Leaning

 

     I stood at the kitchen sink, staring out the window into my backyard.  I've been having a tough time lately.  So many things are weighing heavy on my heart.  A judge who disbelieves my doctors' diagnoses, and denied me disability.  A  global pandemic that keeps me isolated even more than usual, robbing me of time with friends and family.  The torturous process of scheduling a Covid vaccine.  The added stress of these things (and more!) increasing the amount of pain I experience daily. 

     As I stood there I started humming.  It was a song from my childhood that I haven't heard in years.  "What have I to dread, what have I to fear leaning on the everlasting arms?"   I struggled to remember the words.  They didn't come to me, but the tune did.  By the time I got to the chorus, "leaning, leaning safe and secure from all alarm, leaning, leaning, leaning on the everlasting arms", I was in tears.

     Leaning.  It sounds so easy.  I picture someone leaning up against a tree, peacefully watching what is going on.  That didn't really describe how I was feeling.

     Leaning.  No, more like desperately clinging.  I picture someone clinging to a palm tree in a hurricane, holding on with all his might because that's his only hope.

     Over the next few days, the song stayed in my mind.  I finally googled it just to find out what the lyrics were. I found myself humming it throughout the day.  It was on my mind when I fell asleep, and there when I woke. "What a fellowship, what a joy divine, leaning on the everlasting arms; what a blessedness, what a peace is mine, leaning on the everlasting arms."  Sometimes it brought tears.  Always it brought peace. 

     One time, I had a flashback and I heard my dad's tenor voice, leading this song in church.  I closed my eyes, wet with tears, and listened as he sang.  I was back in my childhood church.  I heard the others singing, but my dad's voice rang out, "leaning, leaning, leaning on Jesus, leaning on the everlasting arms".  Peace washed over me.

     I started leaning on God when I was a very little girl.  He was the palm tree in what was the hurricane called my life.  He was safety and strength.  He rescued me from a horrible situation, and gave me a new family.  He was peace and calm in the midst of fear and chaos.  And He continues to be.

    The first time I saw him, I saw a grandfatherly figure.  His eyes were tender, and his arms  outstretched to me.  He stood on a porch, with a big rocking chair.  He reached out to me, and I leaned into him.  

     I often go to this place when I am afraid.  

     Frustrated. Overwhelmed.  Disheartened.

Sometimes I lean, sometimes I cling. But I am always comforted.     As this song continues to play in my heart, I'm reminded to lean, to find comfort, to allow Him to handle it all. 

"what a fellowship, what a joy divine, leaning on the everlasting arms

what a blessedness, what a peace is mine, leaning on the everlasting arms;

leaning, leaning, safe and secure from all alarms,

leaning, leaning, leaning on the everlasting arms.

What have I to dread, what have I to fear, leaning on the everlasting arms?

I have blessed peace with my Lord so near, leaning on the everlasting arms"

     https://youtu.be/FBJgFa4MZLg

Mere Christianity

     I grew up in the church.  Well, from five-years-old on up.  I loved hearing Bible stories of how people in the church took care of each other.  The stories of Jesus ministering to people, where they were, were some of my favorites.

     As I got older, Sunday School lessons revolved around "being like Jesus";  we were to treat people with kindness, feed the poor, take care of the needy, visit the shut-ins. But I was also taught to "be of the world, but not like it".  People who weren't Christians were supposed to look at me and know that I was different, that I had something they didn't have.  It was supposed to make them want what I had.

     But where was the ministry? Who were we reaching out to?  It was the same group of people attending each week.  The same group of people attending weekly Bible studies and home groups.  Occasionally new people came.  For the most part, they appeared to already be Christians.  It was a homogenous group.

     I was a wounded child.  I had deep injuries from physical, sexual and emotional abuse.  I didn't feel like my church was a safe place to share that information, so I kept quiet.  But I loved going to church!  Jesus met me there.  He held me there.  He kept me close.  When I left church, I felt good.  As a child, I didn't know how to explain what I experienced.  Sometimes, I still struggle to explain my relationship with Jesus.  To me it sounds like the simplest thing, yet it sounds so trite (or so I think) when I hear the words come out of my mouth.

     When I was in Youth With a Mission, that was the first time that I felt like I was actually ministering to the world.  I felt like I was fulfilling my Sunday School command to be like Jesus.  Travelling to third world countries and inner-city areas in America exposed me to people, to opportunities very new to me.  My heart began to understand what it meant to serve the weak, bind up the brokenhearted and give what I had to the poor.

