Posts Tagged: "Sarah Bessey"

Lent Day 2… To Be Rooted

Today is a little different—rather than sharing from one of my favorite Lent devotional books, I will be sharing what I fondly call a tweetstorm. This one is courtesy of Sarah Bessey.

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If you would’ve told me 10 years ago I’d be a straight-up devoted church lady, I’d have laughed in your face.

I was emancipated from church – who needs church? Apparently I did and I do and I always will. Look at all the ways God will surprise us.

One of the most important and doggedly hopeful things we have done as a family is to intentionally, simply, steadily stay put with our church.

Community is not the work of magicians or salesmen or brand ambassadors or performers or instant-wish-granters.

Community is like gardening: you prepare, you plant, you tend, you wait, you weed, you wait, you feed, you harvest and…

…you cycle through seasons of rich reward and seasons of seeming emptiness, seasons of work and waiting.

Simone Weil said, “To be rooted is perhaps the most important and the least recognized need of the human soul.”

We experience on a daily basis what it means to… Read More

Sunday Shout Out: About Rice Krispies & Holy Work

My shout-out today goes to Sarah Bessey and her fantastic post about Rice Krispies and holy work. Here’s a quick sample…

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Now I don’t know if you’ve ever had the misfortune to have to clean up wet Rice Krispies but if not, I’ll offer this piece of advice: you cannot sweep them up, you cannot vacuum them up, you cannot wipe them up. No, Rice Krispies turn to a gluey substance which adheres to whatever surface it finds and instead of cleaning them up by those attempts, you only smear them. Ask me how I know. No, no, instead, you must pick them up one at a time, bit by bit, and only then can you wash the floor properly. Unless you want your feet to stick to the floor or you wish to burn the house down (which I considered for a moment), you must pick up every single Rice Krispie individually and only then wash the floor.

I began to get angry as I picked up those Rice Krispies. Oh, properly angry! Not at the tinies who created the mess – those messes can’t be helped when one is tiny, they’re part of the deal – but rather at the fact that this was my life. This was just one more daily indignity to the joyous and difficult and yet sometimes monotonous unending routine of caring for small children.

I muttered to myself under that kitchen table about how I was too smart for this. Oh, I did: I was too special for this! Surely someone else could do this work, someone else should be doing this work! After all, I was creative and capable! I was well educated! I used to manage budgets of $14 million dollars! I used to wear high heels and create marketing campaigns! Then my repressed struggling artist side entered the dialogue and ranted quietly about how I was meant to be writing! I was meant to have creative space to, well, create! Who could create anything or write anything while in the middle of diapers and bath times and housework? I am too creative for this! I am meant to be a writer not a maid!

I bet C.S. Lewis never had to clean up cereal.

And then that little evangelical hero complex in me joined the chorus: I was meant to change the world! I was meant to be someone! To lead! To be set apart! To tell people about Jesus, right? To be a hero in the kingdom of God! And instead here I was doing menial work that was contributing nothing to the world.

It would be funny if I hadn’t actually believed the… Read More

Shouting About Beautiful Art

Sundays are for sharing and shouting – that’s the point of these shout-outs – I want to share what I found to be particularly fascinating, beautiful, and shout-worthy online this past week…

liz vice post

1. This Song: Empty Me Out by Liz Vice.

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sarah bessey post

2. This post: The Sanitized Stories We Tell by Sarah Bessey. Here’s my favorite line(s): “I feel like we give out gold stars to people who get over things quickly. And like any former evangelical over-achiever I wanted my gold star.

We want people to heal on a timeline. Yes, yes, that’s terrible but aren’t you over it yet?

It makes me wonder how… Read More

Some Shoutables (Serious – Ya Gotta Take A Minute Or Two And Read These Great Posts)

On Today’s Sunday Shout-Outs, here are a few shoutables…

 

sarah bessey guard your gates

This post, Guard Your Gates by Sarah Bessey. Here’s my favorite line: “So, no, I don’t guard my gates against simply terrible or scary things anymore. Instead, I want to guard my gates against what diminishes wholeness and holiness in me. I guard against the influences that make me the worst version of myself, the influences that feed my… Read More

Sundays Are For Sharing

I read some great stuff on a few of my favorite websites / blogs this week – and since Sundays are for sharing, I’m passing them on to you…

 

donald miller post problem with bw thinkingThis post, “The Problem With Black & White Thinking” by Donald Miller. I really love this part:

“Black-and-white thinking is attractive because it’s reductionistic; it simplifies everything so we don’t really have to comprehend. It allows us to feel intelligent without understanding, and once we are intelligent, we feel superior. People who don’t agree with us are just dumb.”

His 4 tips for not thinking in black and white are… Read More