before breaking

When the first light brightened the dark
Before the breaking of the human heart...

I love these lines. I thoroughly like this idea, this concept--"before the breaking of the human heart." Crazy to think of, no?

And yet, I am learning, learning.
Redemption is more than a future hope.
It is a present reality.

In this I mean, there is hope for the future.
And there is grace now. It [insert cheesy, overused metaphor for "astounds"] me.

May God be merciful when we ask to see His glory.

A day of rest

I desire to think more. To process events, conversations, big ideas more fully. Sitting here on our teams' sabbath day (Monday) I have some time to slow down.

I have learned that I am a bit afraid of this down-time. My mind goes to insecurities that have not been addressed and yielded to God. It goes to issues that should have been handled better. Thus my question becomes, in the hard times, in the very scheduled, hard day-to-day, am I trusting God or am I just pushing through? When slowing down brings forth the "sludge" of life....is that human, or is that me not addressing things that should very much be addressed and taken care of?

I have struggled with why we are allowed to bring our lunches to the shelter and eat in front of guests and residents who have no food choice. By what you eat, do not destroy the one for whom Christ died. Your body is a temple... I know there is a way to honor and love both God and neighbor by what I eat.

In a high-ratio environment of people with "strong" testimonies and difficult pasts, where do I fit in? I know my sins are just as grave, but it does not mean that I have those experiences with which I can relate.

In all of this, I recognized my need to bring it all to God, first and foremost. Why is it our natural inclination to run to a friend? God of all Glory! Continue to align my heart!

It is overwhelming, wanting to debrief with friends from "back home," be that Jackson or Little Rock, yet not having much time or organized thought. Though the desire is that our friends and family catch this fire that "burns up in our bones," the reality that this is an experience with whom few will be able to relate.

Ah friends. God is good. Hope is real. (I think of how little I really realize this...)
Let His name be praised. :)

-Bri

Are we brave enough to keep on going in?

Friend,

“Sometimes our life reminds me/of a forest in which there is a graceful clearing
…
The forest is mostly dark, its ways/to be made anew day after day, the dark
richer than the light and more blessed,/provided we stay brave/enough to keep on going in.” (W. Berry)

“Remind me, remind me of the vision You gave me…”

I can only wonder why I am allowed to be here. Why I am given the privilege of being among these women who have found such strength in Christ, when I only last week was bowed under the weight of pain caused by not knowing how to best love my family and my close friends, how to deal with apparent lack of encouragement, and with loneliness. I have no right. But then again, I have forgiveness, as do they.

These seven women with whom I am living this summer as part of the HOPE team have already played a crucial part in God’s reviving of His vision within me. I admit, we have not been living together long enough to get on each others’ nerves, but it is a blessing to see like-minded sisters pushing forward in the hope of the Gospel.

Hope has already been seen during training. Training to serve the homeless in the day shelter at Jefferson Street Baptist Center. Training to serve the residents in the Fresh Start program. Training to meet our neighbors here in the Smoketown/Shelby Park area of Louisville. Laughing with a neighbor as she made fun of me not being able to parallel park. Grieving with a neighbor as she told us about the anniversary of her 10-year-old son’s death, and how she copes and encourages others in their losses. Handing that ice water to a day shelter guest who came in from the 95 degree, humid heat. The hope is not, of course, inherent in any of these instances. Rather, it is there when the light of the Gospel shines through love. The truth that while we were dead in our trespasses and sins, Christ died for us, and in His resurrection, we too, through repentance and faith, will be raised to newness of life. This reality drives us. Love commands us.

“When my soul was dry, oh God, Your Spirit came like water
To drown me with Your love, and cover me with life
And Your waves were stronger than my faith could ever be” (Sojourn Music, “Mourning into Dancing”)

What is this life that I have been given? Sometimes our life reminds me of a forest that is mostly dark…a dark richer than the light and more blessed, provided we stay brave enough to keep on going in.

Are we brave enough to keep on going in?

