Is Your Heart Right?

Allow me a couple of minutes of unapologetically Christian-centric discourse.

John Wesley said in a sermon one time, "Every wise man, therefore, will allow others the same liberty of thinking which he desires they should allow him; and will no more insist on their embracing his opinions, than he would have them to insist on his embracing theirs. He bears with those who differ from him, and only asks him with whom he desires to unite in love that single question, 'Is thy heart right, as my heart is with thy heart?'"

It strikes me here that the question assumes that you know your heart is right. To be generous, the situation is not that you simply know with an untested conviction that your heart is right, but that you have explored the motivations of your heart and are striving to align it with God's heart for us and for the world. In making your own heart right with God's heart, you make your heart right with the other's. And so, in a moment of reconciliation, but not necessarily agreement, you come to your sister or brother (in Christ) and ask, "Is your heart right, as my heart is with your heart?"

That question is a quote from 2 Kings 10:15, which the NRSV renders "Is your heart as true to mine as mine is to yours?" (The difference in wording comes from using the Hebrew text rather than the Greek Septuagint translation.) It's a little ironic that a plea for peacemaking should come out of this section of the Bible-- Jehu, the speaker in this quote, has just recently taken over control of the northern kingdom of Israel after a coup in which the former king, Ahab, and his family have been killed, including his wife, Jezebel, who was thrown from her window in her full royal attire. Two verses after this exchange with a supporter of his, Jehu wipes out the rest of Ahab's supporters in Samaria. Peacemaking in this period of Israel's history involves more war than introspection. And with that context in mind, the NRSV reading makes more sense. It's not so much "Are we united in righteousness?" as it is "Are you backing me up? Because we're about to cause some people some trouble."

Still, the interaction has value. "'Is your heart as true to mine as mine is to yours?' Jehonadab answered, 'It is.' Jehu said, 'If it is, give me your hand.' So he gave him his hand." Jehu does not ask for Jehonadab's thoughts or detailed policy plans. He asks about his heart in relation to his own heart. Do you hold the same ideals I do? Do you care for what I care for? Are we united in purpose? Once the answer comes, it is embodied; it takes an action. He gives him his hand along with his word.

This should all speak an uncomfortable word to us. We have forgotten how to unite. We have forgotten to see the trueness, the rightness in another's heart. And we have neglected the importance of embodied relationships; our digital discourses are often the only conversations we have (and we all know that the way we act online is not how we act out in the world). Our interaction often stops without finding its way to actions we can take together. We have forgotten, or we have radically and negatively changed, how to be together. Church, we have long forgotten how to be together. Nation, we have perhaps more recently and heartbreakingly forgotten how to be together. Our world has changed and we, in our distraction, have not remembered who we should be. We should be people who desire to unite in love.

Tomorrow, we start Lent. We start this time where we remember who we are and work on how we are, in preparation for the remembrance and celebration of whose we are and how we became that way. I can't highlight for you the ways you have lost your desire to unite with others in love. I can't show you the moments when you have insisted on your own way rather than asking after the heart of another. I can't bring to your attention every moment of unkindness or boastfulness or irritation or resentfulness. I can only tell you that I am abundantly aware of the unloving moments in my life and that my plan is to allow a work to be done in me during this season so that when Easter comes around, I'll be better able to see the renewed world as I should, as a place that is abundantly loved and redeemed from its brokenness.

For me, this work is going to mean stepping away from most social media, primarily facebook, because I know that I don't use it properly and because I know that it hasn't helped me be where I physically am. I really do think that now more than ever is a time to be where you are, to see and engage with the people around you and build community in order to help heal people and the nation, so that's what I'll be doing. I'll still be posting here-- it was actually giving up facebook for Lent eight years ago that got me to start a blog in the first place, so maybe similarly fruitful project will come out of this Lent-- but I won't be sharing it to facebook, so if you want to keep up with me, sign up for emails in the sidebar. I'm pretty sure it'll only send you an email when I post so you know to check in at your leisure.

Okay, that was that. For those of you who scrolled down to see where the Jesus-talk ended, know that I'm taking a break from social media between now and April 16th, so if you want to keep up with posts, sign up for the emails. I'd also ask that you join me in taking the next month and a half or so to really think about the heart of the other, to try to empathize with everyone who crosses your path or newsfeed or timeline. It's the exhausting but necessary work of community building and I'd love your help with it. It's hard because humans (including ourselves) are frustrating and irritating individuals, but I believe in us.

