emotions

Advent: Day 1

November 28, 2021 — 2 Comments

Advent is anticipation, it’s waiting, it’s knowing that good is coming…and we gotta be patient.

When I’m hangry, the time before my feeding is brutal. I feel like I have lost control of my emotions. I feel like I could bite someone’s head off if they say the wrong thing. I feel pissed and then more pissed because I don’t know why I’m so pissed. When I finally realize it’s because I’m hungry, I get a spurt of light and hope. Ah, a solution!! I forgive myself for the thoughts and feelings and potentially behaviors before my need realization. Sometimes I brave the wait by trying to convince myself the hunger will pass. Actually if you press long enough, the hunger does pass. Other times I immediately go venturing for the food. Now if I’m in search for food, this time is also brutal. Because the solution is clear and feels close, yet too far away. I get focused. I get quiet. I am determined. This is also vulnerable territory because any obstacle can be a land mine. But then when I get that first bite, I am blown away, like heaven has come to meet me in my mouth. I love everyone. I love this food. I am grateful. I forget that I was once upon a time, a minute ago, about to slay and rage. I am simply overcome by this food that I knew would cure me, yet also didn’t fully know would bring me so much life.

Why this story? Because advent can feel like this slew of this and that and pissy attitude, even when you know what’s about to come. Because advent, anticipation, waiting and future promises can bring up a lot of feelings and doubts and land mines? Because you might not even know what this advent uncovers! I know the coming of hope and Justice is damn good and is about to, has come.

But the in between, the moments when your body and the world seem to take over, need to be acknowledged and embraced. It’s okay to be pissy and hungry and longing and disappointed and dissatisfied and excited and impatient and patient and … all of it. Take a breath. Allow for it.

What are you waiting for?

What do you know without a doubt, is going to happen, but just requires some trust in timing?

Can you anticipate good instead of glum? Can you anticipate all your dreams and promises coming true? Can you anticipate god’s YES for you?

Lent Day 3: I give up The Need to Keep it Together

February 19, 2021 — Leave a comment

Then your light will break forth like the dawn, and your healing will quickly appear; then your righteousness will go before you, and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard. Then you will call, and the Lord will answer; you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I.

Isaiah 58:8-9

There is dark so light can break through. There is hurt so healing can appear. There are moments of lapse in judgment and poor behavior so righteousness can once again shine through. There is fear so the glory of God can push me to take my next step. There is my need for help that leads to my call to God. I let go of only holding onto what’s to come without acknowledging how I feel right now. I do not need to be okay right now. I do not need to look okay. I do not need to collect myself. I get to accept, embrace, be angry, be sad, be needing right now in this moment. Because my breakthrough comes when I realize this part of myself — the part that is messy, scared, lonely, angry — is just as beautiful. I give up needing to present only the side of me that works for the people around me. I give up spending energy trying to make those around me comfortable when I am shriveling up inside. I allow myself to be all in, in the pain with hope for the joy, in the sadness with expectation of the renewal, in the fear knowing if I dare to take just one step in faith, I will fly.

Blessed in the Mess

October 8, 2020 — Leave a comment

My heart is in anguish within me; the terrors of death have fallen on me. Fear and trembling have beset me; horror has overwhelmed me. I said, ‘Oh, that I had the wings of a dove! I would fly away and be at rest. I would flee far away and stay in the desert; I would hurry to my place of shelter, far from the tempest and storm.’
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As for me, I call to God, and the Lord saves me. Evening, morning and noon I cry out in distress, and he hears my voice. He rescues me unharmed from the battle waged against me, even though many oppose me. God, who is enthroned from of old, who does not change — he will hear them and humble them, because they have no fear of God.
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Cast your cares on the Lord and he will sustain you; he will never let the righteous be shaken. But you, God, will bring down the wicked into the pit of decay; the bloodthirsty and deceitful will not live out half their days. But as for me, I trust in you.

Psalm 55

Exhaustion brews in the air. Dreaming of escaping the exhaustion takes even more work. How can I rest right here? How can I rest in the midst of my heart feeling anguish? How can I rest in the center of fear and trembling?

Try not to run away. Try not to flee. Cry out, yes, but escape, no. Cry out every hour. Cast the burdens. Cast the fears. Cast the things you care about down. Those are weighing you down. Those are holding you back. Those are trapping you in the exhaustion and the circumstances.

