I just returned from two wonderful weeks of Sabbatical in Arizona—two weeks by myself exploring new territory by myself. What a difference 20 years can make.
I began (really began) following Christ 20 years ago. My daddy had died, my husband had left, and my children were grown up enough to have begun leaving home. And I met the Living Christ. I had known Jesus all my life, but in 1990, I received an invitation to “follow me” that has changed my life.
It all began with a question I asked him, “Who the heck are you, anyway? Will the real Jesus please stand up?” I’ve laughed over that question for a long time now. It seems Jesus is still standing up! Who knew how little I really knew about him.
Then a funny thing happened about 10 years ago. It was as if Jesus stopped, turned around, and said to me, “Will the real Sheila please stand up! Just who the heck are you, anyway?! Who do you want to be? You have a part in your own becoming!”
That’s what this Sabbatical was all about, reflecting on the last 20 years, and the changes in my life that have come about as a direct result of following Jesus.
I was reading my Engaging Scriptures verses this morning, from Matthew 10, and my eyes fastened on verse 39: Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.
20 years ago, I began the process of “losing” my life. I thought I knew so much then—I knew who Jesus was. I knew what it meant to be a “good” Christian. I knew what it meant to be a good wife and mother, and a good witness. I was good at being good. One of the first verses that Jesus gave me to learn was Galatians 1:10: Am I now seeking human approval, or God’s approval? Or am I trying to please people? If I were still pleasing people, I would not be a servant of Christ.
Now, you’re talking to a really good “people pleaser”. I had tried for 40 years to do it “right”, and to make everyone happy. And I had no clue how much of myself I had given up in the process. But the first thing it seemed Jesus did was draw a line in the sand and say, “Sheila, if you’re going to really follow me, you’ll have to make up your mind that pleasing people will not be on your agenda anymore.” Who knew?
And I prayed one of those radical commitment prayers (rcp) way back then, “Lord I want to trust you so much that I’ll follow you even if it looks like I’m going the wrong way.” Those rcp prayers are prayers that you’d never pray if you knew the outcome!
In the process of finding out who Jesus was/is, and finding out who I am, everything got turned kind of topsy turvy, and I lost both Jesus and myself a few years back. Everything got really dark, and I realized how little I knew about myself or about him. Everything I knew about everything got shaken—even my foundations were shaken until I wasn’t sure I could even call myself a Christian anymore. I wasn’t even sure I wanted to call myself a Christian anymore.
Slowly but surely the pieces of the puzzle have fallen back into place. Jesus doesn’t really look the same to me anymore. Like the Magdalene, I’ve learned I can’t hold onto my favorite “form” of Jesus anymore. And Sheila certainly isn’t the one I knew 20 years ago. Following Jesus has changed everything: my life, my faith, my politics, my hopes and dreams. I’ve discovered to my surprise that I LIKE living on the edge! I’m smart, too—not genius, not really, really smart, but a whole lot smarter than I ever thought I was. And curious?! O my gosh, I’m curious. I seriously didn't know I was curious! And I have this tendency to do exactly what I’m told NOT to do. I love pushing the envelope. And that “pushing the envelope” has tended to rattle not only my cage, but sometimes those around me. But a friend told me several years ago not to give up on Christianity—that there was a lot more to it than what I knew from my short-sighted perspective. The last two weeks has given me time to see just what has changed in my life.
Since I drove myself to Arizona, I had lots of driving time and I had the chance to listen to some wonderful conversations I had downloaded from the
Evolutionary Christianity website with Michael Dowd. I remember the first time I wrote the word “evolution” in my journal probably 12 years ago. I kept waiting for lightening to strike, but it didn’t. I love what the new science is revealing to us about the Universe/God/the Pregnant Void. I “yeehawed” may way through at least 10 of these conversations literally shouting “YES” in my car all the way to Arizona and back home. There is so much MORE to “God” than I ever imagined, and a so much more expanded way to read Scripture, and such a larger point of view than I could ever realize.
And I perused through a number of books while I was there in Pine—what else does one do with so much snow and 4 days of solitude??? My favorites were a Wisdom trilogy by
Cynthia Bourgeault:
The Wisdom Jesus, The Meaning of Mary Magdalene, and The Wisdom Way of Knowing.
What I found in my listening and reading experience is that Christianity has the potential to being HUGE! Years ago I heard a “prophetic word” from a Kansas City pastor: “The face of Christianity will change in one generation.” It IS! From the very, very old ancient way of knowing to this new huge evidential way of knowing, the Holy is being revealed again to us in our time. And we get to be in the thick of it! Watching it unfold is an amazing thing! It’s been said that we are both hospice worker and midwife—watching something die and helping give birth to something new.
Occasionally I wish we could get another name—sometimes I feel the word “Christian” has been so stigmatized and so abused that it hurts, and I confess, sometimes shames me. But I chose today to still call myself “Christian”. I so love the man Jesus and what he did and what his life is still doing today—what he’s still calling us to.
So, 20 years later, I will firmly say, “This has been a great journey!” My life has expanded until sometimes I feel I’m about to burst. My ideas have been challenged, and my viewpoint has broadened. I LOVE being human. I LOVE living here on this beautiful blue planet called Earth. I LOVE finding Jesus in ALL people and ALL things. I LOVE being able to hear another’s religious views and NOT feel called to get them to change and be like me. I LOVE knowing there’s so much MORE, and that I don’t have all the answers. I LOVE the knowing that I don’t have to wait to die to find heaven—it’s here IN me and all around me. If I look with heart eyes, I’ll find heaven in you, too. I found heaven on I-10 in West Texas, in the deserts of Arizona, in the mountains, in those awesome spiritual vortices (red rocks) around Sedona, and I saw heaven in the most gorgeous sunrise yesterday, right here on my own deck.
My challenge isn’t to judge someone else’s life and their salvation; my call is to do my own work and let Love transform me, trusting everything else to that Consciousness that’s so much bigger than me.
I sat in church this morning and pondered for a few minutes just how delicious to me it is to have roots in the very, very old wisdom way, and to have wings to fly and explore the new. What a paradox life is. And what a joy it is to live it following Jesus—and unexpected challenge and pleasure. I’m glad he calls me Beloved—I am his and he is mine.
I found this little poem before I left for Arizona:
I would love to live
Like a river flows,
Carried by the surprise
Of its own unfolding.
John O’Donohue
When I got to Spirit Falls, Bhodi (my host) gave me this book to look through:
On the back cover was a quote that became my mantra for the week as I saw my “plans” being dealt the death blow: Everything is unfolding exactly as it should.
Perhaps my life HAS been carried like a river by its own unfolding, and guess what, I AM surprised!