We got this.

Claimed

Listen, I just don't know what to do about me.

Some days I am astounded at how self-absorbed I am. I'll look back at a journal entry or a blog post or a message I've sent and be struck by how the only thing that I have considered (and I'll have considered it at length) is myself. I'll walk away from a conversation realizing that I turned it into something about me when there was a real living, breathing human being across from me that I should have been listening to and caring for and loving properly. I make decisions taking only my own problems into account and even actions that I meant for good were done with self-preservation in the back of my mind. I care only my problems, my pain, my worries, and any pain that isn't felt by me or problem that isn't experienced by me isn't real to me.

Some days I surprise myself with just how hateful I can be to me. I'll let the endless litany of irredeemable faults continue long after I should have stopped it in its tracks. I'm sure parts of it are familiar to some of you: I'm so useless, so lazy, too fat, too poor, too dumb, too loud too loud too loud, too harsh, incapable, unlovable, unworthy, and, my personal favorite, too ugly to be valuable in anyone's eyes. Those days, the litany days, those are the days when I know that everyone else knows that I've never earned a seat at any table I've sat at, have never really contributed anything, could never really contribute anything, and am just a waste of oxygen and space. And even on the non-litany days, on the days when I'm buoyed by my friends and my family, I still find that self-hatred has been at the root of some of my struggles, an absolute unwillingness to forgive myself for human mistakes, a chorus of stupidstupidstupid playing in the background of every memory I bring to mind.

I wallow in the muck and mire of the twin sins of self-obsession and self-rejection. They feed each other, I think, or at least work together, two drainage pipes emptying into this pit I'm stuck in, that I choose to be in, and it's so hard to see clearly from down here.

But listen, friends, we were not made for life in mire. We were never destined for the muck.

We end up there, sure. I don't want to downplay the severity of our fall-- the litany of lies that I let play sinks deep down into my heart to places that I've never explored and bubbles up after every conversation or interaction and in the quiet moments before the decision to act. It stains everything, just as my inward turn to see only my own pain is writ large in our society, depriving us of the empathy that would inhibit our many and myriad unjust actions. Sin is real, individual and societal, and we don't like to hear it and we don't like to see it, not only because of the deep pain it causes us and others, but also because it reminds us over and over again that we cannot fix ourselves and we so desperately want to be fixed. But we do not live as those without hope, because we were never meant to be sin's.

I know that I am loved beyond measure. (Apparently Martin Luther, when he was being tempted, would yell, "I am baptized!" and I like that, that the memory of that claim on his life was what he needed to get through a trial.) I know that for all my faults and all my turnings-away, I live as one redeemed (as are you). The weighty pull of the muck and the mire, chain-like though it may feel, has been cancelled by a first-century Jew from Palestine. The only claim it has on our lives is the one we let it have when we forget who and whose we are. Though I daily need to watch out for and work against selfishness in its many forms, I can silence the voices that take away my worth. I know my value and where it comes from. Anyone else's opinion, including my own, doesn't matter.

Valentine's Day 2017

It is Valentine’s Day and for the first time in years, I’ve realized that I need a man. 

Let me explain.

I do not need a man to change a flat tire for me. I don’t need a man to help me carry a heavy box up the stairs. I don’t need a man to catch and release a spider for me, help me jump my car, move my furniture, build my bookcase, fix my computer, fix my internet, show me how to grill a steak, or walk me home at night. I don’t need a man to teach me how to be strong or smart or authoritative or brave. I’ve seen Hidden Figures. I now know how to be all of those things and how to run in heels and put an astronaut into orbit and bring them back.

Even though I swing that way, I don’t need a man to hold me as I fall asleep at night or wake up beside me in the morning. Though Lord knows how much I’d like to hear it, I don’t need a man to tell me how intelligent or funny or beautiful or valuable I am. I know the measure of my worth.  I don’t need to be homesick for a man’s arms or cared for by a man. There is such an astounding amount of love in my life from my friends, family, and community that romantic love is, as a matter of fact, superfluous in my life. I imagine it’d be so nice but I am not incomplete because I lack it. A life without love is terrible but I do not live without love. 

