New

Every day is something new, and every moment is new again.  We're living n a time and a place where new is in, new is hip, new is the thing - a new relationship, a new tv show, a new smartphone, a new car, a new job, a new church, a new place, a new you.  (20 pounds lighter with just a hint of a tan, please.)

I got a new desk this week.

Well, new to me.  This thing was a garage sale STEAL at a mere 15% of the original price, and it's in excellent shape.  Hardly a scratch on it.  It's pretty much everything I've been looking for in a desk, and I've been looking for four years.  It's also eerily similar to the desk I designed to build for myself when I could not find one I could afford.  (I couldn't afford to build it either.)  This desk has work space, beautiful curves, and hidden storage - all pluses that raise it high above my old desk.  It's also reasonable height.

I've had the old desk for about 18 years; it was the family desk back when I was in middle school, stayed at dad's house after the divorce, and moved into my bedroom after his death thirteen years ago.  It is still in great shape, excellent shape, except for a few scratches from my x-acto knife, and sturdy.  But that thing is a monstrosity.  It stood taller than I did, stacked near-ceiling high on the hutch with almost everything I own and use.  No work space.  Nothing.  I've kept it because it's not worn out, because it was free, and because I couldn't afford a new one.  But I finally bit the bullet and that thing is on its way to Goodwill later this week.

Which brings me back to my new desk.  It's new.  It's beautiful.  It's wholly different from what used to sit in this very spot.  But it doesn't feel different.  You know when you get something new or even when you just move things around, everything feels awkwardly different for the first few days, at least.  You try to sit where the couch used to be and find yourself laughing when you fall on the floor.  You drive yourself crazy looking for this or that thing in the top drawer before twenty minutes later remembering you moved it to the third drawer.  Little things that just throw you off for awhile.  In little things, it's easy to laugh about.  But the big things...I dunno.  It's kind of fun to be disoriented, isn't it?

Except I'm not.  From the instant I made the desk swap, I haven't felt anything different.  I don't lose myself walking into my work space.  I don't accidentally reach for something where it used to be on the old desk.  I know right where everything is at, sit here like I've been sitting here all my life, utilize this space like it's always been here.  And I have wondered how that could be.

The answer is: because this is right.  This desk is so right for everything I've wanted to do with this space.  It is conducive to the work that I do here.  It is aesthetically perfect for my sensibilities.  It's me.  It doesn't feel different because it feels so right.  It's natural.

It's a silly example, I know.  Forgive me.  But it's not just the desk.  We spend so much time changing, so much time chasing new, and we're so frequently disoriented in different that I think we're wasting it all.  The answer to life's discomforts is not in "new;" it's in right.

In the past couple of weeks, I have spent considerable time in two houses.  One, I live in full-time; one, I was just visiting for awhile.  When I walk in the door of the one, I head straight to my room, set my stuff down, kick off my shoes, and worry about nothing.  I engage in life as it comes and don't worry about being something specific, something new.  When I walk in the door of the other, I kind of put stuff wherever it fits, where it maybe should go, I forget for awhile to take off my shoes, I'm looking around trying to figure out where I am and what I'm doing and what I should be doing and it feels like I should be doing something new, like I'd have to be something different in this place.  And you might be surprised which door is which.

Some things are just natural, some places just are.  You feel at home in them, and even when things change, there's no time for them to feel different.  Because they just feel right.  It's not a new thing.  It's not an old thing.  It's just a right thing, and it doesn't drive you nuts to think there could be another thing.  This one is enough.  It's perfect, just the way it is, whether it was this way yesterday or has never been this way before.

The same is true of you and I.  There is a place where we just are.  A natural place for us to be.  A natural heart for us to live from.  A gift, a grace, an attitude, a presence that are all just perfect for us.  I've spent so much of my life trying to overcome the shadows that haunt me, trying to change things, trying to become new.  Trying to prove to everyone that I am new.  Trying to prove to myself that I can be made new.  All this emphasis on new...it's disorienting.  I'd wake up in the morning and have to remember my "new," have to find it again, have to figure out where I put it so I could do that again.  But here lately, I've found a better thing and that better thing is "right."

I'm just me, and this is just it.  And I'm not a new thing.  And I'm not an old thing.  I'm just a right thing, a right Aidan.  A wonderful creation.  And you know what?  The more I live in the right thing, instead of the new thing, the more I notice that nobody notices.  Nobody remarks that oh my gosh, I'm so different now.  Nobody's drawing comparisons between how I was yesterday and how they find me today.  Because, I guess, this just makes sense.  I am as I ought to be, so it doesn't strike anyone as a new thing.  It doesn't strike me as a new thing.  It's just a right thing, completely natural.

