Musings – Page 5 – Thoughts from Blue Eyes

Wonderstruck and Bothering

I’ve been pondering this one phrase that has so completely captured my imagination:

God bothered.

This Incarnation Celebration Season, aka Christmas, we rave about the commercialism and the church services, the cookies and the presents, even our fiercely-held traditions of being with family or reading the Story itself, but shame on us if we neglect the powerful condescension that fuels this entire thing.

There is a God, and he has bothered to make himself known to us. There is a God, and he has called himself our Father in Heaven. There is a God, and he came.

As J.I Packer writes so plainly and beautifully in his book, Knowing God, despite the magnanimity of Him, we have made God so common, so base–we have lost the sense of awe and reverence for him. God has bothered! The fact that the God of the entire universe wants to know us demands a response of absolute love

Wonderstruck and BotheringKaitlyn2015-12-25T05:03:49+00:00

Wounds and Boxes

There are several storage tubs currently sitting under my bed. They hold things of mine: gloves, an extra hat, shoes, summer clothes neatly folded and laundered.

We tend to associate storage with organization, or unneeded items, or solved predicaments. Our closets hold possessions that are not necessary for regular use, or perhaps they keep hidden things that shouldn’t be seen by visitors in our lives.

Each one of us has a heart closet. In his great redemptive work of love, Jesus cleans out our souls with his blood and enters inside. He takes up residence (Eph 3:17-19), and as we grow up spiritually, he travels further, requesting access into more and more chambers of our closets.

Sometimes, though, there are scars. We make mistakes that leave deep wounds. We run to disobedience, lusting after idols and sin. We bury a hatchet instead of dealing with it. We overlook our offenses against others. In

Wounds and BoxesKaitlyn2015-12-02T05:21:29+00:00

They held feasts in their homes on their birthdays

Tragedy comes in different packages.

It’s a suicide bomber at a Parisian concert hall. It’s a phone call that dad has brain damage from a slip on the linoleum. It’s a cursory glance at the Bible instead of a long drink. It’s an alcoholic beverage or a frosted sugar cookie or one more click on the computer even though you vowed to stop and “just do today” in God’s grace. It’s realizing that you got something really, really wrong.

For Job, tragedy was a gaggle of breathless messengers who delivered the worst news of his life. I wouldn’t ever be able to hear running feet the same way again if I had been him.

His life had been idyllic, blessed by the hand of God for being obedient. And yet, in his sovereignty, God destroyed his life: his children, his material wealth, his personal wellness.

Friends came, sat in silence for an eternal seven

They held feasts in their homes on their birthdaysKaitlyn2019-10-08T02:29:19+00:00

She had a four-bedroom house once

“I left him four months ago.”

I don’t know how much of it is real, but the Lord has led me to talk and pray with M several times while doing street evangelism. Her life is incredibly broken, marked by abusive relationships and disease and too many children left to fend for themselves while their mother tries to beg a few dollars.

Women like M make me want to curl up and weep. I cannot fix her problems, and so I want to run away. I have none of her problems, and so I feel a sense of shame. But still I sit with my legs politely folded as she updates me: how she might be getting housing soon, how she’s so excited (she then proceeds to pull out photos of her children). And I give her a dollar and encourage her and then our group pulls her into our circle for

She had a four-bedroom house onceKaitlyn2019-10-08T02:29:19+00:00

Altar Altercations

It was straight from the Enemy.

Right as communion was about to be served, a commotion began in the front of the sanctuary. A man was yelling something, the worship pastor and the ushers formed a net around him and tried to calm him down until a security officer could escort him out. The organist began to play a tune to smooth everything over. I was dumbfounded as the man continued to put up a fight, shouting, “This church sucks!” as he was led quickly down the main aisle.

Right before the most important celebration believers partake in, when our minds were fully focused on the sacrifice of Christ and the goodness of God. The most holy moment during the entire service. Coincidence? I think not.

How often does a dirty wrench get tossed into our lives right in the middle of sweetness and spiritual growth? Sometimes it’s from the Enemy or our

Altar AltercationsKaitlyn2019-10-08T02:29:19+00:00

Sometimes Quiet is Violent

I remember sitting with Luke on the steps to the alleyway last semester. He was dying inside for lack of peace. Over the next few weeks, we talked and prayed and cried out to God together. I fervently read the Psalms with him. We’d eat french fries and wonder when God would respond.