Obedience when God seems not present has seemed the over-arching lesson of this past semester. And that sometimes, I think I am obeying, when what I am doing is trying to carry my own sin until it breaks me. I think I am obeying, but instead, I am trying to give people myself instead of Christ. I say I do not have time for more than short prayers throughout the day and a token verse...and then I expect joyful obedience. Praise God that neither my salvation nor ultimately, my sanctification is on my shoulders.

And praise God for community that is willing to show us that we need to fellowship with God through Scripture, prayer, and meeting together with one another. Praise be to the God who uses others to convict us when we are not searching for God, and then throwing up our hands and bemoaning our befuddled minds and hearts, and His seeming distance!

Dear God.

You turn my mourning into dancing, my sadness into laughter
My sorrow into joy,

“Halleluiah” is my song

As this past semester is shaken and pressed, this is what runs over

"Do not be deceived, Wormwood. Our cause is never more in danger, than when a human, no longer desiring, but intending, to do our Enemy's will, looks round upon a universe from which every trace of Him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys." (C.S. Lewis, Screwtape Letters, ch. 8)

Many know this has long been my favorite quote by Lewis. I have carried this quote in my head and shared it quickly at the slightest opportunity. It was a romantic quote, romantic in the sense of being nice, neat, and pretty--and small enough to fit just a bite-sized piece of theology in it, enough to chew on for an afternoon.

It is highly unlikely that I will ever again be able to see in this quote its once-thought romantic qualities. I will see in this quote a brokenness that causes nausea. I will see a weariness that clenches the chest and makes it difficult to breathe. I will see a confusion that causes once dry eyes to weep.

I will see a God who is faithful no matter how faithless we are or become. I will see the ability to obey when blind as an ability dictated by need--desperation for life itself. (as the deer pants, so my soul longs for the God of my salvation)

Obedience when God seems not present has seemed the over-arching lesson of this past semester. And that sometimes, I think I am obeying, when what I am doing is trying to carry my own sin until it breaks me. I think I am obeying, but instead, I am trying to give people myself instead of Christ. I say I do not have time for more than short prayers throughout the day and a token verse...and then I expect joyful obedience. Praise God that neither my salvation nor ultimately, my sanctification is on my shoulders.
And praise God for community that is willing to show us that we need to fellowship with God through Scripture, prayer, and meeting together with one another. Praise be to the God who uses others to convict us when we are not searching for God, and then throwing up our hands and bemoaning our befuddled minds and hearts, and His seeming distance!


To be commanded to love God at all, let alone in the wilderness, is like being commanded to be well when we are sick, to sing for joy when we are dying of thirst, to run when our legs are broken. Even in the wilderness- especially in the wilderness- you shall love him. ~Frederick Buechner

My life is like a liberal arts university. It is like taking a history class that matches up with a Spanish class, that is reminiscent of a social work class. It is learning the date 1492 and later finding out that not only did Cristobal Colón land in America that year, but that the first official Spanish grammar was printed that year.

I wandered the library at school, for I had two nights in which I could read a book. I found a collection of short sermons by Frederick Buechner. The title appealed to me. The Hungering Dark. Yet I read the one titled The Magnificent Defeat. (Jacob wrestles with God and is magnificently defeated...utterly defeated, for the Angel of the Lord did not cause the struggle to end until Jacob had nothing left. There was to be no doubt in Jacob's mind but that he was not a match for his opponent)

I did not know that a quote I had long pondered originated by this man, Frederick Buechner. And now, it makes more sense.

As this past semester is shaken and pressed, this is what runs over.
Only the grace of God.
I have nothing of my own to offer.

What to do when life is painful

Is this what answered prayers are? is this how God talks to me? Am I so blind as to not catch on for several hours that this was an answer to the prayer "show me what love means"?

Back in Little Rock, a slight rain was falling. I walked downstairs and, with things on my mind like going to the store for my mom and heading to Louisville, I was hit with a little bit of a lot of terror. As long as any piece of me is holding back in hopes of fulfilling my own desires, I am not loving. Why am I home for these few days but to serve? Why hesitate when asked to go to the store, take my sister to school...? How can we who died to sin still live in it? (Rom. 6:2) What agony!

