Brenda Seefeldt Amodea's Blog, page 12

The Beautiful Life Defined by Stamina

Hang in there, baby! That���s what the word stamina means to me. And this is required in a brave life. Some days you just have to decide to hang in there.

Who else had this poster hanging in their bedroom and/or their elementary classroom?

I chose the word stamina but I could have chosen perseverance or tenacity or resilience or persistence or grit. So many good strong synonyms! I���m choosing stamina because it sounds tough, like I will make it all the way to the end. Though I also like grit because it sounds tough and dirty.

Because honestly, a life of faith does not look like a straight line of upward growth. It is a line that goes all over the place, up and down and around, and forward. Always forward if we have the stamina to grow. This is tough and dirty.

This is faith mixed with total confusion.

Stay a bit longer in it.

This stamina is a you decision. You can���t offload this to God.

This quote gives us the grace we need to know.

���It���s the most counteractive aspect of Christianity, that we are declared right with God not once we begin to get our act together but once we collapse into honest acknowledgement that we never will.��� y, p. 78

���Dane Ortlund, Lowly and Gentl

Amazing. This is where our stamina begins and ends. There is grace for the up and down and around decisions. We say ���me, too��� about that. Because God designed us to develop over time. All of our development. If this wasn���t true, we all would have been born as fully formed adults, with a mature faith and no trust issues. (Wishful thinking, huh?)

Instead we come into this world as babies. Vulnerably learning and growing over time. Jesus came to earth this way too.

This means we learn through our struggles���and through our failures. This means that in the midst of disappointment, we lean into our stamina and somehow we come to learn that Jesus is trustworthy. That somehow is the mystery that keeps me growing forward after all these years.

Stay a bit longer. Be intrigued by the mystery.

Stay gripping on to your belief in God a bit longer. Hang in there, baby.

Stay with your gift of people a bit longer. Yes, people are messy. Yes, you need stamina to deal with people. But people help us see this Larger Story God. People have stories to share, wisdom to give, consistency and time to help you see God in the disappointment that is overwhelming you.

Do not despise these small beginnings, for the Lord rejoices to see the work begin.

–Zechariah 4:10

Your small, slow, and imperfect progress is still progress.

Your small, slow, and imperfect faith is still faith.

Your small, slow start is still a start.

Be kind to yourself about your imperfect progress. Your stamina is your beauty and strength. Hello, beautiful.

In our world full of so many choices, what do we do when we don���t like something? We look for something new���because we can. What if you stayed a bit longer? What if stamina or tenacity or perseverance became words that describe your life? Hello beautiful.

This is a you decision. This is you making a brave decision when your heart is smashed, your soul is overwhelmed, and your life is confused. In that moment you are declaring, ���Here is my cry and here is my anger and here is how I feel. Thank you for blessing the godly.���

The beautiful Beth Moore said this about what her life of faith looks like:

���Oh, you could try to tell someone younger in the faith what steps you took. You could post a blog about it. You could do an effective Q&A on the topic. Perhaps you could even write a decent book about it. But deep in your heart you know that much of the time, you really had no earthly idea what you were doing.��� 

–Beth Moore, Chasing Vines, p. 228

I say, ���me, too.��� I have no earthly idea what I’m doing but hanging in there, baby.

Suffer well.

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My Coppiced Faith of Beautiful New Growth

You can also buy your Christmas tree this way.

My Christian faith and coppiced Christmas trees have a lot in common.

Coppicing simplified means you cut a tree down high at first to leave a stump that remains alive. This stump then becomes the source of all future trees to produce again and again with the right management. So when you cut this Christmas tree you aren���t killing a tree.

It looks something like this. This is the book cover of Bravester���s second book.

It also actually looks something like this.

photo credit Geoff McKonly

Read this story about The Pieropan Christmas Tree Farm that only sell coppiced Christmas trees. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/coppice-farming-grows-christmas-trees-keep-giving-180971068/ (Also who the photo credit is owed to.)

My Bravester story is having my heart smashed and not being able to get out of bed and the brave decision to get up again. I have been cut down. Chopped low.

But obviously not low enough because new growth is coming out of me!!!!!!!

I write about this new growth all over Bravester and teach it at my church, Larger Story Church.

There is more truth about coppicing to amaze you with. According to this Smithsonian Magazine article, a single stump can support an older tree and a younger tree at the same time, thereby increasing production.

What I have learned can support me and you at the same time! We are both growing back into new life. Thank you for joining me on this journey. Are you as encouraged as I am?

