Tag Archive | Voice

Part One – Growing Up Churched (1/3)

Mar7

 

Where Do I Fit In?

When I was growing up, we always attended one of the Lutheran churches in town.

Now I have no problem with the Lutheran church, per se. There are different kinds of people with different preferences, I get that.

But as a small child, I only knew that I would be required to sit, for an hour, and not talk. If I could not maintain stillness, I was sure to receive a painful pinch on the shoulder, or an elbow in my side. Even as an adult this sitting “still” is difficult for me. I can always sit, just not still, and I get to choose whether I speak or not.

Back in the day, every one really dressed up for church, but there was nothing finer than attending on a cool Easter morning, men in their suits and women and girls in all their finery. Springy dresses, bonnets, white gloves and the ever present white patent leather shoes.

None of which we had.

We wore the cleanest, not worn out clothing that we owned. I could feel the heat of the stares on my back as we walked up the aisle to our seats. It always seemed that we were less than, imperfect, those without.

Our dad never attended, even on those special days of Christmas or Easter. Often we would be dropped off, and picked up later. His absence was yet another thing that was my fault. My little mind imagined that in my wrongness.

I was often wrong at home. Every day I was wrong at school. Now here at the one place I should be right, I was wrong as well.

My hair was wrong, my clothes were wrong, our family minus our dad was wrong. Every church service simply proved more to me about my wrongness.

Fast forward, to when I was a young mother, going to a different church with my children, but not with my husband, where I felt the same burning heat on my back as we entered into a room with all the “perfect” people, all the “perfect” families all sitting perfectly still, in “perfect” little rows.

What on earth was wrong with me?

Was there anywhere I (and now my children) could fit in?

The Cartography of Our Scars

Mar5

Last week, a word on “Word of the Day” was cartography.

If you don’t know, cartography is the science or practice of drawing maps.

Hold that thought.

Then in one of my online communities, the topic was “Embracing my scars”.

I took about five minutes to write about it. Here is why they go together;

Our scars are like a road map. One laid out by a expert cartographer.

Our scars show us not only who we are, but where we came from.

The hills, the bumps, the ridges, the pleasant peaceful waters, as well as the water hazards. Straight and curvy roads. Smooth roads, and roads with ruts. All of these make our lives more valuable.

We see that we have come farther than we ever imagined we could, and like a new, snowy landscape, we have before us a place to make a new trail. Fresh new tracks.

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What will your map look like? Will the cartographer use straight lines? Or will it be a more adventurous undertaking?

We need both the straight and adventurous to make our lives interesting, and inconceivably valuable.

Valuable in that we can show others that they are not alone in their wanderings. We can show them the way we took to reach where we are now, or, we can help others to find a whole new way of making it all make sense.

Either way, the beauty of that map, will be strictly owned by you.

As Mr. Rogers was fond of saying, “There is no one like you.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Crazy Women in Caves, With Oil!

Feb19

I heard the following quote at a conference in 2007.

I ran across it again while reviewing my journals.

First the quote, then, why it was so important to me.

“David was in a cave with some crazy people and some oil.”

The back story on this (a study I did) comes from years of feeling inadequate, lonely, and unloved, until finally, after my mother’s death, I went inside myself. I slowly took myself away from  most forms of social activity. During that time I became increasingly unhealthy in my body. At one point, for a couple of years, it was difficult to even get off the floor to get a drink of water from the kitchen. I only moved when I absolutely had to. I had two engagements each week that expected me to show up, so I did. No more.

The healing part of this story is for another time, but when I began to heal, the Lord put on my heart that I was a cave dweller.

Now cave dwelling is fine. For a season. But it was time to leave the cave for a while.

I argued that He had provided me a pretty cool cave, and that I was comfy here. To which I heard, “Comfy is what you come back to, to rest, but to come back, you first have to leave.”

As the healing was beginning, I had a handful of gals come to my home once a week for coffee and a book study. I had shared with them that I was literally a crazy lady hiding out with my friends in my cave on Wednesdays! (Note, I still wasn’t LEAVING MY CAVE.)

First I looked up CRAZY – full of defects and imperfections. Thanks a lot.

Before actually leaving my comfy cave, I looked up caves in my faithful, old, blue, 400 pound Strong’s Concordance. (No Google or https://www.biblegateway.com/  back then!) I looked up all the cave words I could find. Over 20 references!

I won’t name them all, but here is a short list of things people did in/with caves;

  • Lived in caves
  • Bought caves for burials
  • Some belonged to families so that they could all be buried in the same place
  • Some kings hid in caves, then they were executed and placed back there after the fact
  • Mighty men and prophets hid in them and were fed there
  • They were used to sleep in when travelling
  • Eat. Rest. Strengthen.
  • Used as shelters and strongholds
  • Living places for the homeless
  • A place of death (plague)
  • A place of prayer
  • And even a hiding away from the Lord place

What is the oil for?

  • Beautification
  • Fresh oil meant prosperity
  • Lack of oil meant judgement, curse, agricultural disaster
  • Good oil meant stability and prosperity
  • Used to anoint and sanctify
  • Used to consecrate tabernacles – made the tabernacle “Most Holy”. If anyone “unholy” touched the “Most Holy” item, they would die.
  • Sign of the Holy Spirit

Now, here we are. Present day. How does that apply, and why must we leave our caves?

As you can see by the uses for the oil, it can be a pretty powerful thing. It can give stability and prosperity. It has power to give life, and to take it.

The cave, (our homes) are used for many of the things caves were. (Hopefully/fortunately not graves) We eat. We rest. We heal.

We have all this power (oil) in our caves, and we’re not using it.

We need to use our caves to pray, eat, rest, strengthen, then, we need to take our oil and use it for good. We can share it with those no hope.

That power is simply wasted when it is hidden away in a cave.

I have a friend who says that the world needs our words. Could those words possibly be the healing balm/oil that someone needs?

We have it, and we’re hiding.

We find comfort in our caves, but there are others, without hope, who can be helped by a little bit of our oil, if we can just leave our comfort but for a little bit.

So go. Spread your healing oil around and then, you can always come back to your cave to rest.