     It's interesting how all along the way I attracted women and children with experiences similar to mine.  There seemed to be a radar on me.  I admit, I was not far enough along in my own healing to really help.  But I was an ear, a shoulder, a beating heart who understood what they experienced.

     After my husband and I got married, we moved several times and attended a variety of churches.  Each of the pastors preached the same sermons of my childhood, but it seemed like the caring aspect of the church, the part that allows for healing, had not progressed.  It was still "churched" and "unchurched".  Often, old-school church vs. new Christians and wounded people.  There was no allowance for the messiness that comes along with people being real, the people who are struggling to heal from things no one wants to talk about.  I've heard so many stories along the way of injured people being further injured by the Church.  

     It hurts my heart.

     This past week has been a hard one for me as I've listened to people's stories.  I am glad to do it.  I understand what it feels like to have no one understand what you've been through.  But this week I heard things that both broke my heart and stirred an anger in my soul.  I listened to the story of woman who endured gut-wrenching abuse throughout her childhood and teen years.  She felt like it made her dirty, that her secret diminished her worth.  When she told me how the behavior, the judgments, of prominent leaders in the church reinforced her feelings of not being worthy of God's love, I broke into tears.  She told me she felt like if they couldn't accept her, let alone help her, then how could God? 

     I hear stories like this over and over again.  The broken, abandoned and marginalized seek solace, some semblance of comfort from we the church, and we turn them away.  Yes, we.  I am including myself.  I don't always respond the right way, and I've been through crap.  You'd think I, of all people, would understand.  But I struggle with messiness.  I like things tied up in neat little boxes.  Emotion is hard for me.  I don't like to show it.  It's equally hard for me to see it.  Yet that is what we are called to, those  are the very people who need  us, who need the touch of Jesus.  

     So that brings me to this:  when do we actually start being like Jesus instead of just talking about it?  When will we see our pews, chairs, auditoriums filled with people who aren't "members", but rather people who heard Jesus would be there so they showed up seeking an encounter with him?  When will women enduring domestic violence, or women whose husbands are molesting their children, feel safe enough to share that with their pastor and not feel shamed for needing out?  When will pastors stop demanding proof of the abuse before they show compassion?  When will those of us who suffered sexual abuse as children feel like it's a safe place to start unpacking all those boxes we have created deep inside in order to help us cope?  

     How would Jesus actually respond?

     The Jesus that I know, would weep at what He saw.  He never intended the church to be for the whole or those who have it all together.  Those He chose to follow him certainly weren't.  They were messy, unruly and decidedly un-Churchlike.  He would cradle those abused children, holding them to his heart.  I see him embracing those who fear that what's happened to them also defines them.  I think he'd be marching in the streets, fighting for those who just can't do it anymore.

     I see Him smiling, eyes warm, his arms open and welcoming.   Can you see him? 

     I've been convicted these past few days to love more.  If you know me, you've probably heard me say "I hate people".   It's a coping mechanism.  I actually love people, I just don't know how to deal with them.  But I'm convicted.  Jesus never would have said that he hated people.  If I'm to be like Jesus, I need to make some changes in my own thinking and behavior.

     How about you?

** I encourage you to check out these songs on Youtube or Spotify.  They stir my soul every time I hear them.

     "My Jesus", Todd Agnew

     "Truth be told", Mathew West

     "Preach", John

     

     

My Path to Youth With A Mission (YWAM)

    I started going to church when I went into foster care.  I remember always feeling at peace there.  I couldn't explain it then, I just knew I loved to go.  That continued throughout my elementary and middle school years.  My friends were at church.  My sense of family came from church.  One time, my mom asked my why I liked going to church.  My answer?  It made me feel good.  To her, that was the wrong answer,  To me, it was the only answer.  You see, somewhere along the way, I met Jesus. He drew me to church.  He kept luring me back.

     When I was in ninth grade, our church split.  I didn't fully understand what happened. I just knew I lost my friends.  I lost many of the feelings I associated with church.  My safety. My comfort.  My peace.  But I still had Him.

     During my high school years we attended a small, non-denominational church.  I made new friends. None enduring like from my childhood, but I was accepted.  If the doors were open, we were there.  I loved going to the youth group and being with my friends, but by my senior year I had drifted away from Him.
     When I graduated I got a job in a grocery store where I was able to work on Sundays.  That was an acceptable, though not thrilling, excuse for my parents. 

