At the Heart of the Matter

It's hard to love people well some days. After giving a thousand reminders to complete one task or another, giving all that you have just to hear someone say that it isn't enough, or redirecting a student for the same thing that you have had to redirect him for every day for the past month it can become borderline impossible to love people.

You ask, "Am I not loved? Am I not wanted?"

Trap set. Slowly step in. Snagged. 

Pride and self-service engaged. 

When I'm really tired and facing the trials of residential service, I have a tendency to reach a point where I stop focusing on why I'm in the industry to begin with. I lose motivation and become locked up in myself. "I don't get enough off time", "I'm not appreciated for what I do so obviously I'm not needed or wanted here", and "I'm not being supported" are all cries for help that actually dance around the real issues at hand. I hear staff say it all the time, but the fact is that even after 2 years of working in the same field I too still fall into that same trap they do. 

I make the mistake of misplacing the source of my own value and I too forget the reason I move half way across the country: to love and serve teens in need. 

Not a simple or incredibly joy-filled position really. It's easy to love destitute, impoverish children in foreign lands for a week, but middle to upper class white boys with entitlement and a set of clothes valued higher than your monthly pay for months and months at a time? Nah. 

That's rough. There isn't glory and prestige in that. There is often very little recognition for it either. But it is beautiful and needed. The important things usually come with some form of discomfort.

Just as the farmer battles the Sun and pestilence & the sea-man wars against the wind and the waves, so must I navigate the struggles of loving others in spite of their false-beliefs and tendencies to cave into negative peer pressure.

Do I feel unappreciated? Yes. Is that the real issue? No. The real issue is that I'm tired and I really just want to see that all my effort isn't for nothing. I want to know that I'm spending my time and energy well and not wasting anything. I want to know that my boys are going to go back to their homes and live successful lives and be happy, and I want to enjoy the fullness of community and relationship with them and others around me. Those are the real issues.

Ultimately I crave to love others well, and when I remember that and set my heart back in line I find that I do just that. Then I am healthy; then I am happy.

Grace and Peace,
Stephen

Until Morning

Loneliness hits when you least expect it sometimes. Like a sudden storm, it moves in and overtakes the skies; blocks out the sun...

I sometimes feel like a fraud at work, telling my kids that there is hope; telling them to keep going and to push through when I myself am at war with my heart to stay hopeful and to not give up.

Tonight I find myself in the midst of that familiar storm. I've weathered it before, but it still catches me off guard even after having experienced it so many times. 

It sucks. Sometimes it takes all you have just to not grow cold and to not succumb to it's power. My wicked heart demands relief. Temptation to look up porn, to fantasize, to wallow in my sorrows, to cycle through old thoughts of self-hatred. etc come creeping in. It's in moments like these when I feel like God isn't listening or that He doesn't care. I know it isn't true. My life has been proof of that, but the feeling is still there and it overrides my logic. 

I hide it from my students, but I too am insecure, hurting, lonely, and craving for love and purpose. 

I know that God will see me through. I know that God is here in this moment. I have had many moments, even recently, when He made Himself known to me and stepped in. He loves me. 

Loneliness is here for the night and she will will be my guest, but I know that she will not stay long. God will always come in to help me pick up the mess she left behind and help putting things in order again. 

"Sorrow will last for the night...but joy comes with the morning."

On Eagles' Wings

When you're a kid, and the world is small, it is easy to imagine that you can make a difference; that you can save the world. Which is ironic cause most kids can't tell you why the world needs saving. They just know it does.

When I was young I fantasized about being a hero. I imagined that I could fly--that I could sweep in and save someone from harm and take them away to my secret hideout in the side of a mountain where nothing evil could reach it.

As I grew older and my world changed, I began to daydream that that same safe haven wasn't so safe. Family situations began to develop and my ability to comprehend the dysfunction started to shake the paradigms that I had developed within my concrete, 5-year-old mind. In my imaginary world I found that I would have to defend my sanctuaries against attack. Regardless, the place I had conjured in my mind was safe because I fought to keep it safe. Looking back as an adult, I can see the direct correlation between my imagination to my real life issues that I was trying to process out through story.

