On suffrage and sacrifice

Last week I had the pleasure of seeing Suffragette.
Watch it. No, really. I don't care if you don't approve of their militant actions. Nor if you think that feminism has 'gone too far'. Everyone should see it.

As the lights came up and I hastily sorted my smudged eyes, I realised that my limited knowledge of suffragettes had come mainly from Mrs Banks in Mary Poppins. Sure, I had heard about force-feeding and some woman stepping in front of the king's horse... but it had remained an interesting, fantastical piece of general knowledge (like most other history lessons, really).

Instead of a rambunctious upper-class lady partial to breaking into song, I was confronted with the reality of suffrage. Malnourished, shamed and homeless women, giving everything - jobs, husbands, children - for this cause they believed in. It was inspiring to see this relatively recent show of sacrifice. These women believed they were fighting for something greater than their own lives, greater than commitment to husbands or children. And this demonstration of giving up everything felt rather alien to me.

Which is ironic, I guess, given that I've been a Christian for however many years and know Jesus' teaching about "take up your cross and follow me". It's just that as a teenager, that meant putting up with being mocked at school for my faith; and as an adult, accepting that the 'pool' of prospective romantic partners becomes pretty small if you narrow the search to only Christians. Are these things sacrifice? I'm not sure. They haven't stopped me from carving out the idea of a pleasant time on earth, enjoying fullness of life through Jesus and (hopefully) having a vaguely merry time of it.

[NB. Good news: faith in Jesus doesn't mean your life will be awful - that's *not* what I'm trying to say.]

But the idea that I have something so much greater even than women's rights or social justice, to give up my life for - I guess it just hasn't really had to occur to me living in the millennial Western world.

It's never occurred to me that I might actually have to give everything for the sake of the gospel. In theory, I've known and accepted it: but the chance of having to give up home, familial relationships or life for the gospel has always (thankfully) been pretty low.

What am I saying? Not that we should give up our current lives and go live in caves, or off of wild locusts and honey. But just that when you remember the call of Christian sacrifice - being prepared to give our lives, even - and the hope set before us in Jesus, it changes your perspective on Right Now.

If the core of who I am is striving for God's glory, his kingdom, seeing his face - then the tiny sacrifices I make now will be fairly insignificant. The idea of not getting married seems rather inconsequential when I'm faced with what any sacrifice would be for: the reality of Jesus; the truth of salvation; the hope of everything we've been promised.

Purgatory

**Disclaimer: I tend to be pretty blunt in these posts, but even publishing these had me feeling a bit self-conscious. I've tried wherever possible to be as non-melodramatic as possible. This is just life's beauty and pain all mixed up :)**


We're waiting on change, but I don't know if it's coming
Waiting on change, but I don't know if it's coming
Brooke Fraser, New Years Eve


So things have been brighter recently, and then today hits like a huge grey storm cloud.

Within each moment I'm caught between a tantalising hope of what life could hold - normality; happiness; relationships; positivity - and the slow-burn dread that this is, if anything, as good as it's going to get.

I go about the weekend, and tasks are punctuated, sometimes by glimmers of hopefulness that this is just a bad day and actually everything's fine; sometimes by foreboding clouds that threaten me with my darkest fears and whisper that I'm not okay.

My mood has been a lot better of late, but today I found myself wondering yet again, whether it will simply be a case of gritting my teeth and waiting till the day of peace that lies beyond this world. In its bleakest form, waiting to die.

And thankfully no, I don't spend most or even many days at the moment feeling like that. But does anyone else out there sometimes feel like we're just killing time, trying to remain stable?

I have no desire to live like that, but sometimes it feels like the best option life is presenting. I swerve between the faith I've believed and the blurred realities I'm faced with. There should be transformation; but change is painfully slow and I continue to be the same old broken me. There should be hope and yet I no longer particularly know what I can hope for, other than paradise on the other side.

Ultimately, I wish I was different. My biggest fear is that I will remain in this purgatory for the whole of my life, sometimes tasting joy and beauty but always carrying these big old chains which occasionally plunge me into darkest night. Never being truly free.