I then read this quote on one of my team member's pages:
"Give until it hurts, because real love hurts"- Mother Teresa

I thought it was false by a long shot. Why would real love hurt?

I think it hurts because we still sin. We still struggle. I think it hurts because each day, though the Lord's mercies are new (Praise be to Him!), so are the temptations to live self-absorbed lives. And not necessarily overtly self-absorbed lives, but rather, the reserved love kind of life. The "here are three things I want to do this week and now lets see if I have time to go to the store for my mom, my neighbor..."
I kind of think it should be the other way around.

"Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love, that we may rejoice and be glad all our days" (Psalm 90:14)

"I will bless the Lord at all times; his praise shall continually be in my mouth" (Psalm 34:1)

Real love hurts because it is a sacrifice. The sad thing is, the quote does not catch the full picture. Because real love's hurting and sacrifice is in some, inexplicable way linked to joy.

What wondrous love is this, O my soul, O my soul!
What wondrous love is this, O my soul!
What wondrous love is this
That caused the Lord of bliss
To bear the dreadful curse for my soul, for my soul,
To bear the dreadful curse for my soul!

When I was sinking down, sinking down, sinking down,
When I was sinking down, sinking down,
When I was sinking down
Beneath God’s righteous frown,
Christ laid aside His crown for my soul for my soul,
...
To God and to the Lamb I will sing;
To God and to the Lamb,
Who is the great I AM,
While millions join the theme, I will sing, I will sing,
...
And when from death I’m free
I’ll sing His love for me,
And through eternity I’ll sing on, I’ll sing on,
And through eternity I’ll sing on.

March, Preparing for Hope for Louisville

Never, in the writing of my many support letters, have I experienced such difficulty in the putting of my thoughts on paper. (That first sentence took at least twenty minutes of contemplation before deciding to “bite the bullet” and write.) Perhaps this difficulty lies in the reality of God showing me how little I know, I mean really know, of His grace, glory, and love—but how much I desire to know and share Him every second. He has been working a work in me that confounds me. I must step back and say that I do not know His plans for me, but I know that they are good.

Last semester while running, a line in a song punched away the little breath I had—“Peel back the veil of time/and let us see You with our naked eyes” (John Mark McMillan)

In so many ways I found myself on life’s rim.

I could only think of Moses the chosen, Moses the called, Moses of the ancient faith—Moses who could only handle the wake of God’s presence. I, who could barely breathe, was calling on the unveiled glory of God…if ever there was a time to be prepared for God’s glory, this was not it.

All I know is that almost daily I ask that I be shaken by God’s presence…yet it requires my remembrance of running that day to give me a glimpse of what it is I ask.

I have been in college for nearly two years. I entered the Linguistics program, aiming for foreign mission work, yet this fall it was made clear to me that Social Work is the direction in which I should be walking. I am now knee-deep in Social Work studies, with little idea as to whether I will be abroad in the future, or here in America. I fully trust this will be made clear in time.

Along with this shift in study came the opportunity to pursue working with the homeless in Louisville, KY. I applied and was accepted to work with several other young men and women in the HOPE program (through Jefferson Street Baptist) this summer. We will be serving in the inner-city community in downtown Louisville and building relationships with the homeless while serving at the shelter. Our goal is to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love our neighbors as ourselves. I am very eager to see how God will use us to minister, but almost more eager to see how He will humble me.

I ask that you join with me in prayer. I need it. The HOPE team needs it. We need humility and an ever-growing passion for the Gospel of Jesus Christ whose life, death, and resurrection absolved God’s righteous wrath on our behalf. We need strength, for Satan does not sit idly while God’s people work and pray.

I ask that you join with me in raising support. (I understand that many of you cannot. I understand this, and ask you again to pray.) The goal for each team member is $2400.00.

Thank you. Your continued support of me as I pursue God is such a blessing.

(for more information about the HOPE program, please see hopeforlouisville.com)