A lot has happened since I last wrote anything down. My family and I had 3 weeks of vacation ... and it was not the most relaxing of vacations. It was a tour up the east coast to Maine and back visiting different family members along the way. Without going into details ... there were just a bunch of different family issues at each stop that came into play that just made the whole vacation less about peace and quiet and more about serving. That is not a bad thing - it was just different than expected - and if I am being honest not really what I wanted.
Putting that all aside ... as soon as we arrived home I had my second retreat to Colorado for the Soul Care Institute. It was a beautiful setting - gorgeous grounds on a convent in Colorado Springs. Beautiful stone buildings, nestled in the foot hills of the mountains, in lush real grass, with deer that ate from your hand, and perfect sunny cool days.
The first full day of the retreat they always give us a 5-6 hour window for silence and solitude. This is my least favorite part because I always get silence from God, so who needs 6 hours set apart for it? I decided to schedule my spiritual direction hour to fall during this time to suck up at least one of those blasted hours. I met with a women I haven't really talked with a whole lot ... that was the first problem but I tried to remain open anyway. Since she didn't know my story I tried to share it very briefly with her so that I could get to the current problem. When I shared though I was very scattered and chaotic ... and she latched onto the part about me not being healed from shame yet. She thought it might be a good idea to do some healing prayer in that direction and I consented - truly not sure what God wanted for the time. So we dove into healing prayer ... that means I had to track down my first memory where shame came onto the scene. I came to the time when my mom came and told me that she, and my brother and I were all moving out because my parents were separating. Then you're supposed to go back into that memory and invite Jesus to come and speak to you in some way about that event. Before we prayed though, I asked 'what if He doesn't show up?' She assured me He would ... but after about 5 minutes of imagining the scene and asking Him to show - He most decidedly did NOT show up. So deflated she and I went our separate ways for the rest of the afternoon. I wandered around trying to nap unsuccessfully and ended up staring at the trees and the sky and the planes dragging gliders into the sky for the airfare academy students. It was a LONG afternoon. Then finally a couple in my cohort came along having broken their silence and I was massively relieved to have 2 someones to talk with!
The next day S and G from the Potter's Inn were down to join us for the day and they decided to offer some hours of spiritual direction. I immediately signed up for one with G. So when we sat down that afternoon I was able to dive right in because G already knows my story. I told her about my white room. The white room has no windows and no doors, no 2 way mirror, and I am most decidedly not in a straight jacket!, its bright and and clean so that feels hopeful but I am sitting in the middle and I am bored and have no idea what this feeling is for - or what the heck I am supposed to do in there. So once again I find myself frustrated (mildly) but resigned to wait. I reiterated to G again just how much I want to be with the Lord - how much I long for Him ... and then she said something very interesting! She said ... 'A----, I have often heard you say that, and I do not doubt your heart on that, but I am wondering what would happen if we set your longing aside for a while?' ... What? ... hmmm... She went on to explain ... 'What if you explored all the other pieces of who you are for a while?' ... She prefaced all of this by saying that all the parts of me - are all me - and are all one - and are ALL spiritual. No part of me whether it is my body or my mind, or my mothering or being a wife or pastor's wife, or my creativeness, or any other facet of my life ... is separate from any other part - and each part of who I am is part of me and is SACRED. So she suggested that if I set aside my focus from the spiritual - stopped looking at my longing for God constantly - perhaps God would reveal something new about who I am and what He wants for me.
Ok - like WOW - what a CRAZY thought. I sat there pondering that and G asked me what I was thinking about it all. And I said the whole idea reminded me of something the Lord directed me to way back in December. That whole idea of a new bucket. The essence of that whole thing started because S had said to me I didn't know myself at all ... which made me angry. I tossed and turned all night thinking about my intimacy with the Lord because of it. Anyway I came out on the other side of that realizing that I up until then the only thing that I offered to the Lord constantly - was my dark and ugly sinful self. And what He wanted from me was for me to discover my 'glory', my 'belatedness', my created beauty... so that I could offer more than just my ugly half to Him. Because how can you be intimate with God ... when you only offer Him half of who you are. And I realized in that night that if God created us to be intimate with Him ... then this dark night of the soul was to bring me from less intimacy to more intimacy with Him. Yet here I was only giving Him half of myself. So this whole new bucket thing ... was about filling a new 'beautiful' bucket ... the problem was The Lord never showed me what to do with it ... until now!
So I shared all of this with G... and then she and I were on a roll together. She said what if you explored how as a mother you worship God? Or with your body? Or as an artist? Or as a wife? Then I came up with an illustration ... I had a picture of a southern fan in my mind (you know the kind that flip out to one side so women can shyly hide behind them as they keep their faces cooled), but my fan was all closed up and all I could see was one piece of the fan, because that was all I could imagine. All I could see was the outside - or the spiritual side of things. But G was saying what if you clicked it open and explore the different facets inside? One part for each part of me ... she said 'A----, what if you spent some time honoring each part of who God has made you to be - because He wants YOU - ALL of YOU. And if you think about one of those fans ... there is usually a beautiful picture all printed on the fan. This had my brain all stirred up.
So G prayed over me as we closed ... but I could barely hear what she had to say because now suddenly I was picturing myself back in that white room... and it was if God was pointing out that I was in fact the only thing in that room. And that the reason He had given me all white walls was because it was in fact a blank slate - or a new bucket - or a blank canvas - to paint on. I was the thing He wanted me to look at - but He wanted me to look at myself in a whole new way.
OK WOW.
Now I had something to do in the rest of my solitude that afternoon. So I went off by myself with a journal and started thinking through the questions ... what DOES God want me to know about myself? What AM I supposed to explore about myself? I ended up starting in with my body. We had talked about the different dimensions that make us up that day in class and the BODY stood out the most for whatever reason. So I sat there trying to figure out just even what to ask about my body - and how it describes me? I didn't get it at first ... and I started describing what I like and dislike about my appearance ... THIS DID NOT GO WELL. My list was full of horrible things ... and I think I had only one like on the whole page. I even wrote on the bottom ... 'I'm pretty sure this is not what God had in mind - I need a new idea!' So I sat there a few minutes and this idea popped into my mind, 'how does your body experience the world?'... I answered my own thought ... 'through my 5 senses.' This idea resonated with me because of specifically surrendering my 5 senses last summer to God. So I began to write down the things I like to physically feel with my hands... I had picked a Lamb's Ear leaf earlier that day because they are so soft! and I just love them ... so that was one of my first thoughts ... then soft blankets, the wind on my face etc... etc... etc... and it just kept building. Then I moved on to hearing, smelling, tasting and seeing! By the time I made it through half the list I was so filled with this amazing joy and gratitude, like I hadn't felt in years. It was astonishing! Everyone said that evening how changed I was - that I was glowing. It truly was a crazy good afternoon.
And the whole thing seems so simple. So child-like. So basic. But it was so far from it. This was God teaching me to see myself with new eyes. To NOT see the ugly sinful parts of who I am - and believe me, they are all still there and will not be overlooked! - but they do not need to be explored for right now. God is asking me to see myself the way that HE sees me. He looks on me with absolute love and devotion ... but I have continually seen myself only as black and disgusting full of sin - full of shame - and that's how I keep presenting myself to Him. What intimacy can there be in that? What a crazy thought... that He wants me - to see ME - as beautiful, because HE sees me as beautiful.
So I bought myself a fan ... as an ebenezer... a memorial to this lovely day ... exploring my TRUE self.
