2016 brought a good deal of change to my life. I accepted a new job, left my apartment in the city and bought a sweet little home in the county closer to work. Living in a new part of town meant saying goodbye to the church I called home for the better part of a decade. While the job and home were an adjustment, saying goodbye to that church is what wrecked my comfort zone. I knew my role and people there. I said yes to entirely too much because I love to believe that God and his church need me much more than they actually do. All of the yeses piled up on a calendar packed to the brim with (un)holy busyness. Moving to a new church meant saying goodbye to ministry leadership and a reputation I tirelessly built. All of this had me feeling confused and annoyed by the Lord. It seemed to me that this was an unplanned detour.

On one of those frustrated nights I began a reluctant prayer. The previous week had been a series of recurring dreams where I was stuck in the backseat of a moving car with no driver. It dawned on me that I just might have some control issues we needed to talk about. So I sat crossed-legged on my bed and rambled through a list of things I was sure He was overlooking before God kindly quieted me. We were there in silence for a while longer before I started regretfully recounting all of my yeses and plans that met a sudden end. He quieted me again. It was in that quiet where my heart became inclined to His face instead of my wringing hands.

As I sat on my unmade bed, with piles of laundry thrown in the corner of my room, God started painting a picture in my mind of an empty field with nothing but dry soil from end to end. There were other fields surrounding it that were full of life and harvesters bustling around. But my field was barren.  A hand reached into the soil and brought up some roots. They were so dry that when he rubbed his fingers together the roots crumbled and fell like dust to the ground. God made it clear that he was uprooting much of what I planted and tended in the last few years. He gave me an understanding that the roots I spent so much time pouring life into had actually been dead for a while, but I was blind to it because of my plans. Even more, there were things that I lovingly called roots but God called chains. He was digging it all up. It was time for a new thing.

But before the new thing can begin, there must first be rest for the ground and work for the laborer.

I come from a family of farmers who know how to care for their land and crops. Every several years, a field is put into a fallow season where nothing is planted. This gives the soil time to restore the nutrients that were drained by previous crops. The fallow season is needed if the land is going to continue producing full harvests in the future. If you’ve done much gardening you know that soil doesn’t just stay barren for long. Weeds pop up in a matter of days when they don’t have any competition. The labor in the fallow season is to continue breaking up the land to make sure none of these seeds take root.

So here I am, sitting in an empty field doing the gloriously mundane work of pulling spiritual weeds. At least once a week I grow tired of it and want to do something big and the Spirit gently reminds me of the important work at hand. But on my best days in the fallow I have dirt under my fingernails and the biggest smile on my face.  God, in his loving kindness, stopped me from pouring more of myself into dead and dying things. He tore through my plans to break chains that I was certain were the start of something lovely.

His grace, y’all. It never ever ends. He is doing a new thing and my plans won’t get in the way of it. Maybe he blew up your plans recently, too. All I can say, with as much humility as I can muster, is that He is good. Our plans aren’t safe around Him, but we are safe with Him.

Something to read: Matthew 13, Revelation 3, Proverbs 16, Psalm 46

Something to listen to: In Feast or Fallow

There have been times when my prayers seem to fall in line with God’s will and he answers them just how I hoped he would. I love it when that happens! But, more often than not, there is a disconnect. That time of waiting, the season of “hoped for, but not yet”, makes my heart uneasy. The ugly, honest truth bubbles up to the surface- I don’t fully believe that God is good. I spent the better part of my summer wondering about God’s goodness before I had the audacity to ask him about it. I tried to conquer the doubt by finding verses and articles about His goodness, but the uncertainty lingered. Eventually I came to the (now obvious) conclusion that I couldn’t answer my own question. I had to humble myself before the One I was questioning. Here is the gist of that prayer:

Lord, I know I have your Word and that should be enough, but I’m just really not sure that you are good like it says. I’ve been hearing a lot of “no’s” from you lately and I’m starting to wonder if your goodness is for me. Is “good” just a word we use to describe you in general? This is too big of a question for me to grasp on my own. God, will you show me?”

It wasn’t until I asked him about it that I was reminded that experience, not just knowledge, is integral to knowing God’s character. In Psalm 34, David can barely contain his enthusiasm when writing about God’s goodness. In verse 8 he exhorts us to “taste and see that the Lord is good.” David invites us not just to hear or read about God’s goodness, but to savor it and gaze upon it. He gives us an active and intimate offer to experience our God.

An experience is personal; it is something we can only understand by trying ourselves. I can describe how delicious my Grandma Lila’s cooking is, but you won’t really grasp it until you’ve sat at her table and tasted the care she puts into a dish. In this way, an experience isn’t so much a description as it is an inscription. It etches in us something deeper than words can define. And this kind of inscribing experience is what David extends when he encourages us to taste and see that the Lord is good.

