Crying.

Sometimes I cry. 

I cry a lot. 

I cry when I'm sad and I cry when I'm happy. Sometimes I cry when I think of you and how far away you are. I cry when I think of all the things I should have done. And I cry when I think of all the things I still have to overcome. Sometimes I cry for no reason at all. But mostly, I cry when I pray.

I don't pray just anywhere. And I try not to cry just anywhere either. My favorite places to pray are very simple. I love to pray in nature- when I feel God's presence around me in the beautiful things I can see and feel. And I love to pray in an empty sanctuary. When I was still in high school, I would sometimes walk out into the woods behind my house if it was a nice day and I would take in everything- the smells, the sounds, the sun glistening off the pond. I would run my hand over tree trunks and feel dirt run through my fingers. I felt at home there. And I had conversations with God. I felt like Adam in the garden before the fall, like God was right there walking beside me. After these walks I would almost always feel refreshed and ready to move on to the next part of my busy life. I sometimes felt that I had a whole new meaning and goal I was working toward when I emerged from the woods. It felt wonderful. 

I have only ever prayed in an empty sanctuary twice. Once, I was cleaning for my old church in Virginia and no one was in the church except for me. I knew it would be safe to go to the alter and kneel at the cross. No one would see me there. There is something about being in a silent church at an unusual time. That day, it was around 5pm and the light streaming in from the stain glass windows was indescribable. Seeing that was enough to make me feel the Holy Spirit. But I kneeled down at the alter and I cried. I cried and I prayed and I put my hands on the alter and let my tears fall to the floor. I had never prayed like that before. I had this feeling that God was really listening to me in that church that evening. It is hard to say why or try to describe the feeling, but I felt as if every word I spoke was delivered up to Him by angels.

The second time I cried in an empty church was in Ohio. My grandfather's church has a beautiful stained glass window above the alter and right around 3pm, the sunlight streams in like God opening the heavens. It is breathtaking. I don't remember why I had gone to the church that day or why I had my grandmother's key to the church, but I went inside quietly as to creep around the cleaning lady. I didn't go in with the intention of praying, but after seeing how beautiful it was, something moved inside me and I had to kneel at the railing. I wept for everything that afternoon. Things I don't even remember and things I am trying to forget. I wept for 45 minutes at the railing and wept as I drove myself home. I cannot describe how liberating it was. Sometimes I just need to cry. 

There is something that comes over me sometimes. I don't know what it is or how to describe it. I'm not sad or frightened. Sometimes when I cry I hate it because I don't understand it at all. But I think I understand why I cry when I pray. 

I am so overwhelmed with relief. At first I am grieving. I am grieving the fact that I will never be good enough. I can never pray long enough. I can never love God enough. I will never be as good as I should be for Him. And He knows it. He knew it before I was ever born- before I was even a thought in my parents' minds.  He knew everything about me and the struggles that I would go through and the thoughts that would race through my head every night before I go to sleep. 

He has felt my pain and knows my sorrows and knows why I cry. He understands everything that is inside me. Yet he lets me cry. He encourages me to cry. And He cries with me. He leads me down a path so that I may love Him more and more every single day of my life. And I try. I try so hard to live my life in a way that He would be proud of. But I know I cannot be good enough for Him. I will never be good enough to deserve what He has already given me. That is why I cry. 

But then my sorrow and self-pity turns to relief. Like a barber turning his sign from “Open” to “Close” at six o'clock every night. My emotion turns so quickly. I weep with relief. I remember- He reminds me- that I don't have to be perfect. I don't have to be good enough for Him. Because He loves me anyway. In spite of my sin- because of my humanity- He loves me. 

He loves me so much that He gave His only Son to die for my sins. My sins! I have so many! I surely don't deserve to have someone be crucified on a cross for my sins! Let alone the Son of God! But I don't deserve it. That is what makes me cry. I am so unworthy of His powerful and everlasting love. Yet, He calls me back when I stray, saying, “Please, I am not done with you. I want to love you more and give you more and be here forever and ever for you.” But I do stray. And I do wander. And when I do, He never loses sight of me and is always waiting for me with open arms to welcome me back into His presence. 