You will not be shaken even as the waves come crashing near. You will make it even when it feels like your legs might give way. You will be carried because that is the kind of God that is looking after us. God is unchanging even as we storm in with all our mess. He takes that mess and shows us how we can be blessed.

CBG: Body

April 21, 2020 — Leave a comment

You have kept count of my tossings, put my tears in your bottle. Are they not in your book?

Psalm 56:8

This is a needed reminder that God cares about our pain, our losses and our sorrows. While we are encouraged to surrender our pain to God and not keep a record of wrongs, we can trust that there is always someone who knows.

Can this also not apply to the Holy Spirit that is in our body? That the Holy Spirit in our body is also holding our tears and our pains? On the bright side of things, this can mean the deepest intimacy of holding space. The Holy Spirit that is not separated from us, but working through and in us is immediately available to hold our tears and pains. With that nearness, redemption and relief can also be immediate. Do you recall those moments when in an instance something’s lifted, you feel lighter, you feel transformed? On the tougher end of things, which always exists on this side of heaven, it also means our bodies remember trauma. Our bodies hold sadness. Our bodies have memories of hurts and losses. Even after Jesus was resurrected, his hands and feet still carried the traces of his trauma. Where can we fit hope into this? Your body is a temple, a holy place, your friend, your sanctuary. Honor the feelings and memories it gives you access to. How can awareness lead to gentle comfort and patient expansion or realignment? How can you be grateful for your body’s wisdom and history, yet know its true purpose is to point to a redemptive future? For all the talk in the Bible about the body, for the greatest act of God in human form, we must honor our holy selves that are marked by this human body.

Prayer: God, where do I hold my sadness? Where do I hold my anger? Where do I feel your Spirit? Where can I let you expand my heart?

Creative: Give yourself 5 minutes to take an inventory of your body. Thank it.

Brave: Wonderful Fear Setting exercise by Tim Ferris

Generous: Who needs you to “hold” them today?

CBG: #9

March 29, 2020 — 1 Comment

Indeed, in this case, what once had glory had come to have no glory at all, because of the glory that surpasses it. For if what was being brought to an end came with glory, much more will what is permanent have glory. Since we have such a hope, we are very bold, not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face so that the Israelites might not gaze at the outcome of what was being brought to an end. But their minds were hardened. For to this day, when they read the old covenant, that same veil remains unlifted, because only through Christ is it taken away. Yes, to this day whenever Moses is read a veil lies over their hearts. But when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is there is freedom. And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.

2 Corinthians 3:10-18

Let’s have this weekly rhythm of an unveiling, a reflection, an inventory of ourselves. In the presence of God, we can be exposed without judgment. The sin in the garden was the hiding due to shame. We do not need to hide. We can cast away shame. Doing this reflection consistently, does not only reveal how you are shifting from glory to glory, but the catapult to shifting. You are in the process of sanctification you champion! This kind of heart work is creative, brave & generous.

  1. What question(s) were you attempting to answer?
  2. What emotion(s) were most present?
  3. When did you feel the presence of God’s peace & calm? Who were you with? What were you doing?
  4. What brought you joy?
  5. What revealed your heartbreak?
  6. What is one change you can make this week to create more safety, unity and kindness for yourself and others?

Drop an answer in the comment. We are in this journey together!

Psalms 6 – 9: oh Lord…how long?

January 11, 2020 — Leave a comment

The ache and the rejoice are neighbors. The desire for God and the anger of the world are complementary. The recounting of God’s presence and the feeling of God’s absence fuel each other. We live in this tension of want and have, of yes Lord and where are you Lord? Maybe there are no peaks and valleys, only journey in the present.

The presence and calling of God calls forth all our emotions. God forces us to self-reflect. The moment we want vengeance, we also see our own faults. We cannot see the speck in another without seeing the plank in ourselves. So what then? Have your say and have your feel. However end with trusting that God is sovereign and we are only responsible for doing our parts that are led by justice, righteousness, gratitude and wholehearted surrender.

God I pray for self-awareness in the stead of self-pity. I pray for vulnerability in the stead of bitterness and fear. God I pray for an overflow of trust in you even when I cannot see and cannot hear because when I recount where I am now, I know you have been with me till now. Amen.