet or befriend- none of this will ever truly satisfy the place in my heart reserved for Home and, until all these things that I imagine and desire pass away, I won't really get to go there.
I write this to cover all of these weeks because honestly, thoughts on home have been preoccupying my mind many of these 70 weeks- and frequently around the weeks I listed above- if not the entire time. Really, isn't that the question I'm asking with these weeks of prayer when I ask God where he wants me to go next? What I really mean in my selfish heart is, "where is home, God? Where can I go next that can be an earthly home to me and can it be the place that I can really call home, at least in this lifetime?"
I find more and more I have been asking this question: when do we really get to go home?
Alexi Murdoch says first we must go walking on our own. Well, I've done that. He then says, "maybe then we already are home."
Hmm, I suppose in some ways, wherever I am is home to me so in a way he's right. But I want more.
A friend of mine says if we're ever truly satisfied with our earthly home we will never be satisfied with our eternal home. I agree, I'd just like to be more satisfied with my earthly home than I am. I do want a place on earth to call home- a place that just feels right. I feel like I'm always searching for it, always have been, and always will be. Perhaps that feeling is the searching I feel for my eternal home. But there must be some place here where I can be for a while- a place that feels like it's where I'm supposed to be for a while. A place where, after a few years I don't feel the pull, the call to move on again. A place where I feel called to stay a while, establish a community, have ministry I am involved with, and an educational program I am involved with where I can actually make a difference for students.
Besides that, home is not just a place- home is a group of people- a family. Here is one of my biggest gaps- a thing I have always longed for and yet I only am realizing this now. All my life I have longed for community and attempted to create it everywhere I went. I joined clubs and groups in school and tried to create "families" and camaraderie within them. In college I made a particular organization my family, out here, my co-workers and students are my family and I am known as the one who is always planning bonding events, trying to make us more of a community. I find, while I generally find/create close communities, others involved in them treat them as secondary. Their families come first or perhaps a special group of friends. Since I feel that I never really had a family- only my mom- and always wanted a bigger one- I think I try to create one for myself everywhere I go.
One Christmas eve my mother and I drove around by ourselves looking at Christmas lights. We drove by best friend's house and saw her whole huge Italian family laughing and gathered around the tree. We felt like little frozen children or puppies or something sad in some Christmas movie peeking in a window longingly because it felt alone on Christmas. I've always wanted more of a family and I see now all the manifestations of that desire. Now I realize that something I want in the next phase of my life is a family and honestly, my desire for it scares me. I don't want to seek a relationship simply because I want a family out of someone- I don't want to be that girl. I want to meet someone who makes me want to get married and have a family. Just something to pray about, I suppose.
So the question becomes, what is home? At least on earth? A place? A group of people? A group of people in a place? Another one of my friends and I talk extensively about finding home- and how we have it while still keeping the wings we desire, the freedom to travel, the adventure. I find, while I want those things, what I want more is community and I'd give them up and stay in one place to get it. In the end- I think community is a key part of home (and our eternal home, as well, in a way) and thus, to me at least, it's a group of people. In a way then, I've had many homes, everywhere I've roamed. That sounds much more satisfying- we can't disregard every meaningful community and group of people we have in our life simply because we are looking for some place to call home. Everywhere is home. I just want an everywhere that can be home for a long time-longer than anywhere else, so all the other "homes" I've known pale in comparison. I want a long time community- a family. A place that feels right wouldn't hurt either.
And still, I realize, even as I write this- that while it may satisfy this specific desire- even if I find something I would call a prominent earth home- no matter where I go, no matter what job I find, no matter who I could find to marry or what children I could have, no matter who I could meet or befriend- none of this will ever truly satisfy the place in my heart reserved for Home and, until all these things that I imagine and desire pass away, I won't really get to go there.
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