Wore out?

I've been blown away by the effect Easter has had on me. As a PW (Preacher's Wife) more things get on me than your normal non-PW, you know...the wife's out there. We have to be that support that comes from a deep place so that the Preacher Man can wear clean underwear, eat enough protein to keep up that smile, and brush the demon's off his back when he comes home for breaks. It really is a never ending cycle of strange demands that was not taught in seminary!

For some strange reason, I thought Christmas was going to be the big demanding Holy holiday that would pull me to the edge of the cliff and call me to jump in order to save myself. I was wrong. It was Easter.

I think it has to do with the preparation during Lent. No, that can't be it, we had Advent before Christmas. Maybe it was the lack of the church knowing how to prepare that wore me out. I found myself saying, a lot to other's, Spend time with Jesus, just be with him on his way to the cross. I believe in the mist of this time, I did spend that time just being with Jesus.

I feel like that was what he craved, and no one would really do it. He asked them to stay awake while he prayed, sleep over came them. He was denied by Peter, left alone in chains, beat to the point of death, and the one person who did struggle to get to him, wasn't allowed to comfort her child.

So I spent time just being with Jesus and it was hard. It pulled my life right to the surface of my being and it hung there, raw and open. It literally wore me out, physically, emotionally and mentally. So I'm done, stick a fork in me kinda done! Lay on the floor and not shower for a few days kinda done!

Preacher man, being a man of secret smartness, that remains hidden from me, even after 20 years, has planned this vacation to commence after church this Sunday and last for ruffly two weeks. So now, preparing for said vacation is wearing me out... More to come....  

Place!

I'm finding that I'm being pulled to move my place of solitude. That sounds kinda funny doesn't it. I really miss my big over stuffed chair that we had to sell before we moved to Sherwood. I could get all comfy in that big ole' chair and just spend my time with God. 

I found that last year, I was needing more of a structured place where I could place a candle, have some cards/icons around me. So I set up an alter on a tea table, got a great old rocker to sit in and gathered my things I would need to be with God for an hour. This has worked just fine for over a year, but the other day, after Preacher man had gone to work and the neighborhood had calmed down, I took my things and went to the back porch and me and the birds spent some awesome time with God!

I know as the weather changes from summer into fall, I am lovin' hanging outside, but that will change on day's like today that are hovering around 48 degrees. The point I'm trying to make is find you a place, set apart, where you can be alone with God. It will look different for every person, but it should be a place where you can just be with God for around an hour. Now don't freak out about the time, you have to start somewhere, but you also have to shoot for something. Start with 15 minutes. You will find as you grow in your comfort with God, you will want to spend more time in His presence. Mother Teresa of Calcutta said Spend one hour a day in adoration of your Lord and never do anything you know is wrong, and you will be all right. 

Solitude is where the changes happen in us. It's the place where Christ remodels us in his image and frees us from our false self. If you are in ministry, and we are all in ministry whether we know it or not, you need to have this time of solitude. I see it almost like plugging my phone up at night. If I don't plug it up, the next day it's running slow and shutting down. If I don't take time to plug into God, to spend time alone with him, well... you can tell!

Compassion is the fruit of solitude. We may just have to look at that next.      

Solitude

My dear sweet friend, Pat, who knows my love for Henri Nouwen, gave me a book 2 years ago to read before we left seminary. I just now found it again and have started reading it. It's called The Way of the Heart and I think I'm going to have to read it very slowly, cuz it packed with stuff.

I'm thinking a lot about solitude lately, how bout you? To start off with, my whole definition is changing daily about this word. I use to equal it to solitary confinement, and while the words are similar, I believe the way in which I'm looking at them is what is changing. 

Nouwen say's it this way: Solitude is the place of purification and transformation, the place of the great struggle and the great encounter...the place of our salvation. 

The Desert Father's and Mother's left what they knew and went out into the desert to live a life of solitude, yet in their aloneness, they were with Jesus. Jesus himself went out into the desert where he was tempted with the three compulsions of the world: to be relevant ("turn stones into loaves"), to be spectacular ("throw yourself down"), and to be powerful ("I will give you all these kingdoms").

Solitude is the place where great struggles and great encounters happen! We struggle with our false self and we encounter God who offers himself as a substance of the new self. 

I know all this, really I do. However, lately, I've been struggling with just about everything. Things used to work so well, pray life was good, heard from God, took time to knock and seek and I really thought I was in the desert. What I'm understanding now is, I was in a sort of solitude. That solitude is calling me back again, and I'm struggling with how to do that and ministry. Kinda like, the rubber hitting the road.

So, I'm on a journey that I feel like I've been on before, yet there are things that I left by the side of the road, so I could pick them up again, when the time was more right. I'm thinking the time is more right. 

It's kinda like what Augustine said:

Thou must be emptied of that wherewith thou art full,

that thou mayest be filled with that whereof thou art empty.

Wow! Won't you walk with me for awhile on this road?