     When summer ended, I started college.  I continued working at the grocery store.  God kept speaking, but I was becoming immune to His voice.  I no longer felt the weight of what was happening. I went to church and youth group when I didn't have to work, but I was essentially going through the motions.
     Our pastor was young and very outreach oriented.  He was always trying to keep the youth engaged.  One of those ideas was to invite  a group of young missionaries to visit  our church for a weekend.  Of course, my parents hosted two members of the team.
     It was like torture for me!  They exuded Christ.   I was rude to them.  They were kind to me.  I couldn't wait for it all to be over.
   
     Sunday morning finally rolled around.  I sat in the back rows with the rest of the youth group.  I had already decided nothing was going to stir me.  I sat there, arms firmly folded across my chest.  We talked and passed notes, not paying attention to the service.
     A huge ministry tool of YWAM is skits and drama.  They grabbed attention and shared simple truths.  I remember music and movement.  At one point, they were portraying the crucifixion.  My eyes were drawn to the stage.

     "You did that."  The voice was clear as day. I looked around.  No one else seemed to have heard it.

     "You did that",  He said, as the nails were driven into the actor's hands.

     I began to argue.  I wasn't even there.  How was I responsible?  I was a good person.  What about the person who molested me, or the father who abused me.  Why wasn't it their fault?

     "Even if you were the only one left on the planet, He still would have died for you."

     Those words pierced my heart.  Tears streamed down my cheeks.  I knew He was right.  That's who He is, regardless of who I was.
     I don't remember the wording of the altar call, but I do remember being propelled forward.  I felt as if someone was pushing me from behind.  I felt a hand on my back, but no one was there.

     "Come", He said.   I practically floated down the aisle.  The two girls who stayed at our house, the ones I had treated so poorly, prayed for me.  They hugged me tight!  I felt a closeness to God that I hadn't felt in quite some time.  I decided then and there that I wanted to be a part of this ministry.
     My pastor drove me from Ligonier to Titusville, Pa, to see the base and get more information .  I was hooked!  I needed to be part of it,  However, I  was in my spring term at college and needed to follow through with that commitment.  So I applied for the group starting in September, six months away.
     The school semester ended but I still hadn't received my acceptance into the program.  My pastor called their office.  No one seemed to know what was happening with my application.  I began to feel like they didn't want me.  Like God didn't want me.

      I was still working at the grocery store, but I also added a job in direct sales.  My powers of persuasion weren't great.  Selling wasn't my thing.  I was shy and insecure.  However, that job introduced me to a whole new realm of friends.  Drinking friends.  Buddies, if you will.
     Our sales meetings were on Wednesday nights.  Again, work, so I got out of church.  These "sales meetings" were just a reason to get together and drink ourselves into oblivion.  After which I would drive home.

      I was still praying, journaling, believing in Him.  I just didn't feel the connection with church anymore.  My new crowd was this work crew.  I may have been putting distance between the church and me, but He hadn't given up.
     God began to speak to me, audibly, in my car during the 30-minute drive home from those meetings.  Now, I know a lot of people don't believe God speaks audibly anymore.  And why would he choose to talk to a drunk girl driving on the highway?  I don't want to argue with you.  I'm just telling you my experience.
   
     I clearly remember the first time it happened.  I was rounding the curve near a dam, in the pitch dark, in the middle of the night.

       "Regina."

     I actually looked in the back seat, expecting one of my friends to be hiding back there.  No one.  That sobered me up pretty fast.  This became a weekly occurrence.  I'd get in my car to drive home and I'd hear it.

     "Regina".

     I began turning up my radio really loud, trying to drown out His voice.  It never worked.  He spoke my name so clearly.  So softly.

     I partied that whole summer, making one bad decision after another.  I put myself in situations that could have ended really badly, but He protected me.  Even when I felt like He didn't want me, He was there.
     I finally received my acceptance into YWAM in August, five weeks before the program started.  I was elated!  He did want me!  Then reality set in.  I suddenly felt very dirty.  Unworthy.

     "Come."  It was that familiar voice.  So calming, so reassuring.

     Those next few weeks flew by as I tied up loose ends and prepared to go.  Finally the day came when I was to move in.  My parents drove me the four hours to my new home.  They hadn't seen the base before.  I think they were expecting a more traditional setting.  Instead, there was an office building, another for meals and classes, and four run-down mobile homes.  Later, my mom told me how she cried on the way back home because she felt so bad leaving me there.
   
     I finally felt at home.

He Didn't Destroy Me

     I grew up in the church.  It wasn't part of my life with my biological family, but I loved it from the time I moved in with my foster/adoptive family.  I didn't understand it then, but I felt safe at church.  I just knew there was something different there.

