shame

Living by Flesh

January 25, 2021 — Leave a comment

As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath.

Ephesians 2:1-2

Building on Ephesians 1, we have to keep in mind God’s purpose: unity of heaven and Earth, unity of Jesus and the church, unity of head and body. This sense of connection and alignment must be the guide for parts of the Bible that mention words like flesh and body. The trap is to create a separation — flesh is bad and mind is good — a binary way of understanding that is engrained in humanity. With this in mind, I can see the above passage with more softness and compassion.

Zooming in on…to follow the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air…gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. To follow the ways of this world is to not live from a place of connection and unity where we tend to forget our purpose and how redemption. To follow the ruler of the kingdom of the air is to live creating fleeting results. And the mention of flesh here is a flesh that is again, disconnected with that divine hope and reality. That flesh and its desires and thoughts do not lead to unity and connection.

This passage is not to neglect our flesh and its desires. This reductive way of understanding God’s word has created so much harm. This is how shame and stigma have over and over again penetrate the church. This is why overarching rules and structures created from fear, white supremacy and patriarchy have been upheld, while faithful moment to moment living where each human has their agency is tossed aside. God does not want us to neglect our flesh and its desires. He gave us flesh, a living and breathing part of us, as an extension of the divine on earth and as a landscape to demonstrate unity and connection. It is how we use the flesh and why and for what reasons. This is where its gratification can do more harm than health. All of us chose this way of living once upon a time, and some of us now, simply have the awareness that there is another way.

Pleasure, Praise & Play

January 14, 2021 — Leave a comment

For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us for adoption to sonship through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will — to praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves.

Ephesians 1:4-6

It is God’s pleasure and will to call us his children. It is out of God’s love that he brings us in. Our ability to praise God’s grace is even a thing God gives us. Pleasure, praise and love are given to us freely and extravagantly.

When was the last time you allowed yourself to feel pleasure, praise freely and love deeply?

Pleasure. What comes to mind for you when you meditate on that word? “I’m not allowed…” “That’s indulgent…” “It’s..dirty.” Do guilt, shame and suppression arise? God started with pleasure! We are part of God’s pleasure! We, too, are allowed to know what is pleasurable, seek after what feels like ease in our body. Pleasure is our inherent coherence with the divine.

Praise… of his glorious grace. There is humility when you praise of God’s grace. There is an awareness when you really hold God’s grace. Not for the grace of God, go I… How can we praise from this deep humility and awareness, aware that you are not entitled to anything and humbled that if it were not for the grace of God, you would not be here? How can be praise in such a way that invites others into God’s grace, not push them away because of tone-deafness, but rather with a desire to share, even give your joy so another can experience it as well?

Love. Love is dangerous. Love demands of us to give so much we risk getting hurt. Love is removing the armor and drawing near and close. Love hopes. Love sees the other with as much worth and ferocity as God sees them. Can you love in this explosive way?

Where can you invite pleasure into your life today? How can you praise through eyes of wonder? Who can you love today that demands faith and courage?

Hide & Seek

September 20, 2020 — Leave a comment

When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves. Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden and in the cool of the day, and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to the man, ‘Where are you?’

Genesis 3:6-9

What makes me so sad in this passage is the need to cover up exposure and nakedness. Wisdom robs us of an innocence that allows us to be free and naked, unafraid to trot as we are with everything we have out there. Wisdom somehow made our nakedness and another’s nakedness something that was not appropriate for the public. Somewhere between innocence and wisdom, shame snuck in. And I hate shame.

The shame that causes us to hide from each other. The shame that causes us to hide from God. The shame that causes us to hide from ourselves. Shame put barriers between us and other, us and God and within ourselves. Because this shame can be planted in us so early, it’s hard to know what life feels like without it. What does life feel like without shame? What will it take to reclaim a sense of innocence and openness? What “wisdom” is helpful and gives us a way to draw boundaries and separate from that which is evil? But what “wisdom” only seeks to separate and cover up because it gives you an impression of “safety” even if underneath that is shutting in/shutting down? I hope we can hold to wisdom without anger and guilt because truth is we are post-Garden of Eden and we have access to wisdom now. So while you hold to your wisdom, how can you also find the early seeds of innocence that allowed you to be open, to trust, to feel so connected to another, you didn’t ever need to hide or curate?

