about the more of hope

When I was in elementary school, I used to ride my bike all around my Granny & Daddo's small farm in rural Virginia.  There was this little gravel road that stretched beyond their house, with a few more homes scattered along it, that wound up into a hill and gave way to this expansive view of the Blue Ridge.  

I would peddle up there, dust from the gravel smoking out behind my wheels, and stop at the top, leaning to one side so that my foot could balance on the ground without totally getting off.  I remember looking out into the mountain range and wondering what was beyond there.  Being small and imaginative, I loved the thought of things that must exist pass what I could see.  I daydreamed about tiny, colorful villages dotting the far side of the mountain, magical places with fairy creatures and talking animals and music.  

It just seemed so likely that there was more, and I loved to create images in my mind of what that more entailed.  

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Today I was reading Paul's letter to the Romans, and was struck by how often he talks about the present in light of what is to come.  I'm particularly intrigued by a section in my ESV translation titled "Future Glory". Paul asks this rhetorical question that spears me every time: 

"Now hope that is seen is not hope.  For who hopes for what he sees?" (Rom 8:24) 

And I kind of want to shake my fist at the text when I read it, because every part of me screams "I DO!" (or I try to, at least) 

Because it is scary being asked to hope in what you can't see.  It is easier to dream up some future filled with the people and places and opportunities you want, the ones you can imagine bringing you joy.  It is easier to hope in those colorful towns beyond the horizon and then fill them with things.  It is easier to step towards that kind of vision, because it feels like some sort of plan.  

But this is not what Paul's letter describes as hope and how it's to be defined.  As I learn about this word, I'm discovering how it pairs itself up with "more" - not just more than is present in our current world, but more than what we can even dream our futures into being. 

I often forget that God is more than me.  He is more creative, more benevolent, more filled with wisdom, more compassionate.  And so when I hope in the world of my dreams, because it's safer and still seems like a pretty good deal, I'm actually selling my life short. 

There is simply more, and in that more is where my hope belongs, in that space beyond the mountain ridges.  I can gaze at it in wonder, but it's fruitless to think myself capable of dreaming entirely what it will be.  

And as frustrating and scary as that is, there is some sort of comfort in knowing that even beyond the farthest stretches of what I dream and hope for, there is something more waiting for me.  

about the sharing of stories

When we are little, before we have Twitter accounts that we surf before turning the light out, or work projects that keep us up late, stressing about e-mails we should send, we crave for somebody to tell us a story.

Being young, when our intrinsic natures are so apparent and immune from hiding, we long for fairy tales or jokes or family histories. Before we are left alone in the darkness of our room, left to fend for ourselves against the nighttime, there is comfort in hearing and understanding and connecting to the lives of other people. 

As I've thought about stories and their importance lately, as a 24 year old far from the days of fairy tales, I've realized that this need we have for them when we're young doesn't really go away.

I believe, the way I believe that the earth is round or that gravity is a thing, that every person longs for story in their life.  We long to be known by the stories we tell, and we also long to know the world intimately.

Stories do both for us, and they live or die by being shared.

In that vein, as I thought about stories that have mattered a lot to me lately, I thought about how they might matter to you, too.

Here are some.  What stories have floated into your life and stuck around?  Share them, please!

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Stories to listen to: 

The Moth
(The best $0.99 I've spent in a long time was on The Moth podcast app; it's a not-for-profit organization that hunts down good stories at live StorySlams and shares them online and on the radio. They make me laugh and cry and think -- three favorites have been this, this, and this.)  

Serial
(Produced by affiliates of This American Life, and further proof that everything Ira Glass touches turns to gold - Serial is a podcast of one story told over several weeks.  I love Thursday mornings driving to work and listening to the new episode they post then) 

Songwriters who tell good stories: 

James Taylor 
(My childhood musical hero;  Mudslide Slim is one of the best albums ever created (in my humble opinion) and includes some great stories of history and art and traveling, like Machine Gun Kelly and Riding on a Railroad)

Bob Dylan 
(Another classic favorite I've been rediscovering lately -- I love his characters and words.  Shelter from the Storm is an especially sweet tale)

Stories to read:

The Rook, Daniel O'Malley
(My most recently finished fiction; it is the most imaginative story I've read in the past few months.  If you like the idea of something in the style of Downton Abbey/Bridget Jones/Harry Potter, you will love this.  I tore through it, and was reminded of how magical it is to get lost in new worlds through story)

Woman Hollering Creek, short stories by Sandra Cisneros 
(Stories are great for how they bring us into the understanding of new cultures.  I've been reading through this collection and love Cisneros' voice and ability to take me outside of where I'm comfortable.  If you liked House on Mango Street (one of my all-time favorites), you'll love this,too) 

Life of the Beloved, Henri Nouwen
(I love this book.  I. LOVE. THIS. BOOK.  I truly can't get over it.  It is a fundamentally important read for Christians, and is written as letters from Nouwen to his friend, someone of a totally different cultural and religious background.  Beautiful doesn't even begin to describe it) 

about days of the week

Today is Tuesday.  And on Tuesdays I make random playlists.
This one is called Songs I Like that Have a Day of the Week in the Title.

happy it's-the-worst-day-of-the-week-in-my-opinion-but-music-makes-it-better! 

about where I'm from

Today I woke up where I’m from.  

I went for a jog through my small, sleepy town, before I had my first cup of coffee and the light was still young.  I walked down my steps where we took pictures after high school graduation, on the hottest Virginia summer day anyone could remember.  I turned right on Winchester Street, ran pass the houses with their genteel southern porches and their historical society plaques bearing years in the 1800’s.  

