Day Six: Found in Fall

Fall has always been my favorite season. The heat and humidity of Summer drains my energy while the cooling temperatures of September and October put a definite spring in my step. And then there's all the fun Fall events... apple festivals, pumpkin patches, corn mazes, and the like. Oh, and the colors. The colors the colors the colors...

greens that gradually become orange, crimson, and yellow. The maples seems to show these off the best.

I've been blessed to spend the past two weekends in lovely cabins in the mountains of Western, NC with beautiful graceful friends. But even during the week I have found myself reveling in this season.

It's no coincidence that I was found on a Friday in the Fall and that He pursued me wildly until I literally fell (hard) into this year's Fall.

Though I cannot fully understand the why's and wherefore's of how He works. I think I have an inkling of why He chose this season of life for me during this season of the year.

He knew it would be hard, so He let me fall during the months of the year when I already look around in wonder at His creation. He knew I needed to hear his gentle whisper, so He let me fall when my heart and life were slowed down enough to listen. He knew I would need to find hope and excitement for the future, so He let me fall when there would be festivals and fun everywhere I turned.

Most of all, He knows me. There is not one detail of me that escapes His attention. Sure, I've read over the years that He knows every hair on my head - and that's great. But what I realize about that verse now is that He knows every single thing that lights me up from the inside out.

That's what Fall does for me. It has always been my season. Eyes wide open, taking it all in, heart full of wonder. So that's where He found me, where He knew I would be ready to change - just like the beautiful maples.

It literally brings tears to my eyes to know, I mean really know that He loves me that much. To purposefully bring me to this place with Him during my favorite season of the year.

So now every single Fall I will remember how I fell and how I was found. 

Thank you Lord for this season. A season of stunning, life-altering, merciful, grace-abounding change.

31 Days of Being Found: Day Five

Found in the lack of technology

Perhaps this is unique to America. Not sure, I'm not much of a world traveler. But the ridiculous pace of life in the U.S.A. can be absolutely exhausting. Truly - how and why do we do life this way?

Everyone is in a hurry and ridiculously connected to all manner of things - except people it seems. A line at the grocery store with more than one person in front of us inspires a sigh or a huff. A stoplight means 30 vital seconds to check Facebook, Twitter, email, or a play on Words with Friends. Waking in the morning means checking email for 20 minutes even before turning on the morning news show.

Anywho... there's a myriad of things to distract us throughout the day. I don't think any of these things are awful in and of themselves - truly. Social media, the news, smart phones, and the like can serve a host of positive avenues in our lives these days. However, I do believe that if we focus too much on these things we risk becoming consumed and/or driven by such things. In doing so we may miss God's whispers during our day.

Now... I say these this recognizing fully that I have allowed myself to be totally consumed by such things as well as the breakneck pace of appointments, responding to emails in less than 5, and "liking" every possible FB status update or comment in fear of not appearing "social" enough. I obtained an iPhone near the beginning of 2012 through my job and immediately fell in "love." oh my word - it was a quick fall too.

Remember though... I quit my job recently. So that meant no more iPhone (unless I wanted to foot my own bill at the moment). So at the end of July I went from iPhone connectivity back to this:

And life has been so sweet because of it.

Now I won't lie. I'm gnawing at the bit to get my hands on an iPhone again. However, I must say that this time away from it has been a much needed break from distraction.

I have also limited my TV time lately. Instead of starting my mornings with world news and entertainment I turn to God's Word. I realize how "church camp" that sounds, but it has been an absolute necessity for me to drown out every voice but His lately. I have taken for granted how sensitive my mind is to input. That may be negative news, romantic comedies, the FB lives of friends that have "more" of what I want for myself, or the need to respond immediately to email as a means of controlling something - anything.

Gosh, it's exhausting.

So these days away from much of that have been so sweet. It's forced me to sit in silence, to listen to people instead of just hearing them, to listen to my own thoughts and sort out the Truth from the lies, to pick up a book - or even The book, and to write.

In essence, this disconnectedness has issued a connectedness to things that I've needed to focus on for quite some time. Most importantly, I've heard His voice more. I think He whispers to us frequently. We just have to be quiet and focused enough to hear Him.

Have you been hearing His still small voice lately?

31 Days of Being Found: Day Four

Found in Community

Who are your people? I've been asking myself that a lot lately. Yesterday I was rather bold about telling you about my recent failures. I also told you that I am crazy happy with all of this "failure." And I still am.

So let me start telling you about why I'm so joyful amid all the "mess."

A very important factor in my newfound joy is my community. And because I love contrast so much, let me take a minute to discuss the antithesis of community...

isolation.