And whilst my mood is okay at the moment, I hope you can see how easy it is to long for eternal life, which I believe promises joy, consistent peace, freedom for ever with my Father.

There is so much beauty out there to grasp. I want to live to chase it, to behold and marvel in it. There is so much to be seen and done. I want to squeeze every last drop out of life whilst I have it. And yet I know that I am just a thought, a chance moment away from dark shadows which cloud out beauty and hope and joy and replace all around me with one thing: fear. Dark; murky; soulless; joyless: an abyss.

I fear that I will spend my whole life balancing on this precipice called life, trying to keep it together, grasping for beauty around me, almost falling at so many points.

I fear that I will spend my whole life in fear.

Sitting in the ashes

So it's here again, people. Lent. A time of waiting (or is that just Advent?) Either way, a time for preparation and reflection.

These blogs are meant to be my reflections on the world (because I know people must be super-interested in what I have to say). They're generally fairly positive. But I'm not really sure why I'm writing this because (spoiler alert) I don't have many answers right now.

So here's where I'm at. Daily life feels increasingly like a complex obstacle course that I am ill-equipped to navigate. Some days are okay; some are good; some are downright horrible. I'm pretty joy-less (fear will do that to you) and aware that something needs to change. I know God is real and good and close by, but I don't really understand what's going on here, or why.

A phrase I've heard repeated several times is, "Faith is believing in the darkness what you have seen in the light". And I guess that kind of sums up where I'm at right now. I do have some hope that I can get better again; but on days when it feels like I am losing the battle I wonder how long it has to carry on being like this before I get to be 'normal'. Right now I'm in the Good Friday bit of the Easter story, and I don't know how long it will last. Or how many times I may have to revisit it.

When life is a struggle, when the joy gets sucked out of the beautiful everyday things, when I'm in 'survival' mode, I forget about hope. I'm so consumed by my not-so-pretty circumstances that my hope in what Jesus has won for me gets kind of sidelined.

I titled this post 'Waiting in the ashes' both because of last Wednesday being 'Ash Wednesday' and because it seems to express where I'm at right now. Sometimes I don't have any wisdom or answers. Sometimes there doesn't seem to be a silver lining or moral of the story. Sometimes, it's just hard, and that time is when I guess I have to sit in the ashes and wait, hoping that joy and hope will return.

"Let him bury his face in the dust— there may yet be hope.
I called on your name, Lord , from the depths of the pit.  
You heard my plea: “Do not close your ears to my cry for relief.”  
You came near when I called you,
and you said, “Do not fear.”

Lamentations 3:29, 55-57 NIV

New Year, Old Me: a strategy for positivity

New Years Eve: so much excitement, joy, wondering about what 2015 will bring… 

Y’know what I want to say to the girl in those NYE photos?

“YOU’RE A FOOL! IT SUCKS!”

Okay, apologies, not the most cheery way to start a blog post (and my first of 2015 at that). But it is based on these two key points:

a)      I was really excited about a new year, making the most of every day, doing a new photo challenge (oops) and finishing 2014’s photo challenge ( …oops again). This was the year everything was going to be epic, full of growth and good things 

b) It took approximately three days for the new year’s high to wear off, and to wonder when January would be over. 

Again, I know this is all very negative. I try to be a positive person. I love the idea of cherishing life and living each day to the full. But when each day seems to bite you on the bum, it gets hard, y’know?

Pretty much most of 2015 so far, I’ve not been in a great place. I kind of forgot about hope and joy and all of those things, and a grey smog came down. I don’t know why it’s been like that. I think it’s partly the weather and the come-down from Christmas, some difficult conversations and the small fact that I have an anxiety disorder… but I’m not a fan of this life-hating me. 

I’m not prepared to drag myself through each day, from one anxious episode to the next, staring at the clock and looking forward to bed time. Life is too precious for that. 

This thing I’m fighting is a monster and a lot of days it feels like it’s winning. But I’m not going down without a fight. 

(Excuse the corny action-movie rhetoric – it’s true).