Be yourself.  Be your right thing and stop chasing after new.  Whatever is new will be made old again; whatever is right is pure.  So be that.  Be right.  It's so much better than new, and much less disorienting.

Unimaginable

You've heard it said, and my pastor said it again this past Sunday, that you will eat in Heaven - you will feast in Heaven - and not gain a pound.  You won't have to worry about calories.  You won't have to count points.  You won't have to think about skipping that dessert.

True and...not quite.

We will absolutely feast in Heaven, and I can't wait.  I don't know if there's anything greater than bacon, but you can bet I'm looking excitedly forward to holy, heavenly bacon.  Apple pie, sure, but....God's apple pie?  (Still might not be better than grandma's, but I'm game.)  And we won't gain weight.  And we won't count calories or points or bites of dessert.

But it's not like Heaven is going to be a gorge fest.

It's not like we'll get to Heaven and eat ourselves silly, browsing the grand buffet for eternity while filling our plates again and again.  I know that sounds like Heaven to some people, but that's not the promise.  The promise of Heaven is not that you get to do whatever you want, as much as you want, to whatever excess that you want, and not have to pay the price for it.

The promise of Heaven is something else entirely.  Let me think of the word.

It's not that you will eat endlessly; your appetite will change.  You will have this body that isn't the perfect body, but it will be your perfect body, the body created perfectly for you as God intended you to be.  You will eat delicious foods, and your body will accept them because there will be no illness, no disease, no allergies even to make you think twice about that next bite.  You won't have to test your sugars.  You won't have to guard your gluten.  You won't have to choose between potatoes and cornbread because your body will be able to handle both starches in the same meal.  Those and more!

And you will eat only until you're satisfied, and your perfect body will find perfect satisfaction in the perfect food.  You will not be hungry.  You won't be scoping out seconds.  You will have as much as you need, and it will be perfectly enough and you will be perfectly content with that.  And it will feel like a feast.

You will always be satisfied, you will always be full.  There will be no saying that God doesn't feed you enough; Heaven is perfectly enough, and I don't think we understand that concept down here.  I don't think we really have a grasp on "enough," on contentment, on satisfaction.  But that is Heaven.

And it's not just about food.  See?  That's the glory of it.  

Every time we talk about Heaven, people inevitably try to put it in terms of what we would do more of, have more of, indulge in more of if we could do so here without consequence.  It's this glorious place that is more than we have now.  I don't think more is a helpful descriptor.  I think it makes us miss the promise of Heaven, which is not that we will have more, but that our everything is going to change and we are going to have enough.

Our everything is going to change so radically that we can't even imagine it here.  That's why Heaven is unimaginable.  It's not bigger, grander, greater; it's perfect.  But we have no concept of perfect that is not frail, fragile, and flexible.  We've conceptualized perfect from our imperfect bodies, and that skews everything.  Heaven won't be like that.

Because we won't be like this.

Everything you crave here - nutritionally and otherwise - is going to change.  Your appetite is going to change.  And then you will find Heaven satisfying.  It will be enough.  It will be perfect.

I smile a little bit every time I hear someone talk about feasting in Heaven.  I smile because I know it's not going to be like that, because it reminds me that I'm not going to be like this.  I can't wait to see what I look like in Heaven.  Can't wait to feel what perfect and enough and perfectly enough feel like in their purest, most radical forms.  I can't even imagine.

Go ahead and try.  Think about Heaven.  Just know that it won't be like that because you won't be like this, and let that incredible truth take hold of your heart.  Can you imagine what you might be like?  

Of course not, but it's fun to try.

Now, somebody pass the bacon.

Unintimidated

Go ahead.  Growl.  

Was that the best you can do?

It doesn't matter much anyway because I've finally hit that point in my life where I am living unintimidated.  Which may be dangerous - for me, for you, for the Gospel.  Hopefully mostly for the Gospel.

I've spent so much of my life comparing and proving, striving to be the best because I've always thought I had to be the best.  Laboring to prove myself.  Doing more than I've been called to do because, well, I can.  Even if I shouldn't.  Lately, I've taken a step back and disciplined myself into doing only the things God has called me to do and created me to do.  It's changed a lot of things.

Most notably, that I am unintimidated.

I am finally reading the books of other authors without my red pen in hand, without waiting to criticize and critique in order to show my own supremacy.  You know what?  There are some incredible up-and-coming authors out there, and I hope you have the chance to read some of them.  (I will share as I discover them, I'm sure.)  I am meeting with other artists and taking an interest in their work - an honest interest - instead of racking my brain to figure out if I've done anything that worthy or not...or if I can.  I am embracing new moments and incredible opportunities in unbelievable ways because I'm no longer trying to figure out what I could be or should be doing with them; I'm just there, and let's rock this thing.

