wisdom.

I am in the process of reading "Organic God" by Margaret Feinberg and while there are only ten chapters in the entire book, I'm finding myself sucked in on almost every page. I'm reading and re-reading paragraphs that seem to apply so much to my life. I couldn't go on without putting some of those things on here and I certainly hope I won't break any copyright rules along the way...

From the chapter: "Amazingly Wise" --

Wisdom is more than just practical know-how. Wisdom illuminates a better way to live, and even allows us to consider the best possible way to live. Wisdom is so smart that it doesn't travel alone. Wisdom's companions include understanding, knowledge, counsel, discernment, discretion, justice, and equity. It's hard to find wisdom apart from its cohorts. ...

If wisdom is the handle and fabric of an umbrella, then its companions serve as spokes, offering protection from whatever comes--rain-driven storms or the heat of the day. Like an umbrella, wisdom can also be used like a cane when the journey of life becomes steep and our steps become unsure.

Amazingly Wise is the fourth chapter in Feinberg's "Organic God" and it eloquently talks about wisdom and proverbs and prayer. Parts of Margaret's undergraduate experience are captured beautifully here, including an inspiring story of taking a class from the great writer and leader Maya Angelou.

Feinberg took this class at Wake Forest University and this is one of those small pieces that are drawing me in. I only discovered the existence of Wake Forest last year when one of my closest friends moved practically next door to the campus. As small as it seems, I felt affirmed and assured when I read this story--like somehow it was meant to speak to me and here was one tiny, almost hidden clue.

But it was Feinberg's faithful journey that brought her to Wake Forest that really captured me. In her first few paragraphs, she admits her deep desire for acceptance from Georgetown and the work she put toward that application. After the second round of SATs, Feinberg writes: "Neither my parents, myself, nor Georgetown were impressed."

But even before that, before she had fully set out on college applications and extra-extracurricular activites, she had prayed one simple, profound prayer:

Dear God, let me know which school you want me to get into by only allowing me acceptance to one and rejection from the other three.

Wouldn't you know it? She received acceptance from only one school -- Wake Forest University. This example of faith in the journey and trust in the organic God to answer prayer is humbling and enlightening. And it's this deep and humbling faith that I need to find in my own life. For some time now, I have been filling my days looking toward a vague future in ministry.You can ask, but my answer continues to be non-committal and vague. I don’t know what I’m doing or working toward or see on the horizon. And prayer? My prayers continue to be equally non-committal and vague. Perhaps I haven’t found that deep and assuring trust that Margaret’s prayer reflects.

Will I someday be able to ask God to remove the wrong paths? My head is full of examples of God’s grace and power and constancy. But my heart is still weak and afraid—a statement I make with no little pain and some embarrassment. Will I somehow find a way to face God with my greatest fear—that I am not equipped to rise to the level God calls me to?

light.

I haven’t been writing much lately and I have missed the therapy of it. So tonight I’ve intentionally sat here, searching through my exhausted and slightly numbed mind for a topic. I’ve circled around somehow to a conversation I shared with a friend of mine over a year ago.

At the time, I was in a similar place of confusion and chaos. And I was forced to admit to my friend that I wasn’t using the gifts God had given me and that I wasn’t doing what I knew He was calling me to do. The familiar truth is—I was doing my best to stay as far away from God’s voice as I could.

My confession was met with compassion, but also with stark clarity. Katy, he said, this feeling you have—you feel empty and dark? This is the feeling you have when you are away from the light of God.

The transparency of that statement, at that moment and with that person—it cannot be overstated. Its raw truth broke something inside of me. Shattered was the habitual apathy I had begun to feel for myself, a feeling so foreign to my natural being that of course I was out of touch and empty. In its place was a much more painful reality. Through guilt or fear or plain fantasy, I had hidden my need for God in my daily life. Hidden it even from myself.

I’ll be honest—I had tried to cover up God. I covered Him with hateful words and hateful thoughts, directed equally at friends and family and myself. Here, my friend was saying, here is where you end up if you live that way.

In different words than these, he went on to say how he was brought up to know that God gives each of us these wonderfully unique gifts. Rolled up inside of us are our own special God-stories that He means for us to unravel and unleash in this world.

I’d love to say that recognizing my pain led me right back into that God-light, but actually it drove me farther away. At least at first. But my experience and opinion is that, in life, the unraveling far outweighs the unleashing. At least at first.

I’ve found that sometimes God’s paths for us intersect the ones we try to make alone. And we find these moments of intersection in places or ways or people that leave us pleasantly surprised.

But other times, I’ve found that we have to turn around and retrace our steps. We have to walk back through the darkness; this time with an intent and purpose that we didn’t carry with us the first time. And these U-turns can leave us shaky and unsure and even angry. Why wouldn’t God sweep in, take us up and turn us around at the first sign of swampy ground?

But I remember poetic writings in ancient books that speak to me about God having gone before me in all these trials. There are lessons and there is life in our dark, swampy, marshy areas. His is not merely a story of a saved people, but more completely a story of a redeemed people. And mine will never be a story of an enlightened person, but more completely the story of a person who chooses to step out of darkness.

“We will not fear…

…though the earth give way and

the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,

…though its waters roar and foam

and the mountains quake with their surging.

There is a river

whose streams make glad the city of God,

the holy place

where the Most High dwells.

God is within her,

she will not fall;

God will help her at break of day.”

-from Psalm 46

Sincerely.

I want to tell you that I think you are wonderful. I want to tell you that I am who I am today in unspoken ways – ways I don’t even know about yet – because of you in and around and throughout my life. I want to tell you that I feel welcome in this world and relevant in this world because of you. I want to tell you that I would have written this out by hand because that’s so nice and ‘personal’ but I had so many things to write, I couldn’t have been fast enough. I want you to know that I don’t like you. I love you. I want to tell you that that is so much more important and I can’t believe I forgot to put it first.

I want to tell you that I think people who make you feel un-liked are silly people with scrunched up brains and they should all have to sit in time-out in the middle of a small pool. And I will go out and tell them to think about what they’ve done and why they have to sit with their pants all wet and how I don’t care. And I will tell them they were wrong to not be careful with their words and their attitudes. And I will tell them that they should say they are sorry to you.

I should also say ‘I’m sorry’ to you. Because you came to me for a hug and it is a lot easier for me to do that with only my arms than it is with my spirit and my words. I’m sorry for that. Right after you left I thought about why I didn’t have the right words. Why I couldn’t seem to say the right thing. About the words I didn’t seem able to speak.

It is hard for me to see you hurting, which is a sad, silly, selfish excuse for not speaking from my heart. I know you are just a person like I am just a person, but you are also more than that to me. You are part of my story.

That is mostly what I wanted to say.

I am sad for you and hurt for you. I wanted to say that I will carry what I can for you and I would carry more if I could. And I will give you a hug everyday if it will make you feel better. Even on days when I feel like a slob and don’t want anyone to touch me. I will hug you even on those days.