     My parents were committed leaders. My dad was the worship leader and served on the church board for most of my formative years.  My mom was a Sunday school teacher.  She served in the nursery, taught some of the girl's groups and also cleaned the church.  We hosted weekly Bible study groups at our house.  Basically, if the church doors were open, we were there.  If there was a reason to meet up with others from the church, we were in.
     Those we some of the happiest times of my life.  Sure, there were some sad times.  When a beloved youth pastor and his wife moved away, I was devastated.  When the church split and we didn't go there anymore, I lost contact with friends.  But I formed new friendships at the next church, which lessened the blow.
     Church represented continuity for me.  The location, congregation might be different but my feeling of safety remained.  My soul was soothed.  It truly was a refuge for me.  None of my abuse, damage, brokenness mattered there.

     I hit a rough spot with church when I was in high school that lasted through the summer after graduation.  I was still in a relationship with Jesus.  We still talked-- all the time.  But I no longer felt like the church "fit", if you will.
     Fortunately a group from Youth With A Mission (YWAM) visited our church for a weekend.  I'll go into all the details about that in another post.  But I will say that that weekend was life-altering for me.  I finished out my first year of college, then went into full-time ministry with YWAM for the next 3 years.
     During those years I grew to understand why church had been so comforting for me-- I had experienced God.  I totally immersed myself in getting to know God, to really hear him and recognize his voice.  I begin to deal with my pain from the abuse and trauma in my early childhood.  Bit by bit, I was becoming healthy.  Whole.

     When I married my husband, we quickly rooted our little family in the local church.  And, like our parents, jumped in with both feet.  We taught boy's and girl's groups.  We attended Bible studies at other's homes, and hosted our own.
     My husband's job changed often during our early years of marriage, but we always found a church quickly.  It provided comfort and community, as well as allow us to continue to grow in our relationship with God.
     Naturally, when we had kids we wanted them to have the same church experience we did as children.  As toddlers they loved it.

     My husband's job took us out of state for a bit.  When we moved back here to Pennsylvania, finding a church was suddenly difficult.  We had never experienced that before!   He'd like one, I'd like another.  We visited a church where not one person spoke to us, and another on the same day the pastor resigned.  When we finally visited the church that would be our home for the next 10 years, we were ripe for the picking.  However, our experiences on that first visit were vastly different.  He felt like he was finally home.  I felt like my spidey sense had been activated.  I watched from the sidelines, for a year, as my husband became involved and our children made friends.  I watched until they wore me down.  I overrode my gut instincts and jumped right in.

     During the first 7 years, we were honeymooners.  Our lives revolved around the church, to the point that we sacrificed relationships with our own families.  We were given subtle suggestions that all our friends should be from our church.
     We joined teams.  We led groups.  We hosted Bible studies in our home.  I became the pastor's administrative assistant.  We enjoyed a favor that stirred jealousy in people who were working so hard for it.  We became part of the pastor's family.  They helped us through some really tough times in our life, and we opened up to them.  Me, especially.  I told them all about my trauma and abuse.  I showed them the broken pieces of me that I was trying so desperately to hold together.

     All the while, we were being manipulated.  Coaxed to behave a certain way.  Groomed.  They knew all my secrets, so they knew just what buttons to push.

     The pastor was a narcissistic control freak.  He would joke that he could "punish people without them even knowing it".  At some point that became directed at us, especially me.  But in my blind trust, I didn't see it until it was far too late.  Even when he made inappropriate sexual advances towards me, TWICE, I dismissed it as being in my head.  When my daughter was being punished as a way to control me, I dismissed it as she was being overly sensitive.  When my husband started to feel like something was incredibly wrong going on, I still refused to see it.  I had overridden my gut instinct years before; now I didn't trust it anymore.  They had broken me.

     But it would become much worse.

     One of the greatest offenses one could do at that church was to ask "why" about anything.  Blind obedience was demanded.  Anyone who questioned was quickly discounted and driven out.  His tag line was "if this isn't the church for you, we're happy for you to find another one".
     Well, I committed that greatest sin.  I dared to question.  I dared to compare one of my character issues with his.  They decided I needed to go.  They launched an all-out character assassination of me.  They froze us out.  Shunned, if you will.  We lost friends, but it was so much worse for our kids.  They didn't know why any of it was happening, and I didn't know how to explain.
     By the time we left there, I was broken.  I spent the next year in mourning.  I cried every single day.  My body just shut down.  I developed complex PTSD.  I watched my children fall away from the church because of what we'd all been through.