I paused at the corner by the library, where my best friend stalled out on the steep hill a few days after we got our licenses, and we rolled backwards and squealed.  Up from there, the court houses sits enthroned above Blackwell Road, and when I drive that way I think of it like a banner always hanging, reading “home”.   From the steps, where they light the tree every Christmas, I twisted and saw speckled Blue Ridge through the clear.  

Making my way down Main Street, I looked in Jimmie’s store windows; the owner sends a gossip e-mail I read at work each morning for the latest small town scandals.  The restaurant next door, where I worked one summer, bore a new name.  I paused in front, remembering our weekly family dinners there in the golden lit rooms, leisurely pouring ourselves over courses and how chef would serve us the crème Brule we loved in soup bowls.  

Then I came to the Presbyterian church where I was confirmed, where I was a shrieking middle schooler running through the halls during lock-ins, where I once got to climb the bell tower and made the sound ding across the whole town. 

I made my way through the Farmer’s Market and glanced at pumpkins and squash arranged by men and women with smiles and dirt under their nails.  

I crossed Culpepper Street and wound downhill toward home, through the court house lawn where jazz bands and bluegrass bands play in the summer.  I stopped at the bakery where you can (but it isn’t encouraged to) climb the ladder to the roof and smoke cigars at night.  I sipped their coffee and walked in the direction of my middle school, of the ice cream stand where they know my parent’s orders by heart, and the 24-hour diner where I’ve sat many nights, slipping quarters into the jukebox. 

I turned again and came home, and my house was quiet and familiar with the tick of the grandfather clock in the foyer. 

Now I sit in the sunroom, where there are succulents and a cactus with violet blooms, and I think of my younger life.  I think of how dark my room was last night, without streetlight, without drunken heels tapping against sidewalks and cars whizzing by.  I watch my dog’s ribcage move up and down with breath.  

I think of this town and it feels to me like an impassioned cavalry – the last remaining lines, holding their ground against the invasion of shopping malls and hasty time. 

I think of how often my mind catapults me into the future, into cities with humming pulses and noise.  

I think of stories, the good kind, how they always root themselves in their start. 

I think of wanting that to be true of the story that’s mine. 

about songs that are names

Happy Tuesday! Tuesdays are blah, so they need a random playlist to make them better I think.
Have you ever looked at your iTunes library and thought "Whoa, so many songs I love are just names of people!" No? Well, I have.  Here's a playlist of some of my favorite songs that are simply titled names, just for you.


ps.  I'm just discovering embedded playlist links on Spotify -- life made.

about feasting together

When I am afraid and when I listen to lies instead of to what's real, I feel like I can manage life on my own.  There is often this insecurity inside of me that whispers that I should hide myself from other people, out of fear that I may be uncovered, and after that, unwanted and disowned.

There is, however, this beating drum of truth that has reverberated through my life and has shaken me awake from that fear time and again - and that is the truth that we were made to give our lives to other people.  Belonging to the church, experiencing the goodness of community and of love from other people is not something I have coordinated much by my own doings. My sinful tendency is to run away.  But God has consistently blessed me by shepherding me towards, by giving me the joy of being known, even when I was too fearful to seek it out.

And so this weekend, I sat around a table celebrating the birth of the dearest friend, and looked at those in the room with tears in my eyes.  I am known.  I am known, and it is the best part of my life.

When you find those ones who fill you up and who know you, deep down to the farthest layers - stick with them.  And know them back.

Here's to other people, because I need you.

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Feast

We’ve managed to hold time steady -

no first breath taken, no death disturbs the night.

Our talking goes unmeasured, never ready

for silence, skin gilded in candlelight. 

Abundance lives around this table,

more than food, wine, and what can touch.

Day to day, we learn each other and grow able

to feast on words, of our delight make much.

It seems haphazard invitation,

to each within his seat,

to be known, to belong, to share this elation

of life, of not knowing who you’ll meet. 

Present eternity flickers in every sill

as we share that common space –

on what is unseen we take our fill,

and it's the deepest joy, the truest grace.  

about rest and time

The above picture is the view from much of my past weekend: book. mug of coffee. couch. rest. 

I am such a socialite.

But seriously - rest is important to me.  It is something I defend and carve out time for.  When life gets busy the way it's felt the past few weeks, it's something I feel I deserve and need and will sacrifice many other things in order to get.

I've been slowly reading some stories of Jesus' interactions with different people in the gospels, and for a few weeks I've been on the story where Jesus comes face to face with a possessed man and heals him.  It took about eight straight days of reading the same passage for this line to stick out to me:

"And when Jesus had stepped out of the boat, immediately there met him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit. "

After I've worked a long day, I can hardly muster the energy to make a phone call to a friend on my drive home.  And Jesus, who had just enacted his power over the waters of the sea to calm a storm, and then traveled by boat after that whole tiring ordeal, gets to shore and IMMEDIATELY he is met by someone needing his attention.

There is zero "me" time in this scenario.

It might sound trivial, but this has convicted me.  Yes, rest is important and Jesus took time to be alone and recharge-- but it wasn't more important than being available.  It wasn't so important that he carved it out and demanded that he deserved it and could only do God's work on his own schedule.

There are many times when I feel that I am selfish with my time.  I say no to opportunities or to requests or to things that could be beneficial to others because I'd rather spend my day doing something for me.  If something pops up out of the blue, well then I can just make the excuse that it is inconvenient and I didn't schedule for it.

Maybe it isn't rest that you guard with your time, but I bet that there is some sliver of your life that you set aside as "yours", untouchable, not to be diverted or distracted or given to someone else.  And isn't it challenging and humbling, when we realize that if we want to follow the example Jesus set, our time really isn't just for us?