But wait. There is more. When these older trees are cut high, more sunlight shines into the forest understory which then again creates more life in plants, insects, and reptiles. This increased biodiversity also helps plant life manage climate change better. (I guess our ecosystem needs more insects. I don���t like that.)

My heart is smashed. I���m chopped down yet I���m still alive and growing. Of course, I have my gift of people to help with that! And the world is healing. This is the right ���agricultural management.���

My old ways of handling life are broken. I have little choice but to grow anew and lean into this Larger Story God with trust and grow again. This is allowing the sun to reach even deeper instead of being blocked by my big ol��� beautiful top heavy tree of what I used to be. Life is springing up everywhere. Even those insects are basking in the sun.

During the Advent season this passage from Isaiah 11 is often read beginning with verse 1, Out of the stump of David���s family will grow a shoot���yes, a new Branch bearing fruit from the old root.

Now do you see a much deeper meaning of this prophecy?! So much so that you can’t unsee it?

The metaphors here are rich. Metaphors based on actual science.

There are probably more metaphors to be made.

Once again this is true. A broken heart is always a beginning. Pain has a Holy Spirit magic way of making you beautiful. What is happening with these trees is crazily amazingly beautiful. #whattreesteachus

I see it.

I see me in it.

I see God���s larger story in it.

I see hope.

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Hope Begins in the Dark

An Advent thought.

Advent is a rhythm of the church calendar that matches the seasons of the earth, for the northern hemisphere at least. Late autumn is the end of the growing season. The harvest is brought in; the anxiety of whether there will be a harvest or not is over; and it becomes feast time. The long days of field work are over too. Double feast time!

While it is feast time, the night sky is getting darker and darker, earlier and earlier and colder and colder. There is feasting but there is also anxiousness because the world is turning dark. Will the cold devour them? Will the food last? Will the darkness take something?

Feasting and fear. Joy and pain. Light and dark. We get both.

In the growing darkness we subconsciously ask, ���Will the sun return again to grow life?��� Thankfully we now know that December 21 is the winter solstice. We know that the sun will return again, a little bit more and more each day.

Here is where the Christmas season falls���with lots of Christmas lights. And lots of distractions and noise and too much money spent. This is the opposite of the rhythm. Is this all a coping mechanism to get through the dark?

Between the feasting and the winter solstice we have Advent. The church calendar part that recognizes the waiting in the darkness because the Light is coming. A new beginning is coming. Advent is adventus or coming.

Advent on the church calendar is when light and life is fading so we set aside four weeks to focus on the waiting and the darkness to remember that in the waiting and in the darkness God is still at work.

Advent is a Christmas tradition moving in step with creation. Like nature, we hibernate inward to find this Larger Story God. (While still attending Christmas parties.)

Is this a rhythm that your soul is seeking? In the beautiful and memory-filled chaos of Christmas, can you make time for Advent? For some sort of Advent practice?

You are invited to an Advent study with me, Brenda. We will be meeting through Zoom so you are truly invited.

We are using Zoom because for this study we will be having conversations about darkness and where God is. Because this is the movement of God.

We will take a good look and have a conversation about one of the images from the James Webb Telescope. Because amazing things are happening in the dark.

We will also learn about an animal in winter and how they respond to the dark. While we may fear the dark, animals adapt in amazing ways and shape themselves to life as it is given. The Advent book, All Creation Waits:  The Advent Mystery of New Beginnings, is our source. We will learn about the black bear, the woodchuck, the porcupine, and the painted turtle–none of which are in your Advent calendar but maybe will in the future.

Darkness, hope, animals, and a lit candle are a part of our Advent practice as we celebrate our coming Savior. We will be meeting Sunday evenings beginning at 6:30 pm EST/5:30 pm CST during Advent. Join this conversation by signing up at Eventbrite.

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The Long Stay – What Grief Needs

Tuesday November 1, 2022, was the 13-year anniversary of the day my life took a new direction. I would never have guessed what this trajectory would look like, where it would take me, how I would learn and grow, that I would grow to deeply love people who I���ve never really interacted much with, if at all. And that it all would come from the crushing pain of grief.

It was not my grief that started the journey that day, although I do have my own grief story. No, that was the day a ���sort-of��� friend���s son took his life.

The minute I found out (literally) I messaged my friend and said I was on my way. I didn���t think it over, I didn���t hesitate, I didn���t stop to count the cost, I didn���t do anything else but rush to her side, praying all the way. What do you say to someone whose child has just ended their life? How can I help her? What if it���s too much for me? What if I���m a hindrance rather than a help?