We didn’t doubt, we just wondered.

I’ve been confronted with the idea that God suffers inconsolably with us, and that discontent breeds love, so we all must be discontent, including God. That he’s impatiently pacing back and forth, waiting for the day when perfection can be restored in heaven. Eden made us lose our innocence, and now we have to face the tragedies and sufferings that accompany knowledge of good and evil. He’s going to wipe our tears away, but I denote a problem with this image of a suffering God who is out of control, doesn’t understand, and doesn’t

Sometimes Quiet is ViolentKaitlyn2019-10-08T02:29:19+00:00

The cross is an instrument of torture. It’s the symbol of who we are in Christ, God’s love, his sacrifice, his awesome grace and cleansing blood. We wear it around our necks, paste it to our walls, build wooden versions of it on our church steeples. We see it so much….have we forgotten what it means?

Bible studies, sermons, small groups, fellowship, even communion and baptism….we have become desensitized to their significance and purpose. Our society has gripped the church and turned it into a selfish, experience-driven buffet that seeks to stuff us with bloated, boring, banal.

We are tired. We refuse to admit it. We are hungry. We don’t know why.

Oh, how the American church has lost its focus! Who can ascend the holy hill of the Lord anymore, as the Psalmist cried out?

Do we pray for Paul’s words to be true in our lives, that we might count everything as loss compared

TrendingKaitlyn2015-08-27T03:12:47+00:00

T-minus

Year 3 is flashing a cruel smile of daunting proportions.

The City has welcomed me back with its usual carelessness. My friends, and Bible College as a whole, however, have been shining the light of Christlike encouragement back into my heart. I am not alone, and am surrounded by precious souls, kids, really, seeking to minister to the broken and chase after the face of our Lord.

I am eager to dig in. I am frightened about what I have to do. I am delighted in what papers, what research, and what projects I have before me. I want to crawl in a hole and let someone else do them for me. I don’t want to have to do an internship. I’m scared.

At the end of summer, and the beginning of a new chapter in my life, God led me to Paul’s words in 2 Corinthians. Sitting here and feeling unprepared, insufficient,

T-minusKaitlyn2015-08-18T21:40:54+00:00

Wanted: a way to see beyond my sunglasses

Everyone wears sunglasses of perspective.

It’s hard to value your own at times. The big trendy thing to do is to take pictures with kids in Africa and/or post a Bible verse/indie song lyric on Facebook with a #vscocam landscape photo of some obscure beach. Meanwhile, back in the backwoods, God is moving quietly and has me singing in church on Sundays, hosting a couple ladies’ breakfasts, and selling toys in the next tourist town over.

Is this as exciting as spending my summer feeding widows in Guatemala or travelling the Southeast putting on Gospel camps for kids? Is it as meaningful as interning at a megachurch co-leading worship or studying abroad in the Mediterranean or serving at a family camp in Michigan?

God’s Word tells me the answer is yes. When I started working fast food at age 14, this was a verse I quickly memorized and treasured:

“Whatever you do, work at it

Wanted: a way to see beyond my sunglassesKaitlyn2015-07-19T00:28:05+00:00

Wanted: balance between relying on God for my future and going after it myself

I want to do well. I don’t do things halfway. I want to be known as someone who is reliable, able, competent.

A drive for excellence is still important — wanting to do well, putting all our effort into a task, seeking to honor God by giving him our best — but we must pray for discernment and conviction t0 make sure these things do not morph into idols of perfectionism.

Especially in a ministry setting, I’ve realized that this can be an iron wall: wanting to do your best, but relying on the Lord means that it’s not in your own power. Add in the the fact that there’s always going to be someone who is “better” than you (read: with writing, teaching, knowledge, gentleness, hospitality, Scripture memorization, master of the Greek text, everyone they talk to gets magically saved and you can’t even manage to effectively communicate your college major

Wanted: balance between relying on God for my future and going after it myselfKaitlyn2015-07-12T21:20:53+00:00