Ug, I despise that word these days. Truly. Doesn't it conjure images of a prisoner in a solitary confinement cell? Or a school kid in ISS sitting alone in a cubicle eating his or her lunch. For the past three years that word could have captioned almost any snapshot taken of me in my living room staring at my television - any night of the week.

Isolation is essentially hiding. Most days I did not even realize that I was hiding. I simply convinced myself that I was too tired, or too sad, or that because I'm an introvert I needed some down time at home by myself. I'm not dismissing the joy and necessity of times of solitude - certainly not. Quiet solitude and isolation are vastly different.

Times of solitude with the Lord are a necessary and vital part of spiritual growth. I think these times lead to discovery (aka being found). A person leaves such times renewed.

Isolation leads to loneliness and despair. Some of the enemy's best tools to thwarting growth.

As I started to let go of the things that were keeping me in hiding I began to discover my desperate need for community. I began contacting friends and family again. God brought to mind a host of people who were or would become my community. It was beautiful.

For one, I needed a place to stay. I'd just quit my job and still had a mortgage so renting seemed fairly irresponsible. So, I called my 82 year old aunt and she was thrilled to have me. This is my dad's sister and later he said "Holly, does she know you'll be bringing your cats?" Oops. You know what she said when he mentioned it to her??
"Well if Holly is coming of course the cats are coming." Precious.

I invited some girl friends from college to spend a weekend together at my aunt's cabin. Newer friends have invited me to spend some time with them this coming weekend. Coworkers from three years ago still have lunch every Thursday at a mall food court. I join them every chance I get. My family and I have taken day trips through the mountains. My dad is teaching me to fly fish (currently we are still practicing casting out in the backyard with the apple tree as the target).

My community is teaching me that life is not meant to be lived in isolation. I'm needed in this world. Because His life living and breathing in me is needed in this world, in my world - in my community. It doesn't matter that my life "looks" messy. Truth is people identify with the mess. Because all of us have some kind of mess. Being found just means you admit it and cease being afraid to share it.

Being found is causing me to be real. To be real with and in my community.

So who are your people? How do they "find" you? How do they keep you real?

31 Days of Being Found: Day Three

Found in Failure

Relying on myself takes many forms. And these forms are often dressed up. Dress forms. (Yes, I've been watching Project Runway lately.)

My ideas - dressed up very clever.

My intuition - dressed up all wise and feminine.

My sense of justice - dressed up all starched and ready for court.

My need to fix things - dressed up with a tool belt that carries a hammer, crazy glue, Clorox Cleanup, and maybe some baking soda and vinegar for the purists.

I'm sure there's another 15 to 20 forms I could add to this list. Perhaps you have your own or can identify with mine.

I'm sure you see the problem with those statements above... they all start with "My..."
Nothing that comes after that word really matters, because the failure begins with those two little letters.
And the result of any effort based on "my anything" is often the phrase "oh my oh my oh my... what have I done?"

While there is often a ridiculous amount of pain that results from such self-reliance, there is infinite amazing grace waiting to pick-up the pieces. There are pieces because something was broken. That something is self-reliance. And self-reliance or a self focused life is the very best way to hide.

I didn't even realize I was hiding because it was dressed up so pretty. It even prayed pretty prayers. So in order to be found I had to be broken. Which means I had to fail. Oh and fail I did...

I told you the process of being found began on September 30, 2011. Well... I ran back into hiding not long after the new year. My ideas, my intuition, my sense of justice, my need to fix things myself, my, my, my, my everything fought quite hard for several months. Until the end of July, 2012.

Then I finally reached the end of myself. Failure lead to brokenness. And boy was I broken, shattered really.

You see I've been working on a doctoral degree for a bit over three years now. Simultaneously I've been working on a PhD in the theology of ME.

In all of my self focus I managed to burn bridges with precious family, neglect my husband, lose sight of my gifts, and let my passion for my field almost completely die. All I could see was what I thought I needed. My focus on self made me spiritually blind. I still attended church, prayed a lot, and worshipped - but I was still hiding.

So at the end of July I did the following:

quit my job at the university where I was working/studying

put my house up for sale after the prime time to sell in a university town

packed up my cats, a few clothes, some books, and toiletries

and

moved back to the town where my husband and family had been living while I was off "discovering myself"

to live with my 82 year old aunt

I am unemployed, separated from my husband, making zero progress on my dissertation, and living in a guest room.

I'm a failure by all earthly accounts.

But that's not the perspective I'm operating from these days. I much prefer the perspective from the seat at the right hand of God. And in His view I'm victorious.