Just to be brutally, plainly clear, I do not need any mortal man to step into the role of headship in my life. I am not lost waiting on a husband to find me and give me purpose. No matter how internally conflicted I may be around my inherited ideas of motherhood and legacy, there is not a man currently on Earth that I find myself in need of. 

Phew. Can we all just take a minute to acknowledge the backflips I had to do to avoid the Incarnation just then? 

Because of course the man I’m in need of is Jesus. 

No, no, before you run away screaming from this post, thinking that I’ve gone crazy at seminary, talking about Jesus on Valentine’s Day, let me remind you that it’s a central tenant of the Christian faith that we all need Jesus and also that the reason we even have Valentine’s Day is because there was once upon a time a St. Valentine who loved Jesus so much he died for him and/or the faith that bears his name.

And this is his skull. Supposedly. Does that help? It was meant to help.

But listen, listen, I am in need of a man who can teach me how to love my neighbor past the point of comfort (and so are you). I am in need of a man who can turn me away from the damaging things in this world (and so are you). I am, truly and genuinely, in need of a man who can affirm my worth through his love of me, because Christ died for us while we were yet sinners and that proves God’s love for us and what other ground is there for my hope besides the promise that I am loved past the point of death by the Almighty (and so. are. you.)? We are all in need of Jesus, especially now.

And not just the Jesus of the Beatitudes or the Golden Rule or the story of the Good Samaritan. You cannot limit Jesus to just being a moral figure. This is Jesus, the Logos of God, the Word Made Flesh, the organizing principle of the universe made physical in our world. The organizing principle of the universe came to the Earth to show/speak/tell us what’s most important in the world and how to love each other, came to break into our existence and change it forever and we killed him.  The Love that we desperately need, that was so fundamental to the universe that it spoke everything that we see into existence, that Love came to seek us, to find us, and we were frightened of it, frightened to death. We killed that Love in what may be the worst way imaginable, hanging that Love on an instrument of torture, leaving it there to suffocate under the weight of our unworthiness.

But praise be to God that this is a Love that did not forever die.

Listen, I know that I need this man Jesus because there is a homeless man who sits daily at the entrance to the Farragut North metro stop and I’ve never given him anything kinder than a half-hearted smile. I know that I need this man Jesus because one of my best friends moved out a couple of years ago and I can’t find it in me to forgive her for the hurt she caused me. I know that I need this man Jesus because when a good man asked me to dance, I was so concerned with preserving myself that I never even looked at his face. I need Jesus because I need to be shown how to love and trust, to be re-formed in the image of Love and sent out into a hurting world. I need my rough places to be made plain and my valleys to be exalted. These are things that only Love can fix. And if Jesus had come to us as a woman, I would be here saying that I stand in need of the woman Jesus who breaks the power of cancelled sin and sets me free for joyful obedience. It doesn't matter. I need Love.

Love is a many splendored thing. Love lifts us up where we belong. All we need is Love. Love rises above our material needs, above our hurts and our fears, and shows us a more perfect way. But Love does not keep us there. Love sends us back out to be Love for the world.

Happy Valentine’s Day, y’all.

Bottle Stream of Consciousness

...can't believe that confirmation...

Well hello! Look who's awake! Oh, I see that face. You're hungry, aren't you? Knew that was coming. Here, let's try the sling... Okay, okay, the sling isn't going to be our thing right now. But it worked so well earlier! Okay, hey, hey, here's the bottle. Hey hey, little buddy, bottle. That's it.

Shame about the sling, because I got such good work done earlier. Still, I just gotta put in a couple of quotes about the sovereignty of God and revelation in scripture and that paper's done. Then we can dig into that Bonhoeffer reading for Thursday... Maybe I can pull that up now. His Christology just seems so important to--

Hang on, hang on, we need to burp you. Yeah we do. Come on. Whatcha think, little guy? Is it the bouncing or the back patting that does more for your digestive system? There we are. Solid burp, my man. Here you go.

You know, maybe there is something to that idea of original sin being an epigenetic phenomena. I mean, if it's a condition of being "in the flesh"... Where did that idea come from? Did I make that up? That's certainly outside of the realm of what I've studied. It sounds made up. Maybe I'll bounce it off of--

Oops, hold on, little bro, I gotta shift positions here. There you are.

Just astoundingly unqualified. I mean, it's debatable exactly what the position allows her to do, so reports of the death of public education are mostly likely greatly exaggerated, but still, it's not like it's a hopeful sign, you know? All those phone calls...

