I have a blog, but I am terrible about updating it. I type enough in writing 10-20 page papers for graduate school that the last thing I want to do it type more. When I write, I journal. Handwritten thoughts complete with all the spelling and grammar mistakes you could wish for and more. But I'm on a break from school until tomorrow and I thought this could use a more recent entry. This blog is supposed to be around the theme of living and loving simply, just simply sharing the love and care of the Divine with others and embracing it for myself.
Lately it has felt less simple. I have felt a stirring within me, something I cannot name yet and I'm not even sure if I feel welcoming or unwelcoming towards whatever I feel is coming. I only noticed it because I started listening to Sara Groves a lot more recently for no particular reason at all and suddenly her lyrics moved me all over again when they hadn't really in months. The truth is, until recently I was very uneasy with God, Church, Jesus, the Bible, doctrine and everything else that defines the religion in which I grew up. I no longer believe a lot of the things I was taught, but have been finding it hard to hold on to what it is I do believe. Because of that, I have felt estranged from the Christian community and afraid of those who were a part of that community in my past. But two weeks ago, I visited one of those people, a woman who had always been a dear mentor and friend to me in what feels like a past life.
I had not seen this friend in four years and she did not walk with me through these last two years of incredible transformation. To be honest, I almost feared seeing her again. I was afraid of what she would think of who I'd become, of what I have come to think, feel, believe, and act out. I feared her disapproval and that she would affirm my feelings of estrangement. None of that happened. In fact, she said to me, "Stevie, I am so glad that you are still you. Some people change and become less of themselves, but you have changed and have become even more of yourself." I talked with her, watched her with her family, and got to share life with her for what was far too short a visit and returned feeling more hopeful, accepted, peaceful, and embraced by God and community than I had in a while. I noticed this feeling and this Sara Groves lyric came to me: 'No time to grab the camera. No time to write it down, just time enough to breathe it in and linger.' That was all the time I had, 'to breathe it in and linger,' and now something else it stirring, an unrest, and I do not know its name or purpose yet, but I can feel it and I know it's God.
And my prayers reflect Sara Groves' lyrics:
I keep wanting you to be fair, but that's not what you said. I want certain answers to these prayers but that's not what you said. ~"What I Thought I Wanted"
But my body's tired from trying to bring you here. My brow is furrowed from trying to see things clear. So I'll turn my back to the black and fall and wait for the mystery to rise up and meet me. ~"Mystery"
