The wheels fell off the bus this week. All the way off the bus, rolled into the ditch and the bus screeched to a complete halt. Okay, let's be real, that is my first very dramatic response. It’s not really that dramatic, it's just time to re-evaluate. Its no different than the parent/teacher conferences I just had with my ELL boys. Every once in awhile we have to ask ourselves, what's working and what's not. It turns out there are some things that are not working for me.
As fall comes and the sun doesn’t shine as brightly, I’m a little more tired, even a little more cranky.
As my kids hit the end of the first quarter, the newness is wearing off and now people are complaining about going to school.
My energy can no longer run off warm days and sunny skies. I was listening to Rachel Hollis' Facebook Live on Monday and this phrase stood out to me,
energy is not something we have, it is something we create
The season has changed, I can no longer create energy from the sun hitting my face, I need a new energy source. I think I’ll try the new energy source of.... coffee. JK, I want more coffee, but more coffee doesn’t actually help. It is in this season when I am tired and want to watch Netflix and eat junk food that I need physical exercise more than ever. I am less active because it is less warm. But I want less chub and less grumpiness, so I will have to hitting the gym more and eat good healthy green food. My new mantra, “less chocolate, more kale, less Netflix, more treadmill."
I was running off the newness of my schedule and adrenaline. Adrenaline burns out and newness tarnishes. I have to find something a little more consistent to make them go around. Rhythms replace adrenaline. Don’t get me wrong, I love running off adrenaline. I love the jolt of energy and flying down the highway at the speed of light and throw-you-off-the-cliff kind of feeling. But that only takes you so far and usually ends in a crash. Consider us crashed.
Putting the kids in public school has been a complete shift in our family rhythm. In August, Paul and I worked to create a decent daily rhthym, and when-the-kids-are-away rhythm. We didn’t really establish a family rhythm. This week, we had to sit down and figure out a family rhythm. Expectations had to be restated and a rhythm re-found. Rhythms help our kids feel safe and secure. Now they know what to expect so they aren’t randomly getting into trouble for not meeting an expectation that they didn’t know existed.
Here we go, we got some rhythm, let’s get some purpose.
Purpose takes the place of newness. So much about this fall was new.
Kids were in school, I was putting more energy into the church.
Our oldest went to college.
I used to cook three meals a day for my kids, now I sometimes make one.
All of this was fun, but the newness is fading. The cracks are showing. I have to know my purpose. Why am I doing what I am doing? It’s been a while since I have written a purpose statement for myself. In Micah 6, Micah reminds the Judeans of their purpose and I think I will steal it as my purpose statement.
HE has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you?
But to DO JUSTICE, LOVE MERCY, and TO WALK HUMBLY with your God
Although all of these three phrases goes together. The phrase that is really connecting with me is to LOVE MERCY. I don't always love mercy, because mercy feels unfair and like I'm giving something up.
The thing is that what really sent the wheels flying off the bus was me.
I want to feel a certain way....happy, peaceful, in control
I want my life to go in a certain direction.
I want to be affirmed and told I’m doing a really good job.
I want people to like me.
I want to be valuable.
I want to be important.
I want my family to love and appreciate me.
I want to have a voice and have people listen to it.
100% me
Without fixing this, this bus will only gimp along. It's not that I don’t read my Bible or pray. It's not that I don’t listen to podcasts or sermons or worship music... okay I barely listen to worship music, but we can talk about that later. It's not that I don’t serve the church or read books that grow my faith or journal. I do all these things. I serve and serve.
I love my “job” but I struggle with the people. And when I say struggle, I mean I am embarrassed to be associated with certain people.
I struggle with the people that have so combined their beliefs and politics that it has become a religion.
I struggle with people on social media who proclaim truth, but to the end that it serves them.
I struggle with people that leave no space for diversity or differences or viewpoints that are different than theirs.
My struggle has left me embarrassed to be a follower of Jesus.
I know the real problem here is me, and the solution is Jesus. But what if that means people think that I hate the same people that they hate because we both say that we follow Jesus. I don’t want that and I don’t know what to do with that. I have found that this tension requires mercy, for me and for others. In Anne Lamott’s book, Hallelujah Anyway, she riffs on the theme of mercy. And when dissecting how mercy met the Samaritan woman she says this, “She kept lying. Jesus did not stomp away. He stayed with her.” Maybe following Jesus means following him to these places with all the people I struggle with. When I feel like the “christian political agenda” is self-serving and not people serving and certainly not even close to serving the Kingdom of God, I am not going to stomp away. I will try to at least graciously walk away without stomping.
In the best version, I will bring mercy to the table.
Anne Lamott finishes the chapter with this:
Jesus said to the woman at the well, Be like me: be true to who you really are; be in truth, share, and above all, try to forgive.
This is the mercy I will hold out to the others and myself...
Be like Jesus
Be true to who Jesus made me to be
Be in truth
Share
Try to forgive
I would love to know how you are re-evaluating your life? What are the things that keep you moving?
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