By the time I was a teenager, my imagination begat fewer and fewer beautiful realities and replaced them with stories of pain and struggle. Stories that didn't always turn out "happily ever after." And everything around me screamed that this...this was normal.

                                                                               ***

There is darkness and suffering. That's undeniable. It's everywhere we look. The beauty of the Gospel is that all can (and will) be redeemed! Christ, our great hope, is the foundation for believing and chasing after a world that is filled with peace and unity! In Christ, we can dare to believe that the impossible can happen; to believe that skin color, gender, and a thousand human variables don't have to divide us and that, in Christ, they won't!

Behold! the Light has come and the darkness cannot understand it!

***

Life has a tendency to clip our wings and strip us of our armor. It's easy to fall into the trap of hardship and despair; to forget that as kids we once flew above the tree and fought against ghosts and goblins. We have grown cold in our elder years with the pain of love and loss. The kingdom of elves has been closed off. The land of golden rivers and sapphire tress has all but vanished. 

"It's time to grow up", they say, not even knowing what they mean or why. 

Should growing up mean that we lose our wonder or that hope must be tucked away in a chest like it's just another child's toy that is no longer relevant or acceptable to play with? 

What would happen if we allowed ourselves the opportunity to hope again? to hope for a unified and peaceful humanity? to dare to believe that we can put an end to racism? to live in a world where border control wasn't needed or travel warning lists could all be burned?

What if we dared to believe that we could fly?

Body and Spirit

Recently I picked up a book that I had read through with my pastors back in Knoxville called "Sacred Rhythms." While I had read most of the book, there was a couple of sections that I just skimmed through to keep up with the group, and now I wish I hadn't.

The chapters I just read were concerning the theology of the body and the art of self-examination. While I thought I had a pretty good grasp of both concepts, it seems that God had a lot to say to me concerning both of these matters.

Concerning the Body: The belief of total separation of physical health from spiritual health is a trap we can easily fall into. One usually affects the other in a significant way. My physical health affects my spiritual, and my spiritual hinders my desire and motivation for physical health. The cycle continues.

It is also no secret that I am not a huge fan of the DNA that I've been given. Between my brother and other people often making fun of my red hair or my nearly translucent skin, along with other natural/general insecurities, I have not wanted to care for the body that God gave me. As a child or teen I never learned to appreciate the body I have. I never saw the grace that had been given to me or the value that I was bestowed. The focus was always outward, noting that others could tan, that both my siblings were blessed with a kinder metabolism, etc.

God gave me life. He gave my physical form, muscle, color, strength, senses, etc and yet I have not shown Him the gratitude that He is due. Furthermore, I have neglected to appreciate creation in a way that only my physical body can! The taste of water, the feeling of grass, and the brushing of the wind are all examples of things God granted as experiences for us that I often take for granted.

A few months ago I had a friend who ran into my house and excitedly shared her joy in the fact that it was down-pouring rain outside. She insisted that I come stand in the rain with her and dance in it. Moved by her passion I emptied my pockets of anything that might be damaged and ran outside. Even though there were others watching, we didn't care about whether we looked like fools or not. God had given us a gift and we weren't going to miss out!

The Art of Self-Examination: Recognizing that body and Spirit are connected is the first step, but then being aware of the health of both is a wholly different issue. having aware requires focus and time. Neither of which I really like to give when I'm tired. I'm always tired.

Being exhausted often feels like the number one requirement/qualification of my job (residential leadership) and when it comes down to it, the thing I need most I want to do least. This weekend, however, God drew me into a place where meditation was possible (and necessary) and helped me to begin examining my heart and my mind. I doubt I'll ever be a master of self-examination because of the level of discipline and honest it takes, but I'm getting there!

The honesty part is probably the hardest for me. I don't like to see the good in me. Why? No frapping clue. There are some aspects of the bad I don't like to be honest about either.