There’s a lot of stuff I can’t fix on my own on a Monday night, like why I get anxious or terror threats or the fact that it’s freezing and work is stressful.

But, there are little things I can do in the fight for hope – my Strategy for Positivity. 

There’s a disclaimer before I list them. I know from my own experience that all these little frivolous things will not make you feel okay if you are in a bad place. (That’s why I haven’t been able to write this blog for the last two weeks). 

But once you surface enough to find the energy to fight, like I appear to have done this evening, then little, frivolous things can bring light where gloom has set in. 

My personal list includes (in no particular order): Clearance Christmas chocolate; nail varnish colours; watching box sets (I would highly recommend New Girl); making a list of reasons to be positive/reasons to keep fighting; central heating; trying new carb-a-licious recipes (even if they don’t turn out well). 

And as for the real, less frivolous stuff? Talk to someone. Spend some time (once you’ve got the energy to) working out a plan of action, what help you might need and how to go about getting it. Get some exercise (even if it’s only on an exercise bike in front of the TV), get some sleep. If you’re a Christian, remind yourself (or get someone else to remind you) about the unshakeable hope you have in Jesus. And if you’re not a Christian… maybe now is a pretty good time to find out about that hope.

:-)

Here’s to a Happier January.

Ode to the Hopefuls

This is for us
Who are still fighting
Holding on to wavering and (at times) blind, hope

That today and yesterday and the day before do not have to be the pattern for tomorrow
That yesterday's thought does not have to dictate tomorrow's feeling

That love is not just for the lucky or the strong
But for those of us who are still waiting, still hoping
with the scaffolding around us, still Under Repair

To hope against hope that the future can be different
even when the past trails a twisting pattern
of breaking and restoration

To hope, because hope is the only thing
between ourselves and admitting defeat

To hope in the face of deafening, unrelenting fears
at which dreams crumble to dust
leaving you winded and bent double

And even then to hope, because you know
the One who conquered death and lives to make you new again.

But why is it Good....?

Out of few inevitable things in life - y'know, death and taxes - a lesser known inevitable is the fact that this one-carriage, thrice-daily train across the Welsh border will always smell of wet dog and Monster Munch. But the sky is blue, the sun shines, it's the beginning of the 4-day Easter weekend.

I'm excited about going home, seeing my family, and I am definitely excited for 4 days of rest and my mother's roast lamb.

I'm trusting that this visit, and the beautiful countryside, will be a healing time. All is not well in my heart. Two weeks of goodbyes, packing, cleaning, moving, living out of bin bags and attempting to make sense of a new job have left me bruised and drained. I have nothing to give. And in the hubbub of my self-centred chaos, I barely hear the whisper of Easter approaching. I feel completely disconnected to what it means for me; yet aware that it's for people feeling just like me today.

In a brilliant book I've been reading by Shauna Niequest, she comments that one of the central messages of the gospel is the cycle of death and rebirth; beautiful sunshine and then rain; losses and new beginnings. She also commented that change is hard, and that if we fight it, it can break us. I read that, some weeks ago, sitting in the sun, thinking 'Well... Yeah, course'. What else is new?

And yet, as I stood dejected in my bare, bin-bag-filled room, I realised that fighting against the change, rallying against it in my heart rather than being open to the new things God might birth, was exactly what I had been doing.

So what does this have to do with Good Friday, with God himself taking on all our sin and pain and loss and destroying it? Well, (as ever), it means there's hope. The hope of rebirth. Things can and will get better. Hurdles can be overcome; joy can be clung to. Death is never the end of the story, and though we might wait 3 days or 30 years for the rebirth, the new hope - it always comes.

On Birthdays

Tomorrow heralds yet another change in life, the transition from one age to another. My 24th Birthday.

Now I realise it's probably very uncool to get excited about my birthday by 24. I think by now I'm meant to be at the 'I'm over that', 'Oh, I don't really celebrate my birthday anymore' stage.

But, screw that.
I am turning TWENTY-FOUR tomorrow. And given that I spend most of my life still feeling like a ten-year old, 24 is a pretty big deal.