And I cry. Because I realize that I have not been living the way He wants me to live. He is calling me to His table every single day, every hour, every moment, saying, “Come, eat this bread and you will not hunger. Drink this wine and you will not thirst. This is my feast that I have prepared for you. Come eat with me at my table.” He is so quick to invite me to sit with Him. As if I am worthy! But instead of taking His gift, His generosity, His love, I am hiding underneath the table in my guilt and sorrows. 

He knows I cannot always be good and I cannot always be right. But I am called to love the people that are hardest to love. I am called to recognize that everyone makes mistakes and I am called to forgive those mistakes. Every single time. The Lord loves me so much, without measure, and without reason. He loves me every single day in a way that is so completely unimaginable that it makes me cry. 

And I am supposed to love everyone around me with that same type of love. Because of God's love, I am to love others. And I am trying. I may not always be right and I may not always be strong, but I know that God forgives me until the day that I die. I do not have to be right on my own. He is there for me. And I will never have to be strong- for He will always be there with me. Because of Him, I am able to conquer all evil. And through Him, I am able to love all of God and all of His people. 

Undergrad vs Seminary

Allow me to be weird for a few minutes and post about something that has been on my mind lately. I'm not sure why, but it's there.

Ways in which undergrad did not prepare me for seminary:

We live where we study.

I have to walk about 500 steps to get to the library. It's even less to get to the building with all the classrooms in it. I cannot get away from this place. I can always find someone that is in almost all of my classes if I have a question about a project or assignment.  We are almost all fighting the exact same battles.  I'm not used to that. I have the phone number of about 75% of the people on campus.

Our professors are a part of every aspect of our life.

The following is a real conversation I had with the associate dean of our school.  She was walking her dog near the apartments (where she lives during the week) on a Wednesday.  I was walking to a friend's apartment from the dorm with a bottle of wine and wine glass in my hand.

Dr. B: Hi Sarah.
Me: Hi Dr. B
Dr. B: I hope you have that paper done for class.
Me: Um yup...
Dr. B: Enjoy your evening with your wine.

They know everything we do all the time and it's weird.  In undergrad we could separate the "professional" student from the "typical college" student because our professors weren't around to see our walk of shame or day drinking. Not so much anymore. I'm not saying this is a bad thing.  We should be the same people behind closed door as we are in the pulpit.  But let's be honest, we aren't.

Everyone knows your business.

People say that seminary is like a fish bowl.  There are lots of people looking in at your every move from every different angle. Your home church. Your field education church. The staff. People at the grocery store when you're wearing your cleric. People on Facebook. Family friends. Your parent's coworkers. Everyone all of a sudden thinks you are either A) not fit to be a pastor because of your past or B) expected to be better than everyone else at being holy or human. Or both. No one cared about how much I prayed when I was a political science undergraduate student.  They didn't ask how I was maintaining my spirituality or how I would balance my social and life when I was in my vocation.

I actually like what I'm studying.

In undergrad, you basically had to bribe me with promises of a test the next day to get me to do reading assignments or research a topic on environmental politics or political parties.  I realize now that I was probably in the wrong field because I know plenty of people in undergrad that actually love what they study. Well, that wasn't me.  Now that I'm in graduate school, people have to invite me out so I'll stop reading for my Gospels class. I have to tell myself to go to bed before 2am because I have fallen in love with a new author. Reading for class has actually made me want to read more, not less. I want to talk about theology and God and Jesus all the time. It's such a good feeling but it is also really weird and I think I'm getting boring.

Praying is a normal part of study.

We pray before all of our classes which is awesome.  Sometimes I'll walk out of my dorm room for a break and see my dormmates gathered around one another praying silently and aloud. Everything we do here is solidified and realized through prayer and communion with one another. I wasn't prepared for that. Most of my studying during undergrad involved getting as much done before my roommate and I could start drinking around 8pm.

What I'm studying has everything to do with everything.