Asking God to give me more than scripture to understand his goodness felt like I was breaking a bunch of unwritten rules. I was so caught up in not offending God with my question that I ended up dulling my understanding of him. Once I asked, it was like he gave me new eyes to see just how good he is. But I can’t adequately describe any of that to you. So here is my encouragement: Experience your God. He has given us a standing invitation to know him. He will always respond to our questions because he is the one who initiated with us in the first place.

Humble your heart by acknowledging you don’t know our great God as much as you thought you did. Pose your question to him and listen. Delight when it seems as though he answers, “I’m so glad you asked!”

p.s. Add this song to your playlist. The whole album has been a good encouragement to come and experience the Lord.

About a year ago I found myself in a place that I can only describe as “the bottom of the ocean and the middle of the desert.” I was wronged by someone I trusted and the weight of that betrayal felt like I was sitting at the bottom of the ocean, heaviness pressing in on all sides. At the same time I felt incredibly dry, like I’d stumbled into a desert without any warning. I cried out to the Lord for justice, and while he was not distant or ambivalent I couldn’t hear him speak. His silence only caused me to cry louder, questions mounting in my heart and spilling out in prayers. Of all the times God could be far from me, why now? What is he trying to do with me? And the one I was most afraid to ask- will he return to me?

As much as I’d like to, I don’t have tidy answers to those messy questions. I couldn’t begin to. Months have come and gone since then, and that ocean-deep weight has been gently removed; the dryness met with rain. But you know the cycle of God’s people- we forget and he reminds us. We stray and he shepherds us back again.

Given our tendencies, it isn’t all that surprising that I’ve wandered back into the desert of silence. I hate how quiet it is here. It seems the only things I can hear are my own voice and the Accuser’s. I’m starting to worry that maybe I’ve been forgotten, left out here until I pop up on God’s cosmic radar once again.

Oh, but Truth. It hits me like one of those spring storms that crop up furiously when you least expect them. That isn’t the kind of god he is. He is the God who knows every hair on my head. Who formed me before my mother even sensed me growing inside her. He is the God who saved me while I was stone cold dead in sin, my heart set against him. He is the God who promises to redeem every part of me until I reflect him more radiantly.

He is not a haphazard God, so his silence is purposeful. When the Lord’s face is obscured from his people, it produces an immense longing in us to hear his voice and savor his presence. That desire isn’t something we can cultivate on our own. It requires God’s movement.

Oh, that we might know the Lord! Let us press on to know him. He will respond to us as surely as the arrival of dawn or the coming of rains in early spring.” Hosea 6:3

May I leave you with a picture of this promise played out in our fallen world? Fruit harvested after a drought has a higher concentration of sugar in it than a normal harvest. Do you see that? The fruit produced during that dry, undesirable season is sweet and dripping with complex flavor. There is beauty waiting for us at the end of this desert season. Let us press on to know our God. He will respond to us with the fruit of longing for his voice.

Little note: God’s quietness can be multifaceted. I’ll write about it again soon(ish).

Last week I was sitting in my car deciding if I was going to take a few minutes to meet with the Lord or run inside to start dinner and catch up on the show I missed the night before. For weeks I had chosen the comfortable route- refusing to yield to God. But that night I was drawn to him. I couldn’t not be near him with all the things running through my mind and the mess piling up in my heart. I realized that although I wanted to be with him, I didn’t want to be seen by him. I was hoping to tiptoe into his presence and hide in a dark corner.

I felt like the bleeding woman in Mark 5 who doesn’t want to draw attention to herself, but knows she needs Jesus. So she just touches the hem of his robes and is changed. For 12 years she struggled to find a cure and was straight up exhausted. I have been striving lately too. But unlike that woman trying to heal her body, I am attempting to heal my soul. Working hard to meet expectations, earn approval from people around me, and please God with all of my (un)holy busyness. I am tired too.

So I sneaked into the throne room of grace, prepared to find a nice dark corner.  Do you know what I remembered as I met with him? There is no hiding there. There are no dark corners. Every crack and crevice is bathed in the light of God’s love and grace. And in that light I am changed, because when you are seen by the One who loves you, your soul is altered.

“Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in our time of need.” Hebrews 4:16

We can approach him today knowing that he will meet us because he is faithful and true. He is patient, waiting for us to come to him so he can show his love and compassion. You can tiptoe, limp, or stomp in, but be prepared to leave dancing, confident that the Holy One saw you and welcomed you.