Rooted

My twenties have only just begun and yet they have already been a defining period of my life. I fell in love, had my heart broken, got my first speeding ticket, signed my first lease, found my first job, graduated from college and started fresh. By your mid-twenties you should be capable of taking care of your own place (be it apartment, house or cardboard box), you should know what music you truly like, be able to eat alone, buy an outfit without needing a second opinion, and have the self-control to say, no, when yes just isn’t an option.

It is a time for drifting and discovering. Most friends that I keep in touch with lament about the same feeling of unmapped wandering. We don’t quite know where we are headed, but we do know where we have been. A brick wall lingers slightly above my head, threatening to rock my world, when I allow my thoughts to stray towards the future.

On a recent work outing I learned more about Cypress trees than I bargained for. Ziplining high above the ravines of the Hill Country, our harness-clad guide explained the secret behind the success of the Cypress. As these giants grow taller, a creature begins to eat away a tunnel system within the confines of the trees trunk, which grants the tree flexibility and other positive adaptations otherwise unknown to the species. Without this symbiotic relationship, neither would be as strong as they are now. Both pour into the other, bringing life to the partnership. If nothing were being taken out of the tree, its rigidity would lead inevitably to destruction.

Have we become so accustomed to our roots that we are unable to bend when the wind blows everything its got?

Stability is the least important thing that roots provide to the trees that line the river I jog beside on my evening outings. These tendrils traverse cement and stairs, creep down bridges, and drill deep into the unbreakable earth unhindered by drought or man, all in search of nutrients. The foundation laid is a by-product of the tree’s need for life-sustaining elements. These trees watch my progress as each step takes me closer to my destination. They are less selfish than I am, providing comfort from the sahara-like sun…and the very air that I am currently gasping in quantities that make the tourists stare.

 It would be naïve to believe that God didn’t create this parallel for a reason.

No tree ever survived that had one fat root attempting to harvest the water needed for the entire tree. It outlasts the seasons by spreading itself out, seeking vitalization from multiple sources, branching out in all directions. When a seed buds, not only does it send a sprout upward, it also sends its first root down, called the ‘radicle’. Fitting. The radicle is the plant’s anchor, from it sprouts root hairs that are responsible for absorbing water to sustain the plant.

It is easy to bunker down with a few choice relationships, post-apocalyptic style, stock-piling mysterious canned meats and veggies, never needing to step out into the streets or talk to a stranger. Even easier to convince yourself that those relationships are about the people in them, a lie I have told so many times, I actually believe it. Each relationship God placed in my life is a direct result of the radical love from which it sprouted.

My stability can come only from the Prince of Peace that grounds me through love and justice, loaning me some of his most beautiful creations to commune with as we journey down this path of life. No loan will ever be as sweet as the shoulder I can cry on and the arms that wrap themselves around me, allowing me to leach the nutrients from their God-filled souls.

People enter and exit your life in rapid succession, each relationship just another stem of your radicle, there to nourish one another during your time together. From the prayer-warrior taking my deepest wounds to the throne, to the evening shift worker at the locks and dam, letting the river taxis through, who willingly offers a smile, a towel to wipe the embarrassingly large amount of sweat from my face, and the air-conditioning of his small kiosk atop the dam to me when my mind out-jogged my physique, each encounter used by God to love me in such intimate ways.

I offer you no advice, simply an account of God’s ceaseless work in my life. May your radicle be rooted in the richness of His word, digging ever deeper towards the I Am. May your nourishment be a two-way street, never selfish. May the love you receive be poured out on those around you and may the trials in your life serve only to make you more flexible for those yet to come.

Spin Cycle

When you live in a building that was erected in the 1800’s there are certain modern amenities you learn to live without. Many of those things were easy to get used to. I learned to live with an oven that barely rivaled my childhood Easy Bake. I learned that no matter how hard you scrub 50-year old tile, it will not sparkle like new. I learned that garbage goes south quickly in the stifling heat that envelopes my apartment during the day. I even learned how to not singe my eyebrows while lighting my radiator and stove. No big deal, apartment, I can handle it.

One thing I am still coping with is spending an entire afternoon at the Laundromat.

There are only so many times you can re-wear a pair of jeans before coworkers start to get creeped out. My Gucci perfume can only do so much. It isn’t magic. I even invested in another hamper to help house the growing mountain of laundry that accumulates during my 3 week stint of avoiding the Quick-n-Clean that is just a block away. 

My pre-church shower is now rendered useless by the heat that accompanies my laundry days. My thighs are marinating in a lake of sweat in the bucket seat I occupy watching my clothes enter the spin cycle. As my clothes get cleaner, I get dirtier. 