I am not intimidated by you being better than me.  I am not intimidated by the moment being bigger than me. I am not intimidated by time pressing in on me.  And interestingly, I'm not even intimidated by my own failures.  That last one shocked even me, maybe because there are so many of them.

But I'm editing my way through Prayse (title subject to change if God would just inspire me with a better one already!) and running into some glaring failures, especially as a writer, just as I was starting to think I might get this writing thing under my belt.  That used to be discouraging.  That used to be intimidating.  Today, I just find myself smiling - and laughing, often - because it's just a challenge.  And it's one God has uniquely prepared me for.  I trust in the gift He has given me, and I'm not scared of my own bad writing.  I just won't leave it that way, either.

That's the key of it all, I guess.  Of being unintimidated.  It's trusting in what God has given me, what God has given you.  It's believing He has crafted and created this unique and wonderful and capable gift within me and that it is sufficient to do as He has called me to do.  Once I gave up all I haven't been called to and settled into the gift, I find that the gift is enough.  For writing.  For creating.  For socializing.  For living.  For breathing.  For loving.  For being.  It's everything; it's enough.

It's simple.

So go ahead and growl.  Is that the best you can do?  Go ahead and paint a brilliant painting, cast a breathtaking sculpture, write...*gulp*....an intoxicating story.  It doesn't change what I'm doing, and you can't scare me.  Heck, even I can't scare me.  There is no reward, no prize, no glory in being the best at anything if you are not first and foremost the best you that can be.  That's what I'm working toward.  I'm pretty excited about what the best me is going to be able to give to the glory of the Gospel and to the praise and honor of God.

And I'm excited for you, too.  I'm excited to see what God can do through you when you put aside being the best and hone in on being the best created you.  See?  Since you don't scare me, I can get excited about that.  Looking around, there's a lot of good reason to be excited.

Our best selves together, let's rock this thing.  It's a mighty dangerous time - for me, for you, for the Gospel - because this is how fires start.  And friends?  I'm on fire.

Unburdened

I am home now from ten days in the mountains.  After ten years without going anywhere, it was a much-needed getaway...even if I was working most of the time.

As I put the miles behind me headed south a week ago last Friday, I could feel so much releasing within me. So much pouring out of me.  Years of burden.  Years of struggle.  Years of heavy weight that I'd been carrying around.  This trip was a chance to break free from so much of that.  And truth?  I was able to.

But it wasn't all pleasure.

Every day, I woke up and looked out into the mist, popped open my Bible, and started reading, just as I would any morning at home.  Devotion comes first.  And normally, I am inspired by the Word of God.  He and I just connect.  We connect as I'm reading.  Several times throughout the day, He pops into my head.  Many moments, He sneaks in and grabs my heart.  I kind of live inspired.

In the mountains, not so much.  I only made notes on maybe two sentences in all my Bible in ten days.  I didn't have a lot of mercy moments.  Other than the really cool matters of creation - the thunderstorm over the lake, the rainbow, the mist, the mountains - I wasn't connecting with God in the same way that I have come to know, to treasure, around here.  It was kind of disappointing.

Really disappointing.

Down there, I had these moments where I was everything I thought I had ever wanted to be.  Relaxed.  Sociable.  Pleasant.  Hard-working, but not uptight about it.  Unconstrained.  There was no sense of time.  I mentioned it on Twitter and maybe Facebook - there was a clock where I was staying, and the clock's only job was to show the day of the week.  It was so easy to lose track...because I just sort of took the days as they came.  I didn't hurt.  I didn't fear.  I didn't tremble.  I looked in the mirror and saw the girl I had always dreamed of - inwardly and outwardly.

But this one gnawing thing was missing: heart.

I wasn't a woman after God's heart.  Don't get me wrong - I was living and loving, working and serving, doing and being and praying that in all of that, God would continue to use the time to free me from so many things and to create in me the woman I yearned for.  He did, and I have to be honest, I completely failed to notice.  I forgot to remember His role in things.  I forgot to honor Him for doing in me; it was too easy to just grab onto what He was doing.  It got to be midweek, and I wondered where my inspiration was.  I wondered where this whisper in my heart had gone, this companion and voice I have grown so accustomed to hearing.  I could almost feel my life shallowing out, my depths fading.  Because I was content for a few days to trade the God who has wanted to be all for me for a chance to experience all I had ever wanted.  Or thought I'd wanted.  Or...I don't know.

I'm not saying it's bad to have your moment.  I'm not saying it's bad to be the woman God created in me, the one I've longed to be in touch with.  It was absolutely cool.  But if I'm going to be that woman, I have to be more diligent about connecting with God in that place, too.  I have to be more concerned with getting my heart straight so that I find that relationship that I so treasure even in the fine times.