Are you done? You look almost done. Yeah ya do. Yeah ya do.

To be and not to seem, Senator Burr. To be and not to seem.

Okay, up and burp one more time! Let's see what you got. Let's see what you got. Dum da dum dum, dum da dum. Dum da dum dum, dum da dum dum dum! Dum da dum dum, dum da dum-- Good job! How ya feeling? Ya feeling a nap again? Maybe a look out at the trees?

That walk was really nice this afternoon. It's a shame that 70 degrees in February can't just be enjoyed as a fluke of nature or something. And a good breeze! I wonder if he's ever felt wind on his face like that before. Looked pretty happy. Well, let him be.

Hey, look, it's a cardinal! Look look, that little red bird over there! They say it's a sign of good luck! Yeah they do. Who knows. Stranger things, right? And we could all use some luck sometimes, right? Just a little bit. Just a little bit. That's right.

I Didn't Know

Y’all, I had no idea. I had no idea what it’s like.

I mean, maybe you do. Maybe you know what it’s like to have a baby fall asleep in your arms, confident in the reliability of your support, snuggled into the skin of your chest like it’s the only pillow to ever exist. Maybe you’ve lived into the sweet peace of that moment when the bouncing and the comforting and the rocking can cease and a tiny person grants you the grace of trust and quiet. But if you haven’t, goodness, what a difference holding a baby makes.

I hadn’t seen what it’s like to watch a baby watch the world. I mean, maybe you have, maybe you’ve seen those gigantic eyes as they follow birds and squirrels and dogs from down the street out in nature, how they squint against the still-too-bright sunlight when they try to see the sky, the newness of the outside world still surprising the sensitivity of their tiny, growing body. It’s an inspiration to watch a baby watch snow, endlessly fascinated by the swirling flakes even though years from now he won’t remember whose arms held him while he learned how the whiteness falling from above blankets the ground in rest. I’ve watched more people than I can count see the Earth from space or the shape of a galaxy for the first time and I guard those moments jealously, like a wedding attendee sneaking a peek at the groom just as the bride begins to walk down the aisle, but man, what a difference the newness of a baby makes.

I just had no clue how many songs I would sing to this child in the past week. Maybe you’re familiar with the quiet hum that sometimes settles a tiny one when they’re fussy, but I have pulled out all the stops for this kid, even with my throat scratchy from leading chants as we marched down Constitution Avenue. I sang Dear Theodosia and Summertime and Go to Sleep and Do You Hear the People Sing and A Father’s First Spring and I know-oh-oh a Change is Gonna Come. I hummed Star Wars and Indiana Jones and Harry Potter and ET and the waltz from Sleeping Beauty. I got in a few snatches of Jupiter and bits of melody that I couldn’t place or name. I never imagined the natural comfort and ease with which I would give my voice to another. Then again, it is astounding the difference a baby makes.

And I just don’t know. I don’t understand the self-sacrificial love of a parent. I don’t grasp the incredible hope that bringing a child into this world entails. I don’t feel in my gut the worry for the future that this infant must engender in his mother and father, no matter how many times I hear about it in songs and movies. I’ve never had to adjust my sleeping schedule, my eating schedule, my free time around someone else, much less around a little bundle of helplessness that can’t express to me in words what he wants. I’m just a nanny so I change his diapers and rinse formula out of my sweater and stretch before I walk in the house in case the baby can only conceive of quiet if he’s being held and count each precious second of this little life in formation that I get to be a part of. I am floored at the difference eight hours a day with a baby makes.

Every human life starts off as this tiny little miracle, this little being that hasn’t heard the lie of self-sufficiency or mastered the delusion of control and possession. They give their faith so freely. How do I get back to this? How do I rest with such confidence? How do I look around with such joy? How do I listen with patience to the songs around me?

Maybe I start with naming the grace upon grace that’s been given to me this week through this child, through my classes and professors, through my friends, through strangers. I can be reminded and renewed. Strength has given, even when all I had were sighs that begged for it. And maybe the next thing I do is to pour back out all that kindness and goodness and mercy and strength given to me. Maybe the trust, the rest, the joy, the patience comes in both the receiving and the giving.

Because, man. I wasn't ready for the way a baby's smile can knock you out. One of the finest gifts a tiny one can give and they give it away for a song.