I am passionate.
I'm passionate about Jesus and sharing his love and helping others to see, know, experience, and share His love.
So- I'm passionate about the kinds of things that help me to do that!
We have a new website we have launched and I'm passionate about that because it helps us to share the power of Christ and how God's transformed our lives, given us grace, and blessed us with more than we can imagine. I want people to see the community of contagious joy that is so prevalent at Messiah and this new site will help us do that more effectively, and so I'm passionate about it. It isn't just a website- its a venue to those seeking real community, real, change, real life that is more worth living than they've ever imagined! Life is so much more...palpable, real, sacred... The great hymn "He Lives" says "And life is worth living just because He lives!" Its hard to understand that for some people, but they can see it in our lives, experience in our love, and see, know, experience God's love too!
I'm passionate about the new organ we are getting! We have a loaner organ now that does 30% of what the new organ will do. I am not a musician, or a singer (really) I love to sing (but not alone in front of people!-however I will if called to). I love to sing and praise God! I can make a joyful noise! I even sang in the Gospel Ensemble at my home church in Detroit- Central UMC. I actually had my own "Sister Act" moment when my choir director got a sound out of me that sounded amazing!
For me the new organ is not just an organ- it's part of our mission to share God's love and joy with the world. I am in awe of our Music Ministry - we have over 200 people actively involved in our Music Ministry and our community concerts reach over 1000 people a year! Just last night in our P.o.L.O's (Parents of Little One's) Small Group one woman shared how the part of her faith that brings her the most joy is sharing her faith through music- when she plays in the orchestra, hand bells, etc. We've raised $125,000 so far for the organ fun- and we are a third of the way to fully funding this important part of our ministry!
I'm passionate about the upcoming Women's Retreat, about holding people when they are going through cancer, guiding a couple as they begin he journey to marriage, celebrating a new child in the world, holding and crying with someone when they have lost their son and helping them to celebrate his life...
I'm most passionate about my beautiful girls and the joy they bring me! Today Gracie offered a "Princess Prayer" for lunch: "Dear God, thank you for princesses, for Easter, and candy, and eggs, and for me, and Sophia, and Mommy, and Daddy, and Lucy (our dog), and for loving me, and food. AMEN!" We ate princess soup... I love that I get a whole day with them on Thursdays just me and them.
So what's the downside to passion?
Exhaustion, having to get all the other stuff done (laundry, bills, grocery shopping, all the paper that has to be filed!!)
But that's really nothing compared to the biggest downside of being passionate--
A lot of times people seem to be passionate, excited, intrigued, ignited to want to know more when I share what I'm passionate by.... and that is awesome! But sometimes they aren't. Sometimes I am met with indifference. Sometimes I see apathy. And that is really tough. I don't run into it a lot (and I'm very blessed by that). But when I see it does get me down. It doesn't take away my passion... no-- but it does frustrate me, it does test my patience.
Let me be clear- apathy and indifference isn't the same thing as people who disagree with me- no I love them (and I love the indifferent people too...it just requires extra grace). And maybe sometimes its not a fully blown indifference.... Part of me struggles knowing that I have high expectations and that I can be a perfectionist (clearly not about everything if you've seen my house!) But about the important things... I want things done right (that doesn't mean things have to be done my way) but I want things to glorify God!
I want things to invite people in- I want my life and how I live, and I want the church to be a place of invitation, welcome, a space for peace to come, for anxiety to be lifted, and for Christ's light to reveal beauty, and the Holy Spirit to guide, equip, and transform people to live in and into the kingdom of God. Now I know that I can't always do that- not alone-- I need God to nudge me when I need to rest, retreat, and when I need to be pushed and I need the Body of Christ through my faith community to do that too. I have wonderful people who kind of serve as "protectors" and they see me when I'm getting exhausted and remind me to rest... But they can't protect me from encountering those downsides to passion.
The website is an example-- we're not able to do everything I'd like it to do- or we don't have all the pictures I'd like to have up...or whatever-- I have to be patient. That's hard because I'm passionate about.
When you're really really passionate about something-- part of that is because you have this deep deep belief that there is something at stake!
This is important--for a reason-- and it just burns in you- you have a fire in you! For me that fire is the Holy Spirit just flaming - just wanting to love people and love em' really love em' - to love them like Jesus loves them. And I just want people to see it, know it, hear it, and experience it.
What's at stake? People feeling the isolation, alienation, separation, lonliness, fear, darkness, chaos, distress, shame, hurt, ...and so much more of not experience recognizing, seeing, knowing, experiencing God's presence in their lives.
The biggest struggle with it all is when others don't see the value or importance of something that I see value and importance in. It will always happen- and part of me loves this challenge and part of me struggles deeply with it. And it happens all them time- with websites, organs, being in a small group, having faith at all...but the worst thing is when people don't see the value and importance of one another or themselves.
That's the hardest- because God sees it- and God is really passionate about loving us and seeing us the way God created us- in His image.
1 comment:
Your passion is one of the things I've most admired about you since we first met.
This post sounds so much like a conversation we've had many times before. Its just so hard to accept how people can not care at all on the topics we care the most about. I much prefer someone to fight me on a topic than responding with something like "Oh, that's nice...". At least you know they've thought about it and care enough to have an opinion. I think I've been burnt out for a while now because of this. Maybe I should go pick a fight to recharge my batteries. ;-)
Post a Comment