Imogen Heap – Hide & Seek: Isn’t that our life anthem? Can we shift to more of a Keala Seattle – This is Me soundtrack?

CBG: Pure

June 28, 2020 — Leave a comment

And [Jesus] opened his mouth and taught them saying:
Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

Matthew 5:2-8

Purity. How do we untether the word from the white supremacist, patriarchal and othering world it is often defined by in today’s church cultures?

Burn the idea of being a precious untouched flower.
Burn the idea of being white.
Burn the idea of being a certain kind of feminine that “upholds value” aka dogwhistle sexism.
Burn the idea that it is too late, too far gone for others aka shame.

Purity. Clean. Whole. Full integrity. Is purity a fable and a lie to keep the masses down while those at the pulpit hold onto their power to tell us how to attain? Who is pure among us? Jesus? I think, maybe, only, Jesus…Jesus certainly saw God.

What was his heart like? Full of emotions. Full of purpose. His heart was for his calling on earth — to close the gap between humans and God. His heart was to bring all to a state of worthiness and wholeness so that those in that experience know their forever place in the kingdom of God.

Purity in heart is a callback to the uninhibited connection to God in the garden. It requires a burning of the shame, the lie that we need to do it on our own and the distrust of a good creator. Purity in heart is how we are created — an innocence and full access to God — but the ways of this world fog up that truth. If we can believe that we are already pure in heart while simultaneously working to feel and exist pure in heart, we will become intimate with God and our purpose.

Prayer: God I pray for the courage to believe in my already purity while working towards experiencing it fully. God I pray for shames and lies to be burned away by your goodness.

How has the idea of purity made me small or judgmental?

CBG: Scarlet Letter

June 12, 2020 — Leave a comment

So [Jesus] came to a town of Samaria called Sychar, near the field that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there; so Jesus, wearied as he was from his journey, was sitting beside the well. It was about the sixth hour. A woman from Samaria came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.” (For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.) The Samaritan woman said to him, ‘How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman of Samaria?” (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.) Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.’ The woman said to him, ‘Sir, you have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.’ Jesus said to her, ‘Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water I give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.’ The woman said to him, ‘Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water.’ Jesus said to her, ‘Go, call your husband, and come here.’ The woman answered him, ‘I have no husband.’ Jesus said to her, ‘You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; for you have had five husbands, and the one who now have is not your husband. What would you have is true.

John 4:5-18

The woman comes to draw water at the well at the sixth hour, which is noon. She comes at this time because no one else comes at this time. She won’t have any awkward and uncomfortable run-in’s. She can’t talk to the Jews because she’s a Samaritan, and that’s the way of the land. She can avoid judgmental eyes and whispers she can deduce are about her. She might not want to talk to her own people because they know her past and her present. Her practice of drawing water at this hour and then her response to Jesus’ ask demonstrate a desire to hide and squelch connection.

The Samaritan woman must have felt like Hester from The Scarlet Letter. In this Jewish land where she is a Samaritan, she is a minority that well-acquainted with the racial and ethnic tensions. In this encounter with Jesus, her systems and cultures are questioned, her story and beliefs are revealed and her work of bridging communities began.

These sound bite phrases are frequently used and may lose their potency. So for today, this is the language I’ve chosen to find resonance.

  1. This Samaritan woman was given the opportunity and permission to converse about the systems she has been living in. She was invited into a conversation about attitudes and cultures that have been passed down from generations, without being shamed for having these thoughts.
  2. This woman was given space to share her story, her questions and her hopes. Even though Jesus knew all the answers, he never comes at her with an arrogance or impatience. Because part of healing one’s shame and trauma is to feel, hear and experience one’s identity in the safety of another who is gently and non-judgmentally holding it.
  3. This woman was so inspired and uplifted that she ran back to her community, forgot the task that she was doing and entered the path she was always called to. She ran back and told others and in that bridged even more relationships between Samaritans and Jews. She shared her revelation because it was a gift for all.

