Sunday, June 08, 2008

Nitty Gritty.

I've been struggling in the past few months with the idea of a personal walk with God.


In the last ten years my relationship with Him has been intensely and happily corporate. I believe that God wants a people, a group, His children to know Him together. I have found Christ richly and deeply with others.


Now I am alone.


Before you slant your head to the side and say "awww," please realize what "alone" means for me. It means I have a husband who is pretty much on the same page as I am, spiritually (although our methods and approach differ.) I have adorable children who ask questions like "Mama, I just noticed something in my Manga Bible. God made light before he made the sun. How is that possible? And who made God?" and then (after I practically swallow my tongue and twitch in anxiety until I remember John 1) when I direct him to this, he goes "Oh, well that explains everything!" I have a believing family, extended family and friends.



What I had was more intentional than that. Ideally, our purpose was the Lord and His Church. It is why we gathered. To give Him something. It was why I gathered, anyway. I could say alot about that. I believe it. I miss it. It was, at best, the deepest I'd ever seen the Lord, and at worst, well, just all the bad things that come along with being part of a group with an absent (on purpose) leader, and an different opinion/personality for each person.



When I was a teenager I read a quote from Tennyson on the back of a Celestial Seasonings box about "Life piled on life" and I wanted that. You know what? I had it. Not "good piled on good" or "good piled on bad" or "good piled on life"(although if anyone finds that version, I would not be opposed to partaking of it) I wanted Life. Living. To experience the most that could be experienced out of every day. I experienced a lot of the Lord in the garbage of daily life. What more could I ask for?



But in all this corporate pursuit of the Lord, there was a letting go of my personal relationship to Him. I was always aware of this, and I know others were, because we would talk about it. But I would just let it go- thinking that it was all tied in to this higher thing of knowing the Lord together.



So here we are, the point of all this. I am alone in my pursuit of Him. I do not have people I can rely on to drag me back to Him on at least a weekly basis. I have tried going to regular old church and I can't stomach it, and don't invite me to yours unless you are prepared to handle a scene because I will probably start weeping uncontrollably. I can corral it into looking like "repentance" for the sake of appearances, but believe me when I tell you that it ain't.



The idea of "personal relationship" to the Lord became a lesser thing to me. This is no one's fault but my own. It was something I was shocked to discover in November when I realized that "personal relationship" was what it had all been reduced to. For a while there, I didn't believe it. How could a God, Who is corporate, put any stock in my individual love for Him? There's no adding, no expanding, just simple ol' tired-out doubting me. A dear sister told me "How can he not care about you personally? Think how much I care about you, and how much bigger His love is?" It's true, and yet...(shoulder shrug) ok, great. Whatever, man.



Truthfully, I don't think I was sure how to face him without an army of saints at my back. How to come to him empty handed, needy (shiver), banal, and above all else, solitary? And if indeed I did manage to connect, how could it do anything other than fall short of the glory I had known in the past, and simply serve to wake a thirst that couldn't be slaked?



Months went by, and I didn't do anything. I didn't talk to Him, didn't think of Him. And things were ok. Life was good. Not rich, but good. I've been in dry places before...I know there is an end to them. I don't panic anymore when they come, I usually just ride them out.



I can't say what it was exactly that brought me to the place where I wasn't afraid to "make eye contact" with Jesus anymore. Perhaps just time to let the wrench from the change settle and fade.



I decided I needed a "new" relationship to my Lord. One that fits my "alone" status. One that is, forgive me, mine. Not casting aside anything I've known or learned of Him, but letting it support TODAY's revelation of who He is and not determining it.



So far, I've discovered something major.



He cares about me.



My brain and soul start to splinter admitting that. It sounds so

a) basic, duh!

and

b) self centered and shallow.



But here's the thing. His caring for me is not the end of my story, nor the totality of my "new" relationship with Him. It's only a beginning. It may be a slow growth, but I'm not eager to rush into the deeper things, quite honestly. I'm savoring this knowledge.



Thank you Lord. You are sufficient for today.

6 comments:

Goody said...

Oh my! And yet your aloneness is also part of the corporateness that we all experience. I have tasted of both and without a personal relationship with him I would have died of despair. But he picked me up once again and set my feet upon the rock making my footsteps firm. He put a new song in my heart, a song of praise to him. Many see and trust in the Lord. He is seen once again, without any help from my fleshy state! Praise the Lord!! Thanks for sharing Sarah and making my heart quicken with the joy of the Lord!

jayjay said...

Ah, sigh. Big sigh again. Beautifully put - just because it's you sharing your heart and I so appreciate that. Hey, me too - not the same, but me too. We're A LOT smaller than any corporate I've ever experienced over there with you, and so my individual relationship has kind of had to be more. . . I'm watching you sister, and knowing that your experience is still as inextricably bound up in my experience of my Lord, that it all counts. He's made you part of His heart in Me, or something like that. In that sense alone, you're not alone. Y'know?

PRIDHAM10 said...

I understand -

On June 3rd I wrote on my experience of aloneness as
The Awe in the Lord -
It encourages me to know that even in our aloneness we are not alone in the experience.

http://homechurch.meetup.com/241/boards/thread/4825751

Thanks Sister
yourbrochris

sahmqueen said...

Great post. Jason and I have had our share of less than wonderful corporate experiences. I went thru the phase of not being able to "stomach" church. I'd invite you to the best church I've ever gone to, but you said you didn't want that. hahaha

Charles said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Charles said...

Wow quite amazing. You are where you should be with Christ as you have been in the past. You are walking down the path of Spiritual revelation and not Spiritual knowledge. You have always let your Spirit win out over your mind when it comes to God. Those that have known you for years understand you’re deep and unique relationship with Christ, even if it you did not see it for a bit in the Church. Everything of God on earth is fueled by our individual revelation of God and the Church requires it to be healthy. I’m not sure how you get both at the same time or maybe you don’t. His plan may be for use to move back and forth between the two. But remember we need your revelation as much as you need ours.

God bless you always.