Now maybe this is just the childish narcissist inside me (it may well be), but I find it sad when people don't celebrate their birthdays, or shrugg it off as 'any other day'.

Your life is no less of a miracle than it was when you were a child. Sometimes, your life is even more of a miracle than it was then. Sure, it's old news perhaps, but it's BRILLIANT news. You've lived another year!

Maybe the idea of celebrating it with a certain person missing just feels impossible, and I respect that.

Or maybe it's just been a really tough year.  But if so, even more reason to mark the day in some way: you made it through, or, at least, you're still standing. As the years go on I imagine that the birthday may become a time of mixed feelings - am I 'where I should be'? Every year, reaching an age where it's more normal to 'settle down', get married and, in several years, start popping out children.

BUT for me, and I hope for you, the Birthday will be a day of celebration, joy and thanksgiving. I am alive; nothing has destroyed me or my hope. I know Jesus (and this is surely enough reason to celebrate on its own). I am happy, and I am free. I don't know what lies ahead (except for the next month of changes), and I'm peaceful about that. I have health and I have people whom I love and who love me back.

Sure, it's only twenty-four; no big milestone for the card-makers. But it's another year of life, and for that I will rejoice.

I am Happy.

This month's blog comes with a disclaimer: there is a small chance that I am currently under the influence, that is, inebriated, with the heady, blissful fragrance of spring sunshine. 

That's right, after seemingly endless months of grey, freezing days, I am FINALLY enjoying a warm spring evening. At one point I truly did believe that the White Witch had returned to curse us with an eternal winter, but surely as my hope in Jesus has not been displaced, neither has my trust that spring would, finally, arrive. 

I say I'm under the influence because it is shocking and (some might say) concerning how affected I am by this gorgeous sunny weather. 

But, whilst fully accepting the role a healthy dose of much-needed vitamin D has played on my mood, I feel the need to declare that, aside from this, 

I am happy.

I'm really happy.

I LOVE life.

It’s fair to say that anyone who's known me for a while knows that I would not always have said this, and I'm not the type of person to slap a fake smile on a crappy situation. I'm for authenticity - being real when things are tough, saying it as it is. I believe our hope in Jesus frees us to admit not only our blessings but our struggles and sorrows.

Last year, if I'm truly honest with you, a lot of the time I did not love life.

Sometimes (without being melodramatic), I severely disliked life. But just as I felt the need to be honest about that, I feel the need now to declare that right now, life is REALLY good. 

Most of the time, I'm not struggling with crippling anxiety. I'm peaceful and confident and fiercely determined to fight this beast. 

I live in an amazing city. I LOVE it. Yes, you all get sick of me posting countless pictures of Big Ben. But I do it because I'm still so excited to be living and working in this iconic place. I'm amazed at this blessing, to not only have a job, one I can cope with, but where the people are friendly. Actually, most of the time my job is really pretty dull. But in this time and season, God's not only giving me an opportunity to develop important skills for working life, but is also teaching me about His ability to be glorified through all aspects of our work, however boring or menial.

I have amazing relationships that are life- and joy-giving, some that are deeply rooted and others that are in their infancy. 

I'm at a place in life where, crazily enough, despite not knowing what my 'next step' is and without a plan, I am happy, peaceful and content. Within the last year, I've come from a place of sometimes despair, through fear, uncertainty, and through to a current place of flourishing and fruitfulness. If you look back to my blog from 6 months ago, I was feeling daunted and very apprehensive about this new place God had brought me to. And yet embracing this new place and season of life has, I believe, been God’s way of bringing me out into a spacious and fruitful place, one where I can grow.

For that the only One to be praised is the living God, who daily shows his power in restoring broken things for His glory, and making beautiful things out of ugly situations.

When things are really good like this, I get scared – things can’t be this good, I can’t be this healthy – surely something will go wrong. And yet, in Jesus, I have the freedom to fully embrace the fact that this peace and happiness may only be a season, and could be interrupted by sorrow or relapse. However, that’s not for me to know. Right now I’m in a place of flourishing, happiness, and gratitude for all of this.