     I clung to God for my very existence.  We found another church, a place that gave us the space to begin to heal.  You see, a man hurt us, not the church.  A man attacked us, not God.  If there is one thing I know about God, it's that He has to be better than any man.

     It's been almost 10 years since we escaped what I now have come to understand was a cult.  It's been a rough road dealing with all that damage.  Unpacking those boxes, all the little compartments I had to stuff those memories into just to survive, is both freeing and terrifying.  I'm definitely not the person I was then, but my relationship with the church has not changed.  Mainly because it's not based on man.
   
     God has not changed. That gives me hope.  That gives me strength.




   

Would you go back....

     I'll admit it.  I'm on facebook.  A lot.  I'm able to have contact with people from different periods in my life.  I like that.  It's interesting, even fun, to see how people's lives have changed.  I enjoy seeing the cheerleaders wrinkled and gray-haired.  I like seeing the football players fat and bald.  Is this childish?  Perhaps.  But admit it.  You like it, too.

     One thing I see on facebook often is people wanting to go back to an earlier time in their life, whether it be to a simpler time or to have the opportunity to do things differently.  I see the questions of "wouldn't it be great to be a kid again?" Nope.  Or "wouldn't it be fun to be in high school again?"  Never in a million years would I go back there.  If you've read my earlier posts, you know exactly why.  I am completely happy with where I am now.  I'm more whole than I have been in my entire life.

     My  Youth With A Mission (YWAM) days are different.  Those years were some of the best of my life, and ones I wouldn't mind revisiting. That's where I met my best friend of 32 years (she's the one in the hat in the photo).  It's also where I met my husband of almost 30 years.  I loved that time in my life!

     YWAM was the first place I was allowed to be an individual, as evidenced by the above photo.  No one cared that I didn't fit the mold.   No one cared that I wore make-up different from theirs.  I was able to dress like Molly Ringwald in "Pretty in Pink" and nobody made a big deal about it.  My individuality had been discouraged most of my life.  It was nice to finally be me.

     YWAM is also where my healing began.  I discovered that I could actually be friends with a guy and there be no expectations.  This was such a foreign concept to me.  I'll be honest, it took a little while for this to sink in.  But I was in a safe place that allowed me room to grow.
     It was during this time that I began to unpack the trauma from my childhood.  Everything from that time had been neatly packed away, emotions and all.  I had believed that once I could tell my story without feeling it, without tears, that it meant I was healed.  Yeah, that's not really how it works.

    The nice thing about the YWAM days was basically living in a commune with only limited interactions with the outside world.  We spent 6-7 hours a day in classes, learning who God was and why He mattered to our lives.  The more I learned about Him, the more I changed.

    Grew.

    Healed.

It softened my edges and gave me hope.  Those were some of the best years of my life.
 
     I was watching a church service last night and they were really stressing the importance of taking the time to remember.  Remember where you have come from.  Remember how far you have come.  Remember the things God has done in your life.
 
     Remember.  But don't get stuck back there.  Not when so much is pressing you forward.

The dreams I dream

Last night I dreamed that I died.
This is not an uncommon dream for me, but this morning I forced myself to wake up.  I just didn't want to see myself die... again.  I've developed this coping mechanism over the years, this ability to force myself awake, to shield myself from nightmares and, also, painful memories from my past.

Death is inevitable.
I know that it's coming, and probably sooner than I'd like.
I know I will die long before my husband does.
I know I am both ready and unready for this to happen. 

My spirit longs to be in God's presence. 
This keeps me from having a fear of dying.
My body is ready to be done with all the pain, torture and torment it continues to go through.
My mind is not ready.
I worry about my kids. 
What will their relationship with their dad, my husband, look like after I am gone?  How will my passing impact their relationship with God?  I want it to draw them closer, not give them reason to retreat.  That is my greatest fear.

I know people think I'm weird when I talk about my death.  But the fact is, I need to be prepared, to have things in order.  I will be a control freak until the end!
My ability to talk about my death speaks to my relationship with God.  How others react to it speaks volumes about their inability to understand that relationship, and me.
The longing to be in His presence is overwhelming.  Just the small taste I've had of him here makes me want more.
It doesn't make me sad.
I know He is a safe place.
I know He is waiting for me with arms wide-open, a big smile on his face,  I see myself running into his embrace like I do a dear friend I haven't seen in a very long time.
He smells good.  Better than downy.
His arms are strong, but he holds me gently.  It's even more soft than the blanket Cinnamin made for me.
I snuggle in and he says "I've been waiting for you".

I'd rather dream of that any day of the week.