There is nothing in my life that doesn't relate to what I am studying in seminary. I think about my friendships and my parents and my goals. Everything revolves around God. Everything we do here is about the promotion of the Kingdom. I don't even know how to separate my "real life" from my "student life" anymore. Everything is woven together because of God.

Love.

I've had this video saved for a few months now. I watched it once. I don't remember where I first found it. Then I watched it six times after that. The "script" is written out below.

I heard that God wears a white hood and burns crosses.
I heard that God sold kool-aid to Jim Jones.
I heard that DOMA was written in his handwriting.
I heard that God seeks revenge through natural disaster.
I heard that God watches torture in his inquisitions.
I heard that God fashioned Matthew Shepherd into a crucifix.
I heard that God protests at funerals.
I heard heaven's gates were built to keep me out. 

That God's word forces secrets into my back pockets.
Leviticus 18:22 and men I cannot call my lovers
In wooden pews, that I am unholy.
Demonized
Heretic
That'll I'll end up in October crucifixion.
A rusted fence of sin
They say that God can soundproof his ears to fags
That he never meant to create.  

They say that God has abandoned me.
For never coming to wrathful sermons
That called me a bastard, orphan, sinner
I heard heaven is built on faith alone
Half baked apologies fed to God's willing eardrum
Blackened keys to heaven's gates
A white robe for even the bloodiest of hands
I heard God's forgiveness is just permission to be vengeful
That all it takes to be a good Christian is to call yourself one
Slit throats, then pray, ask for forgiveness after
Given your wings just for asking 

I heard God can't help me
My heart is hemophilic.
I bleed out scarlet lettered sins
I heard that God spoils his children
Never punishes their bad behavior
Always accepts their apologies because he can't bother to listen
God is too busy to open my prayers
God is always busy  

He wishes I could fix everything myself
They tell me he would leave me entirely
If I wasn't a white Christian girl in America
They say that he is worried about his image
To those who fund his paycheck
Heaven seems so expensive
Why can't God tell me these things himself? 

Tell your God that I mention him in my prayers
Tell him I miss him
That I know it's not his fault
It's just that he hung out with people like you for too long
Tell him I carry the faith of a gospel choir in my chest
Tell him I have not turned my prayers into chalk lines 

Tell your God that he is my God too
That I want him back
Tell him to show you my blueprints
How he created us both
Tell him to remind you that I am beautiful too
Tell him I've read the Bible
I know of love.
It is diverse, thousands of flowers
I've seen it in the shape of an orchid
Blooming inside my chest
Until the day it was ready to come out 

Tell your God he did something right
I grew up to be a lover
Tell your God
I've seen him officiate more weddings than funerals
Tell him that we are all imperfect
And thank him for it
Tell him he's a great father
Even in absence
That his children feel safe in his arms
That the sun rises for him
Her
You
Us
That I can feel his warmth on my back
Tell him I don't believe the rumors.
Tell your God: I forgive him. 

I just watched this video again (8 times). And I am completely heartbroken.

I know those feelings. I have been told that I need a "good influence" in my life because "God doesn't want to listen to sinners." Good friends of mine have been told that God didn't mean to create them. Others have been told that the bad things happening in their lives were a punishment from God for their sins. One of my best friends is told that they way God created her is an abomination.

Who told us these things?

People who call themselves Christians.
People who wear the cross proudly. Like a badge.
People who go to Christian colleges.
People who have read the Bible cover to cover.

People who don't understand the Gospel.
People who reshape Jesus' teachings to fit their prejudices.
People who don't understand God's love and forgiveness.

People who call themselves Christians.

People like me.

In my introduction to theological thinking class (and I think the middler's theology class) spent a lot of time talking about what it means to be a "real Christian." Yeah, I know. I don't know what that means either. But I have a pretty good idea that if we were all acting like "real Christians" - ones that love and follow Jesus and his teachings - people wouldn't look so critically at us.

Instead we judge and push and hate.
We do everything that Christians aren't supposed to do.

I'm really starting to hate Christians. (See? I do it too... ugh.)

So what in the hell are we supposed to do? How are we supposed to be better Christians?

Love. Love love love.

Seriously. It's that easy. And it's that freakin' hard.