I have to remind myself that my happiness is ultimately not grounded in whether the sun shines or life looks sunny, but in my unshakeable Saviour and the hope I have in Him.

On Love.

“They say that Home is Where the Heart is

- I guess I haven’t found my home”

(Ingrid Michaelson, 'Are We There Yet?')

The Valentines season - and all the gooey sincere and not-so-sincere sentiment it brings with it - helped me to re-evaluate my own thoughts on love. Now this is by no means a put-down of love, committed relationships, marriage or any of that malarkey. But when cards and songs scream out about ‘Finding The One’, it suddenly dawned on me that, mercifully, I don’t need to do that.

And not even because ‘ I'm okay on my own’ – I'm not. I can admit that I needed saving.  

I was made out of love and to love, by a relational God - I can’t do life without relationships. 

However, I realised recently the incredibly freeing fact that I have already found ‘the One’ – (or we may argue, He found me). I’m not on the look-out for that ‘special someone’ any more. He came and found me, loved me when I was unlovely and hated him, and died that I might be able to enjoy this special relationship with Him. I've never known a love like it, and never will. I HAVE found my home, my heart does have a resting place and I know it’s safe in His hands (to quote Phil Wickham).

So whilst I might see lots of beauty and good things in relationships and marriage, I don’t need to pine for them as my ‘end goal’. I already have it, that thing that fulfils its promise to satisfy. And I've been promised that I’ll never be separated from this love. WEHEY!! This is incredible news, surely.

This doesn't mean I'm always happy being single and Do Not want to get married. It’s just helped me a little to re-evaluate my attitude towards those things. I don’t need to be pitied by people in relationships (any more than I should pity them) – we are both blessed. I haven’t ‘pulled the short straw’. In his book The Meaning of Marriage, Tim Keller highlights a number of often-used reasons why Christian singles are not married. (My favourite is, ‘“As soon as you’re satisfied with God alone, he’ll bring someone special into your life” – as though God’s blessings are ever earned by our contentment”).

Keller also quotes a woman who says, 

“I am not single because I am too spiritually unstable to possibly deserve a husband, nor because I am too spiritually mature to possibly need one. I am single because God is so abundantly good to me, because this is his best for me... I may meet someone and walk down the aisle in the next couple of years because God is so good to me. I may never have another date... because God is so good to me” (Paige Benton Brown, in Keller pp 110-111, 119). 

This has really helped me to have a more realistic view of marriage and of singleness. Yes, it’s hard sometimes when everyone around you appears to be loved-up (in restaurants, clubs and - my pet peeve - on Underground escalators. Just GET A ROOM)...... anyyywayy.... But it’s also hard for married people when they want to go out and have a drink with other single friends, but need to put the washing on for their spouse or look after the kids. Swings and roundabouts.

Ultimately, the thing that will keep me going if I'm not feeling so chirpy about singleness, is that first paragraph – and the love I know I already possess. I don’t require anything more. Maybe a romantic relationship would be a nice added bonus. But I guess it’s trying to find contentment in every situation, like Paul says (Philippians 4:11-13). And, moreover, to trust the one who has freely given me such beautiful and abounding love, that “I may meet someone and walk down the aisle in the next couple of years because God is so good to me. I may never have another date... because God is so good to me”.

For more thoughts on love, 

• Read Tim and Kathy Keller, 'The Meaning of Marriage'. It is the best book I have read on relationships, singleness and marriage. It is FANTASTIC. Go read it.
• Check out www.pcpc.org/ministries/singles/singledout.php for Paige Benton Brown's whole article

'Be My Valentine'

Don’t worry, folks. This isn't going to be like my Christmas blog.

For starters, I actually like Christmas.... no but really, this isn't going to be a rant.

The ‘Big Day’ hits us next Thursday, meaning that since mid-January (but especially noticeable this week) we have been subjected to red envelopes, an overkill of hearts and teddybears, and a load of largely useless and slightly trashy love-related gifts. Including, for instance, a piece of plastic which promises to stamp hearts into your toast. Hearts? On a piece of toast? Come on. It’s not exactly a handy gadget, is it?