I'm ridiculously happy. Seriously - not kidding at all. It's the strangest thing. Nothing in my life at the moment makes much sense to a lot of folks. But it makes all manner of sense to Him.

Thank you Lord.

31 Days of Being Found: Day Two

This finding process began on September 30, 2011. 

I honestly had completely forgotten that date until I started paging back through my journal this past weekend - on September 30, 2012 to be exact. I literally gasped when I realized it was one year later.

One day later I was enjoying a lazy Saturday and decided to watch one of my favorite movies, Amazing Grace.

I watched this movie for the first time in 2007 (I think). I loved it immediately, but my heart had not been laid open at that point. It was simply an inspiring true story.

Well, four years later as I began to watch it again - heart splayed wide open - the message of the movie nearly jumped off the television screen. A steady stream of tears ran down my face. Not those horrid guilt-ridden tears - those are more based in hiding. No, these were tears of joy, of knowing,

of being found.

I've posted the movie trailer, but the part I wanted to find was a specific conversation between Wilberforce and Richard (the butler). It's near the beginning of the movie. Some of my favorite quotes from that conversation:

Richard:  "You found God sir?"

Wilberforce:  "I think he found me."

Wilberforce:  "I have ten thousand engagements of state today and I'd rather be getting a wet arse (yes, that's how's it is captioned) marveling at bloody spiders' webs."

Being found had that affect on me. Suddenly the constant hassle of life and the stress that threatened to literally choke me faded from my consciousness. In it's place I sat in near silence marveling at the miracle of being discovered the Creator of the universe. Not only was He the Creator of everything, but he was my Creator. 

Simultaneously I sat in awe of the bigness (the Creator) and the resulting smallness ("the Creator" created me) of that truth. Oh my... it still leaves me stunned.

31 Days of Being Found: Day One

I started Found on a Friday much much earlier this calendar year after I spent the Fall of 2011 truly being "found." I thought I was ready to write about it then. Not so.

The 7 posts that precede this one are still relevant and I enjoyed writing them - truly.

But now is the time to tell you about how I was found and how I continue to be found.

Being found is the opposite of and also the cure for "hiding." My dear friend and college mentor Emily Freeman wrote about this in her book Grace for the Good Girl. I strongly recommend it. Being found is one part of the larger grace experience.

I believe deep down we all want to be found. Hiding feels safe, but it is not. Being found brings freedom and in doing so unlocks the deepest and most beautiful mystery this world will ever know.

I will spend the next 31 days talking about the unveiling of this mystery in my life. I hope some of these things will resonate with you and if they do, please tell me if feel compelled.

For Day One...
being found showed me that I no longer had to figure it out. Instead, I am called to walk it out. Insert all manner of situations, decisions, people, etc. into the it of those two phrases.

Every time I attempt to reason something through I inevitably come up with most clever understanding or solution. Oh so clever. I pat myself on the back and plunge head first into my self-assured plan....

and then wonder why it does not turn out to be what I thought it would be.

All that dressed-up, clever self-reliance is no way to live. That pull-yourself-up-by-your-boot-straps mantra is rather exhausting and physically impossible. Seriously, but on a pair of boots and simultaneously try to pull yourself up into them - both feet at the same time.

So if relying on myself doesn't work, then what does?

Well, I plan to explore that with you for the next month. And I'll leave you with this...

Someone else already has it figured out. In fact He also walked it out. And what's more?

He'll still walk it out with us

See you tomorrow

Narnia and My Niece

I fell in love with The Chronicles of Narnia when I was in college. I never read these books as a child. A few years ago my husband gave me this beautiful bound version of all seven books from Barnes and Noble. I love love love it. It has gold edged pages and a ribbon bookmark.

My first grader niece is already an avid reader. She is also imaginative and brings her creativity to life in her artwork. I had a hunch she might enjoy Narnia. So I started reading them to her via Skype. I was right, she loved The Magician's Nephew immediately. We moved on to The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe and now we are in the middle of The Horse and His Boy. 


If you have a child in your family that loves to read, or even one who doesn't - you might want to give this a try. It works well even across the web. When you read aloud, make sure to use your voice well and make it exciting. Add hand gestures if you like. Shake your mane like Aslan. It's great fun. And ask your young reader questions so that they stay engaged and think about what you are reading. See if they can infer what might happen next. It's amazing what they come up with.

And most of all, make memories with your children that both you and they will cherish for a lifetime. I will always love this book because my husband was so thoughtful to give it to me. And I will love it all the more for the time spent reading it with my precious niece.

Happy Friday.