Like many other privileged kids, during my youth I associated laundry mats with “bad people”, the people who lived on the wrong side of the tracks, the ones that were great for ministering to, but not for fellowshipping with.  Its rows of empty machines seemed somehow sinister, like getting caught there would be akin to getting caught in a dark alley late at night. Now, it is simply my hang out spot. 

God has thrown me so far out of my comfort zone in the past six months that looking back requires some binoculars. I no longer clutch my purse every time a strange man comes within a 10 foot diameter. Now, he is simply a neighbor…here to get the sweat stains out of the shirt that covers his back as he works to feed his children. His sins no deeper than the judgment I gently kneed from the fabric of my life with each step I take towards adulthood.

Washaterias aren’t known for their high class machines. The delicate cycle is a laughable concept. Your water options are warm, hot or magma, and the dryers shoot hellfire and brimstone rather than the warm air that fluffed my linens in my mom’s Maytag. The Sunday crew is a team. We share rolley carts, remind each other that 48 runs hot and 62 eats your money, we share bleach, laugh at the sweat dripping down our faces, and scold ourselves for waiting until the last minute to do a chore we’ve known about all weekend. We are all here for the same purpose, getting clean. 

Here, no one hides their dirty laundry. My panties have hit the floor a dozen times, my lacey unmentionables even drawing jokes from the older women who long ago gave them up for a more practical alternative.  You get to watch your clothes swim through the suds, one step closer to being dirt-free and ready for the world once again. The water slowly turning darker as the water washes them clean. That’s the thing about getting clean, there’s nothing clean about it. 

I’ve long fooled myself into believing that redemption is pretty, like birth. In theory, birthing a child is beautiful, in execution, it is messy at best. Though, as I sit here watching the dirt get extracted from each cotton fiber by force, I realize that my salvation looks more like the spin cycle than the rosy picture I once believed. 

God never promised us that his discipline would be gentle. We do not have a tag with instructions saying “Hand Wash Only”. He doesn’t have to treat us like my unmentionables and place us in our own little net bag, zipped up safe and sound, protected from the tumultuous force of the jolting water. He throws us in, dirty and soiled, knowing that in the churning waters, our healing will begin.

His discipline is the last thing my flesh desires. It hurts. It stretches. It is hard. But He only disciplines His children and that title is worth sleepless nights, fallen tears, broken hearts and a multitude of other wounds that only He can heal. 

I, like my favorite pair of jeans, am in constant need of laundering (not the illegal kind...the hygienic kind). This season of life is a blur of changes and growth, and if I’m being completely honest…a bunch of me time, me and God to be precise. He has dumped me into the spin cycle and though I am dazed, uprooted and often bewildered, I know that on the other side of this whirlwind lies a wholeness that I do not yet know.

We are called to obey, to persevere and to do it all with joy in our hearts. No one ever said it was going to be easy, but we are promised the strength to survive our spin cycles. Even when it feels like you can no longer keep your head above water, take heart, the more chaotic the waters, the cleaner you will become.  

Hebrews 12:1-13 (The Message)

^1-3Do you see what this means—all these pioneers who blazed the way, all these veterans cheering us on? It means we'd better get on with it. Strip down, start running—and never quit! No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins. Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we're in. Study how he did it. Because he never lost sight of where he was headed—that exhilarating finish in and with God—he could put up with anything along the way: Cross, shame, whatever. And now he's there, in the place of honor, right alongside God. When you find yourselves flagging in your faith, go over that story again, item by item, that long litany of hostility he plowed through. That will shoot adrenaline into your souls! 

 ^4-11In this all-out match against sin, others have suffered far worse than you, to say nothing of what Jesus went through—all that bloodshed! So don't feel sorry for yourselves. Or have you forgotten how good parents treat children, and that God regards you as his children?

   My dear child, don't shrug off God's discipline,
      but don't be crushed by it either.
   It's the child he loves that he disciplines;
      the child he embraces, he also corrects.

God is educating you; that's why you must never drop out. He's treating you as dear children. This trouble you're in isn't punishment; it's training, the normal experience of children. Only irresponsible parents leave children to fend for themselves. Would you prefer an irresponsible God? We respect our own parents for training and not spoiling us, so why not embrace God's training so we can truly live? While we were children, our parents did what seemed best to them. But God is doing what is best for us, training us to live God's holy best. At the time, discipline isn't much fun. It always feels like it's going against the grain. Later, of course, it pays off handsomely, for it's the well-trained who find themselves mature in their relationship with God. 

 ^12-13So don't sit around on your hands! No more dragging your feet! Clear the path for long-distance runners so no one will trip and fall, so no one will step in a hole and sprain an ankle. Help each other out. And run for it!