I'm sure I'm in no way alone in inwardly wanting to vom at this overbearing display of genuine (and not-so-genuine) affection for one’s Valentine. A phrase from our beloved Single Lady (no, not Bridget Jones – the other one) – Miranda – has been circling through my mind the last few days: “I don’t know who Saint Valentine was, but I hope that he died alone, surrounded by couples”. Fair play.

And I know what you’re all thinking. Especially you couples/married ones. “This has ‘Bitter Singleton’ written all over it”. And due to this not being the case, I feel the need to set the message straight. Firstly, Valentines as an idea is really sweet. And yes, I'm sure Valentine’s season would be less overbearing if I had a hot date lined up and roses delivered to the door, but even with that alternative reality, there is something undeniably superficial, disingenuous perhaps, about the Valentines season. This is at least partly to do with the fact that (and NO, this is not bitterness speaking), it has become such a big deal through the fuelling of the ‘season’ by card shops, gift shops, flower shops, restaurants, hotels etc. Kind of like the way Christmas has been taken over. Except (and yes, this is bitterness speaking), Christmas is not an exclusive holiday where one is meant to feel happy or sad depending on whether they have been given a card saying ‘Bee Mine’ (cringe).

It’s not like Valentines is still just a quaint way of telling someone that you like them, or reminding someone that you love them. I was in a card shop today and saw two different cards which simply read – no joke – “Your willy makes me happy”. REALLY, people?!! Come on. We were made for more than this.

If Valentines is about two people who deeply love each other (and, preferably, can express that without sucking each other’s face’s off in public), then I'm all for it. It’s sweet and how can you not be happy when two people fall in love?

However, if and when Valentines is about finding a randomer to send a card/pair of knickers to, ‘because it’s Valentines’, then all that does is expose our desperate need to be wanted and desired.

That’s an understandable human emotion. But why go searching in that way when all the love you ever needed is available to you? I know someone who has loved you since before the creation of the world, and showed it by giving Himself up so that we could know Him and know His love. That might not feel as ‘warm and fuzzy’ as receiving a red envelope next Thursday, but it surely counts for a heck of a lot more.

The Christmas Message

   Well, a very merry Christmas to you all my friends! As I look out onto the Welsh countryside, with low fog clouding the hills and a steady drizzle sitting over us, the traditional 'Christmas spirit' is not as overwhelming as in previous years. Instead, however, I'm actually truly excited about the 'truth' of Christmas. Yup, the 'Jesus' bit of it. Yes, really.

Tomorrow will, I'm sure, be fun. There's great TV planned (YES to the Downton Christmas special), of course I am excited by presents, the food, and simply being with my family will be so special. But without the whole Jesus bit of it, it's not much more than a slightly more special day.

          The hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight

After a year actually pretty full of fears AND hopes, I can testify to this truth. Our hopes and our fears have always been so far beyond ourselves to solve. We can't solve our selfishness, our yearning for more to life than we see, our fear of death, our loneliness, our sorrows, or the way we have hurt others. These things are not within our control or our remit to fix. The only one who could.... was Him.

So yeah, Christmas is celebrating Jesus coming to earth as a baby. But let's not get too overly wrapped up in the cutesy baby, 'away in a manger' stylee. This is GOD in FLESH.

And isn't it beautiful, exciting, mind-blowing, that in the huge weakness and vulnerability that you and I may have experienced this year, this is how God chooses to come - weak, dependent, vulnerable. This IS good news for people like me. He came to those, like me, who were hopeless and in Himself brought hope that change is possible; restoration of relationships and redemption of brokenness is truly possible. 

What better news could there be on a drizzly Christmas eve, that once the paper and the trees have been disposed of for yet another year, and we have happily said goodbye to Slade's timeless reminder of all that is bad about the festive season, that Jesus came for people like us? He came not to bring us the warm fuzzy feeling, but to bring hope and change when the world is falling. I can't think of any better news.