Thank Y'all for Sharing

I am blessed to be a member of a great teaching team at ECL. We are very different and we often approach the text from such different backgrounds and experiences that often I walk away from a Sunday morning and think, well I would have never thought of that! This rich tapestry of life and reflection allows us to better understand the human impact of faith.

Coming back from vacation, I have to confess that I did not spend much time this week dwelling on Psalm 107. This is the text that we are spending the entire Lenten season on in our community. Each week, we are adding a piece of the chapter to show the many ways that we cry out to God and in mercy and grace, God rescues and delivers. 

I walked into church this morning happy to be home but mildly time zone hungover. I was comforted by familiar faces and good coffee. We sang some favorites and settled into the teaching and I could tell in the first 5 minutes that my friend Matt was bringing goodness. 

Darkness to light

That was the theme of the teaching. My mind flashed backwards to the stories that I have shared with you in the past 18 days. It flashed forward to those that I know will come in the weeks ahead. I am a girl of redemption. My life and story is full of darkness. It is also a place of hope and light. But this did not happen overnight. 

I didn't wake up one morning sitting in the depths of complete darkness and think, well today is the day to let the sunshine in. Moving from darkness into the light is complicated. For me, it begins with a tiny match of hope. Someone usually has to light it for me because shining light in the scary dark places is horrifying. If I'm really lucky, the match only has to be lit once. More than likely, though, I will blow it out in fear and sometime in the future I will have to try again.

Every once in a while, the match seems to hit kerosene and starts a fire. Here's what I know about fire. It burns. It hurts. And sometimes it takes a fire and it's refining powers to penetrate the darkness that we are masters at perpetuating.

I absolutely adore my Southern roots, but they are wildly exhausting.  In the South, words like "nice" and "fine" are code for barely tolerable and one step short of misery. 

Let me translate this Sunday morning conversation in the church parlor for you:

Friendly neighbor: How are you today? 

(I am supposed to be kind and great you cordially, but I really don't want to know)

Gracious Southerner: I'm just fine. *insert painful smile*

(There is a good chance that my child is failing in school or I have a sick relative, but we always smile on Sunday)

Friendly neighbor: I'm so glad to hear that! Have a blessed day.

(Whew! I heard that her junior higher is up to no good and her dad got bad news this week, but I wouldn't want to appear to gossip. I'll add her to my prayer list)

I grew up with the understanding that one does not air their dirty laundry. They certainly don't tarnish a family reputation or call attention to messy. There is just no need for the entire world to know your business. Now, in all fairness, this may work for some. It does not, however, work for those of us that find it life's game to see how far outside of the lines we can live without getting caught. 

When you live your life to portray the image of togetherness, you are slowly turning down the dimmer dial on the light. If you are living one life in the light of the church parlor and have an entirely different world in the darkness of your bedroom or kitchen cabinet or wallet, you are not living in the light. 

I'm sure that both of my grandmother's are fit to be tied about my public blogging of my very personal woes. They may be having coffee in heaven with their twice-a-week-set-hair shaking their heads and trying to figure out why in the world I am airing my dirty laundry for the world to read. Bless their hearts.

Here's why. I have received countless emails and texts and Facebook messages in the last 18 days about how much someone needed to hear the story I shared that day. I have literally cried as I read your stories of hurt and loss and life vests and aloneness. I have heard from friends far and near (some that I don't know how they saw this blog) that can't believe that these things happened to someone like me. Can I clear something up? These things happen in our lives because we are human. 

There is no amount of education or money or faith or birthright that will protect you from darkness. It may look different. The resources available to you will vary, but the pain of human experience is the same. So if you find yourself in darkness today, know that you are in good company AND you don't have to stay there. 

I'm not made for pleasantries. I often greet people with "How are you, REALLY?" Let's agree that the answer of, "well, my life is going to hell in a hand basket" is waaaaayyyy more freeing than "fine."

Let's do real. It's the only way in the world that we are going to be bearers of light. And, friends, the world needs some torches carriers!