It's easy to be God's when we need Him.  When life bears down on us and we have all this fight and all this burden and all this trouble that only God can mitigate for us.  That only God can help us carry.  That only God can carry us through.  In an unburdened moment, can we also find God?  How are you His when you don't really need Him as desperately as life sometimes demands?  How are you His when you only want Him?

He's not a different God in those times; you are only a different you.  You have to learn - I have to learn - to bring yourself before God however you are: burdened, unburdened, worried, wondered, frozen, free.  You have to make God a priority and carve out the place where only He speaks to you...before the good things get so loud that you can't hear any more.

God still wants to be all for you even when you think you're all you ever wanted to be.  He is still all, and He is still more.  It doesn't have to be a trade-off; never settle.  Live unburdened - man, it is an incredible way to live and to breathe - but burden yourself for the fullness of God.  You need that, too.

I need that, too.

On Creation

As you probably know by now, I am more than a writer; I am also an artist.  I enjoy the creation process, the creative process, really, and I almost always have my hands in this or that design-based thing.

Which only gives me a deeper appreciation for my Creator.

In the past couple of months, I have done some graphic work for a therapeutic horse riding center and have also undertaken a redesign of our monthly women's ministry newsletter for the congregation.  In these ventures, specifically, I have found myself trying to recreate things that have already been created - horses, flowers, the sun, a tree, a bug.  It is a surprisingly agonizing process during which I am fully aware: these things don't even have to work.  That is, my only objective is to create a two-dimensional, flat, stagnant representation of such things and not the vibrant, tangible, dynamic things that they actually are.

My flower just has to look like a flower; it doesn't have to grow.  My sun just has to share a smile; it doesn't have to shine.  My tree stands as a representation; it doesn't cast its shade.  My bug is just a little thing; it doesn't have to pester.  My horse just has to be recognizable as a horse; you don't have to walk behind it with a shovel.  And I'm a perfectionist, and let me tell you - even this is hard!

It's hard to create something that even looks like something created.  It's hard to get the little details right.  It's hard to bridge that gap between "refrigerator art," where everyone knows what you were going for and appreciates the effort, and "created," where things of course live and breathe and interact.  Somewhere in the middle is good design, and I only pray I hit it as often as I can.  Both to bring glory to the God who created me to do so and to bring glory to the God who created these things in the first place.

God is fairly sarcastic with me much of the time.  He loves me deeply, but it's the way we communicate.  My brain and my heart just seem to get it.  Or maybe it's me being sarcastic with myself the way God would if He were standing over my shoulder.  (He's standing over my shoulder, isn't He?)  But every time I sit down to design something simple, I kind of get the God of Job echoing in my head.

Tell me, God teases.  Have you ever even seen a ladybug?  'Cause that's not even close.  Do you know the way I built the shell?  Or why the antennae stick out at just such an angle?  Have you seen a tulip?  What is that thing you are drawing?  It doesn't even have to drink water; can you even make its petals look right?  

And so on.  I am generally amused.

(And God's not the only one.  The lady I was working with at the therapeutic horse riding center tenderly informed me that every one of my horses was a donkey.  By ear shape alone.  *sigh*)

But He's right.  And she's right.  Creation is so far beyond my grasp, even as an artist, even as a creater (I won't call myself a "creator"), that I cannot help but be in awe of the world around me.  I cannot help but lose my breath at the sight of the created world.  I cannot help but stagger under the beauty of Creation.

A flower...that not only looks like a flower but spreads its roots, soaks up the water, drinks in the sun, creates its own food, and grows.  A sun that holds its place in the emptiness, in the vast expanse of space, and gives light to a world billions of miles away.  A tree that stands firm on a root system that dwarfs its branches, that births new leaves and casts a shadow of respite on the ground.  A ladybug that flies, that lands, that senses its surroundings, whose red color is misleading, a beautiful defense mechanism so that it can protect itself from natural predators, though its vulnerability is ever-present.  A horse whose heavy body stands on strong legs, who gallops and trots and takes on a rider, whose sleek coat is contrasted by a flowing mane, whose hooves are firm but fragile.  This stuff doesn't just look like stuff - it is stuff.  It's incredible!

So I am in awe.  I am so far less a creater, even as I have been created to create.  I used to agonize over getting it right, over the finest details, over the smallest things.  Over doing justice to the images, the shadows of real things, that I was trying to recreate.  Not any more.  I mean, have I even seen a ladybug?  'Cause that's not even close....

Now, I just try to give glory.  To the God who created me to create.  And the God who created all this incredible stuff in the first place.