While the spaces and life we live may not be marked overtly by the presence of Jesus, may we enter hard conversations with this openness and honesty, even if there are high risks. May we educate ourselves on our history, our trauma, our wrongs and our hopes. May we share gifts and grace with all because grace begets grace and grace opens hearts to the love of God.

Prayer: God may every day feel like an encounter with the curious, kind and radical Jesus at the well. May that spur me onto community building words and acts.

Where do we see our desire to hide and squelch connection?

Sh*t Christians Don’t Say: Singles vs marrieds

June 29, 2019 — Leave a comment

Just kidding. The church LOVES talking about singles and marrieds. It’s both adored at the pulpit and anticipated in the audience. There’s this rush of hope every time that maybe this sermon would unlock and unravel the pain of waiting for singles, and root and make sense the never talked about pain of staying for marrieds. Yet no one really talks about the pain of waiting because we love focusing on how singleness is a gift and that the Lord can really use you specifically in this season. So we have a bunch of singles hurting inside lashing themselves with this holy waiting and trust. And no one talks about the real pain of marriage. Ya we talk about how it’s ultimate sanctification and how’s that’s the hardest BUT MOST BEAUTIFUL thing on earth, blah blah blah. But can we cut the glamorized version of difficult sanctification and get into the nitty ugly cave. Do we talk about falling out of love with your spouse? Do we talk about low grade amounts, and I dare you, overt abuse? Do we talk about how monogamy is not natural and how sometimes this fight seems too uphill? We don’t. We wrap obstacles in, we’re being sanctified.

The danger of never talking about these things is that when someone is in that position, the response is guilt and shame. If we are ever in a space that is not publicly discussed as normal, we feel abnormal when we experience these human tendencies. Shame is hiding because of a fear of losing worthiness. Shame is hiding because of a fear of judgment. Shame is hiding because a facade keeps others distant from your mess. Isn’t that what happened at the garden? We assumed God would lash at us so we hid and lied instead. I wonder if those peeps in Eden were outright about what they did, would they have been able to stay in the garden? God might have let them stay? The transgression wasn’t the issue? The hiding was? But the reality is, we are no longer in Eden and people are not lovely like God. When we are vulnerable people do cover us in judgment, create distance and make us feel less Christian or unwise/blind/foolish when we talk about said topics above. It’s a fucking catch-22. If you talk, you might get shamed. If you don’t talk, you are imprisoned by shame. How do we change the culture to merely listening and holding space, suspending your judgment and quickness to scripture showering?

But I think the deepest issue with this whole thing is singles v marrieds. FOR THE LOVE OF GOD STOP DIVIDING PEOPLE IN THE CHURCH IN TWO CATEGORIES. Why do you do that?!! Why do you delineate people by relationship status? Inherent in that boxing is our huge human-created difference, there’s a type of crossing over, there’s us v them and they wouldn’t understand the struggle. Don’t act like after marriage, spouses don’t want to sleep with a hot emotionally available dude that walks by. Don’t act like singles cannot get deeply sanctified by close friends and roommates, FO SHO. When you say singleness is a gift, then proceed to spend 15 minutes chatting about the beauty of waiting….take a nice exhale, smile and then get into your inclusive circle tone of voice to talk to those who are married, it is obvious and weird. Stop taking a few verses in the Bible and elevating them into central to our faith structure — don’t we Christians love doing that with whatever scripture seems perfect for such a time as this. Why don’t we talk about things we as humans struggle with that cross all boundaries? Greediness. Jealousy. Greediness. Racism. Sexism. Misogyny. Defensiveness. Ego. Gossip wrapped in we should pray for her. Ego. Fucking ego. Why do we need pastors specifically for singles and marrieds? What qualifies one to know people in these categories better? I’m really asking. Do I go to one pastor if I’m thinking about masturbation and another pastor when I want to hoard my money? Stop drawing out details of my identity like they’re my defining trait. Stop making such a big deal about my status like that’s the reason I sin. I don’t always put God first because I’m human and selfish. My relationship status is not how primarily relate to people. We have created a culture of such connection like that in church. It’s incomplete and often damaging.

Stop putting people in boxes so it’s easier for you to manage and control. Stop defining people so you can quickly go to your prescription box of scriptures. See me as a complicated human. Show me the wisdom and faith and trust I too have the Spirit.