Sometimes You’ve Gotta Ask

One thing I have learned in the past year is this – keep your hands and mind open to whatEVER direction the Spirit wants to move in. I wrote a post a few months ago about my own wrestling with calling and what that looks like and how to embrace it. I left a ministry that I thought would be my life for many years. I began to look at other opportunities. I finished a book! I had resigned myself to the fact that I would not be going back to Exodus, and I was perfectly fine with that. I didn’t know what the Lord was directing me to, other than to finish my novel. But I just continued to wait and pray.

Almost a month exactly after I finished my book, something totally unexpected happened. I met with the president of Exodus for lunch. We had a great conversation, and the Lord opened up a door I thought would be shut for a long time. I was offered a new position at the ministry, one in which I would have more opportunities to grow and be utilized in my gifts.

Huh?

I Can Say it Now! I Wrote A Book!

Ok, this post is a little late, or rather a lot late. But I want to post it anyway.

I have been working on a novel for the past six years. The story developed in my imagination when I was working for A Christian Ministry in the National Parks at Zion National Park, Utah. My imagination runs wild whenever I’m hiking, and being surrounded by the beauty of Zion, there’s no way you can’t be inspired. While I was hiking along the western wall of the canyon, I began to think of an idea involving a canyon such as this one. And out of that hike came an idea for a story. For the first few years I developed the back story, a few characters, the world (this is fantasy), and the overarching theme. But things quickly got in the way.

When I came back from Utah I had another year of Undergraduate work, then I went on to pursue a master’s in seminary. If you’ve been to graduate school you know there isn’t much to life during that time except for reading and writing. So I got distracted. I would sporadically return to the story and occasionally would work on the first chapter. Two years later I was in full-time ministry and I had only the first few chapters written. That was a season of great depression and fatigue for me. I had no creativity in my body. The story was put on hold.

what’s your name?

Or maybe I should ask, who are you? What or who identifies you? What is your identity?

Today I’m feeling lonely, insecure, and frustrated with relationship. So I began to think about these questions. Instead of wallowing in pity, I thought I’d do something constructive with what I’m feeling.

So often how we feel about ourselves is fueled by our perceptions of others. God made us relational beings so it’s in relationship that we find definition, right? If we don’t have any friends at all, we feel unloved, uncared for, alien. If we have shallow friends we feel noticed but not appreciated, included but not validated. If we have close friends we feel loved, appreciated, enjoyed, cherished. In any one of these situations we find out more of who we are and in effect become defined by that relational construct. I think it’s something that naturally happens to all of us. Like I said, we were created relational beings, so there is truth and validity (in my opinion) in this “relational defining”. But when we allow that to be all of what defines us, our foundation is certainly upon crumbling sand. After all, we are human, we aren’t perfect, and we aren’t experts in relating – neither are the people we hinge our identity, worth, and value upon.

a destination turned stepping stone

What is God’s calling on our lives? What does it look like? How do we communicate it?

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately.

Is His calling a ministry? A title? A position?

If we answer yes to any of these three questions are we limiting or boxing in God’s call for our lives?

I did just that.

I remember the day very vividly when the Lord called me to vocational ministry. I was watching The Oprah Winfrey Show…I don’t know why, honestly…but the Lord used a particular interview to change the course of my life. He called me to a life of ministry in revealing the truth that there is freedom in Christ on a broad scale and proclaim the truth that there is freedom from sexual brokenness. I didn’t know what that would look like, or how I would make it to my  ”destination”, but that was my path.

a restart minus crazy hormones

So, if you know me and have followed me a while, you know I had another blog called A Living Commentary. The last post there was April of 2009.  A long story short – I stopped writing because, honestly, I was depressed, couldn’t think, couldn’t be creative and was tired all the time.  This past January I found out why I was tired all the time.  I produce too much estrogen!!  No need to worry, my testosterone levels are normal (even high), but the excess estrogen was affecting my thinking, focus, and creativity.  So, this amazing wholistic doctor put me on some meds that kill the estrogen…and voila! I can think clearly, I’m not tired all the time, and most importantly my creativity is back!  The depression is gone too.

Soooo….

I wanted to revamp my old blog, make it better.  Here we are, minus the excess estrogen.  This blog is a place you will get to see Chris (me) communicated.

Happy reading, contemplating, criticizing, laughing, or whatever it is you will do here…