Making Peace with Psalm 23

Green Grass & Quiet Water ~ May 2013 ~ Portland, Oregon

Where I grew up most, kids learned the 23rd Psalm. I think they had to in catechism. Where I grew up, all the school buses altered their routes to include a stop at the Catholic Church on Mondays for catechism classes. Because of where I grew up, I heard that Psalm recited as rote and therefore I didn’t much care for that Psalm. Also it talked about valleys of death and rods and staffs, and hearing that over and over and over again sorta creeped me out.

Where I live now, I do full time ministry through my church by encouraging and supporting university students and other transients of my downtown Portland neighborhood in a variety of ways. To do this work, I raise my own support. I sorta suck at this aspect, but that’s another story for another time. And now I have an agent for my book so I’m retooling my book proposal which means an enormous amount of research and writing and editing and feelings of inadequacy. Again, another story for another time. And I also have a life full of relationships with people not connected to anything mentioned above that I try to maintain. I guess you could say I've got some stuff going on.

I try to be diligent about maintaining a Sabbath. Because of what I do, it happens to be on a Wednesday. What I mean when I say 'Sabbath', is a day where I truly try to stop and rest and spend some time focusing on God, believing that my to-do list will get taken care of…eventually…in God’s perfect timing. Sometimes this involves a lot of deep breaths and verbal reminders that it WILL all be OK.

On one of those Sabbaths God reintroduced me to Psalm 23.

The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing.
He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he refreshes my soul.

The message and God haven’t changed, but I have. I now hear them more fully. I now know that life is better when I take a moment or a day to lie down, to be still, to let God’s truth, wisdom, love and life pour into me, to have my soul feel all shiny and new.

Today was the last Sunny honestly warm day Portland will see for a while. I spent most of it inside working. That was up until the last hour and a half of daylight when, due to a variety circumstances, including locking myself out of my apartment, the Lord herded me down to the green grass beside the quiet waters of Willamette River and, there, the Lord refreshed my soul.

Sometimes we just need to take a moment to pause, breathe and remember that it WILL all be OK.

Waiting isn't for the Weak

The Pink Tree of Portland ~ February 2012

Today is the 30th Birthday of one of my favorites. She is handling it way better than I did.  Today, she posted on Facebook: “I've been looking forward to 30 since 25 so I'm über-excited about this particular birthday.”

I, on the other hand, went a little, “Oh-my-pants-I’m-turning-30-and-I’ve-failed-at-life,” kind of crazy. I went for a walk on the waterfront along the Willamette River and admitted to God that I felt like I had failed because I didn’t have an awesome career or a fabulous marriage/family. In fact, I was nowhere close to either of those realities and I was a week away from 30 – unemployed and severely single.

God gently replied, just on the north side of the Morrison Bridge, near the pink tree where I often hear God’s responses;
 “You’re wrong. Failing, for you, would be already having those things. You are waiting for a reason. For something better. For me.”

I believe this. I believe I have seen glimpses of this in the incredible amount of healing and growth that has happened in the almost two years since this walk.  But I still feel like I’m waiting.

And sometimes it feels a little like that time I went a tad berserker because I was ridiculously hungry because I waited until 1:30 pm to eat my first meal of the day and because I was waiting for what felt like an eternity in a food cart line. And by wait I mean absolutely NO movement. There was no ordering then waiting for food prep. Oh no, no, no, I was waiting for the OPPORTUNITY to order. It was excruciating. I was good for no one. Really. I couldn’t talk to anyone because I all I could think about was how hungry I was and how the line WAS NOT MOVING and gave no indication that it would anytime soon. It’s a little embarrassing how obsessed I got.

Eventually I got my Vietnamese sandwich and then I walked the half-mile to my friends’ home to eat it. Those 15 minutes were totally bearable because of the movement.

I’m learning what it looks like to wait with elegance, especially when it feels like there is no movement. It’s hard to not be in control, to not take the little that I know and run with it. But that is what God is asking of me. God is asking me to be strong…to be courageous… to wait. Waiting isn’t for the weak. 

This whole food cart scene is a prime example of failing at waiting with elegance. But that’s OK, because while I’m waiting I’m learning how failure can be an excellent teacher, too.

Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord. 
~ Psalm 27:14 NIV

Space and Time: One of the Reasons I do College Ministry

Almost 11 years ago I sat in the front of a car at the Lake Charles Boardwalk and officially ended a two-year relationship with the one man who has ever seriously considered marrying me.

It was one of the hardest decisions I ever made. I wasn’t sure if I would ever be loved that much by another man, but I knew that he and I weren’t best for each other. I made it holding on to a truth that the life I was currently living was not the one God wanted for me so I said no to this man and journeyed on with Jesus.

After 10 years and multiple relationships, I am nowhere closer to marrying my helper than I was then but I have had an amazing adventure.

It’s funny how big this one decision was/is still in my life. It shaped a lot of the woman I have become. I left that relationship through the faith that God wanted to give me something different, that God wanted to give me his best. I still believe this. This pivotal moment, this moment that set my life on a completely different course, happened in college. This has a lot to do with why college ministry means so much to me, why Portland State University has never left my heart.

During the fall term when I made this decision, there was a church and a retreat and, therefore, space and time for God to meet with me. Space and time for God to pull me aside and remind me of how much he loves me how much he cares for me and how much he is faithful.  To remind me how he never left and still wants to give me his best.

God moves people – sometimes we don’t have to do anything but be there. 

This is why I raise support for what I do. This is why I’m OK with barely paying my rent every month. I want to be there, to give students space and time to meet with God and continue on their journeys becoming the incredible men and women God created them to be.

Students helping students move in at Portland State ~ September 2012

“Don't overlook the obvious here, friends. With God, one day is as good as a thousand years, a thousand years as a day. God isn't late with his promise as some measure lateness. He is restraining himself on account of you, holding back the End because he doesn't want anyone lost. He's giving everyone space and time to change.” ~ 2 Peter 3:8-9 The Message

So you want to support my position:
1.Go to Give section of www.thegroveschurch.com
2.Click the Donate button to give online via PayPal
3.Write PSU Position in the special instructions section

PS: Today is the first day of classes for the Fall Term at Portland State. Go Viks!

Learning To Live By Letting Go

Somewhere in the Carolinas ~ October 2011

Sometimes pivotal thoughts occur to you while you are in the middle of an epic adventure, like traveling the lower half of the lower 48 states in a month with one of your best friends.

Sometimes you find yourself with no music, windows rolled down, staring out at the Appalachian Mountains just before peak fall foliage craving divine direction and thinking:

“Somehow we begin to believe the lie that this now, our current present, is the best there is, was, or ever will be. We forget that this current present, good or bad, is only for now. I'm currently on a 4 week road trip across America and “for now” is as vivid as the colors on the leaves outside my passenger side window. The leaves are changing and so am I.”

Sometimes, you hear God speak a week later, in a friend’s living room with strangers singing along to a guy playing the guitar. I write:

I hold too tightly to this smallness in my hand. “But it’s what I know,” I cry as I stomp and flail about.

“But it’s not what’s best,” God calmly replies.

“Is best ever gonna come?”

“If you let go, Alyssa, you have to let go. My best is too big for you to grasp with your fists grabbing so tightly to the smallness you continually try to hold. Please, let go. You can trust me. I know you, I want my best for you. My word is good. I am good. Let go.”

(One year ago today, my good friend Christy and I set out from Oregon on a four week road-trip to Philadelphia and back. This post is a result of that trip.)