So here is a confession. This weekend I've experienced a lot of jealous/envy. Jealous of how others look, how fit they are, how tall they are, the relationships they have with our students, etc. I often have to be the "bad guy" at work and I rarely get the benefits that I used to as Mentor rather than as an Assistant House Director. I have been jealous of my staff and even felt a measure of bitterness in hearing their complaints as I take the junk and they get the love, support, and appreciation that often seems lacking in my own life. That's not fair to them though. In the midst of my examination, God drew my attention to this reality and revealed to me how it has been affecting the way I think, feel, and behave.

I love people. A lot. I give all that I can and often that gets overlooked. I find myself torn between trying to live without any need for appreciation and the hard truth that I do, in fact, NEED appreciation. We all do.

All that to say, if I had not taken the time to examine my heart and see where I was at, I couldn't ever address it. I couldn't begin the steps I needed to healing this part of my life and I couldn't ask for help. I couldn't express my need to those who needed to know/wanted to know. In turn my spiritual, mental, and emotional state would continue to degrade and, as a result, so would my physical state. I would not have the energy to try or the ability to focus. Etc.

Give and Take: Having addressed both of these issues, my goal now is to integrate this knowledge into my daily living. I am seeking to take better care of my body and my spirit by bringing both physical and spiritual discipline higher up on my list of priorities. I can't help others if I'm not also seeking to help myself.

I always tell my students "Give more than you take, but never give in order that you can take." The reality is that I have to take to be able to give. I have to take care of myself to give care to others. My ratio of loving others will always be higher than for myself but I still need to care for myself. In the midst of that I never want to become entitled and think that I have earned/deserve love and care just because I give both. I don't love others to make them love me. I love and let love. I have students that I care for who couldn't care less about me, but that shouldn't hinder me from caring about who they are or for their well being, only what I invest and how much I invest in the relationship.

Lastly, giving care often helps us to give care to ourselves. I have often found that in helping another resolve an issue in their life was exactly what God wanted me to do in order to resolve an issue in my own. God reveals a lot to us through the lives of others. So just as we must take care, we absolutely must give care as well.

Can you imagine what life would be like if the entire world lived out this concept?

Grace and Peace,
Stephen 

Brothers in Humanity

Every few months we get new staff at work. We hire in bulk three times a year and train them as "classes." With each class comes a new set of faces, personalities, giftings, and struggles. Each one bringing to the table the light and darkness-the sin and the Spirit-that is embedded within every Christian.

Hurt, pain, insecurity, pride, stubbornness, bitterness, the list goes on extensively. It's irritating!

Looking at the struggles of my students, teammates, friends, and those that I would consider even family, I can sometimes find myself frustrated with them and their shortcomings. Impatient and ungracious towards their needs and struggles.

Christ said to love our enemies. He challenged the status quo and demanded that love be shown even to those who we don't like or agree with. "Love your neighbors" is one of the many coined phrases of Christianity, yet those same Christians turn their back on the impoverished and war torn souls that need help.

I have needed help, and in in my need I forgot to see other people's needs. Mine eyes are turned inward to my own pain and I have began to "self-care" in an isolated and unloving way. A reality that God made very clear to me recently.

I had a student in my English class in Amman that made a big impact on how I viewed other people. "We are brothers in humanity", he would say to me. The words loom over me like a ghost and my soul stirs in response. It's a sobering and humbling experience to receive true, biblical wisdom from a Muslim. Reflecting on the environment I'm living/working in, I find those words affecting me still.

These men and women that I work with are my brothers and sisters. They are mine and I am theirs. My team. My family. My people. How could I be intolerant of the sin in them when it's so clearly embedded in me? When they endure my own? (and they definitely do!) How can I neglect their needs and their craving for love and support when I know so intimately the needs and desires in me?

As a new team comes to join us at Shelterwood this week, my prayer is this:

"Lord, bind us together in brotherhood and sisterhood. humble us to be loving and caring for each other just as You humbled Yourself for the sake of our souls. Tighten us together and teach us to hear form each other and to heal together, to be light to one another. Help us to find rest and support in our 'family' and let us not be unloving. Amen"


Grace and Peace,
Stephen