These were the thoughts going through my head on the drive over. I didn���t have answers to any of them by the time I pulled into her driveway, but I put on my brave face and headed in.

I found a house full of people milling about awkwardly, while my friend was face down on the floor weeping in the upstairs hallway. It was as chaotic a scene as I���ve ever encountered.

That was when this ���ministry��� that God has given me began. A ministry of grief, if you will, but perhaps a better definition is a ministry of presence.

I���d never been so near to so much pain as I was that day, and it seemed to me that all the chaos was making things worse for the family.

There was an air of tension and uncertainty in the house. Nobody seemed to know what to do next. As I stood there taking it all in, my feet took me upstairs to my friend. I pushed my way through the clusters of people until I got to her, then knelt down close enough for her to see my face and I just said, “Let me help you to your room.” I put my arms under her to help her up. I truly don���t think she was able to get up on her own. Once she was in bed though ��� then what? I didn���t have a clue.

I chose to be a “firefighter” that day, which is an important job and one that came naturally to me. Firefighters come immediately and see to all the tasks and things and such that need doing. Arranging meals, making sure the rest of the kids had funeral clothes, keeping the house in order, and so on.

Because there were church ladies seeing to the practicalities, I sat myself down on the bottom step, right inside the front door, trying to think what to do, and if I should even stay. The upstairs people had moved on once I got my friend out of the hallway, but the downstairs people were still buzzing. So I sort of just ��� did what I do best. I went around and started thanking people for coming, basically telling them goodbye.

Most of them drifted out after that so I seated myself on those stairs again. Only to find a new round of people showed up in the meantime. So I changed my strategy. I just sat there on that step watching the front door.

Unless it was someone my friend had asked to see, I thanked each new person that came, said she was unavailable, but would be glad they had come by, and handed them a notebook and a pen to write her a note if they wished.

It was a good thing to do–the chaos quieted, and a bit of peace descended. I stayed quite a while, until someone I knew well came. I explained what I was doing and she took over.

Everything my firefighter-self did that day was just right. What? I said I didn���t have a clue what to do or say, right? Right. But Jesus knew just what was needed, and when I say my feet took me upstairs, I really mean Jesus took me upstairs. Ushering people gently out, sitting on those stairs to protect my friend–all of those kinds of things are things I do well, but I had never put them to use in a setting like that before. God directed my every move that day and in the days to come, and it was the beginning of my learning how to be present with people who are in great pain.

My friend unintentionally began teaching me how to be a Builder also. She was raw and vulnerable with me, and I could see what hurt her. I could tell what was helpful, and sadly, often those are the things that aren���t said or done. I learned things like saying ���Call me if there���s anything I can do to help,��� are not helpful. What is helpful is saying something like, ���Hey I���m going to bring dinner this week, is Tuesday or Wednesday better for you?���

Why? While your nebulous offer is sincere (maybe because they were the only words you could come up with), we must realize that our friend will not know what to do. She cannot. She doesn���t know what she needs. But you might if you do offer them a specific thing. They might say no, and if they do, respect that.��� (Peering into the Tunnel: An Outsider���s Look into Grief, p. 9)

See the difference? She���ll never pick up the phone to call me for help, it���s too much for her. But she can choose between Tuesday and Wednesday, and she knows her family needs to eat.

Another helpful idea. Sometimes we talk because silence feels awkward to us. More often your friend needs silent companionship and shared tears. Rarely do they need our words more than our presence.

Since then, one after the next, more women bearing crushing losses have come into my life. From them all, I have learned how to be a Builder. A Builder leaves the practicalities to the oh-so-important Firefighters, and goes to a griever���s side. And stays, sometimes for a long time.

In fact, this ���sort-of��� friend is now one of my dearest friends. We still meet often. These days we laugh more than we cry, but there is a bond between us, built on the pain of loss and the love of Jesus–for her child, for her, and for me.

Over these past 13 years as I���ve walked alongside friends old and new, maybe the most important thing I���ve learned is that there is no ���right��� way to grieve. Everyone I���ve encountered on a grief path has done it differently, and none of it was wrong. We need to be cautious not to project our own notions of what grief should look like, because that���s how to circumvent the grief path.

Instead, pray for them. Overlook their offenses, should there be any. Give grace. Go to them. And stay.

They need you.

Angie Clayton is an author, speaker and blogger who has a passion for ministering to the grieving. Some of her writing reflects those experiences. She is a storyteller, and her blog, Framing the Days, is rich with diversity. wife, mom to two kids and Nini to four grandkids. She has a ministry of presence, and spends much time with grieving women. Her blog, shares with you the joys and beauty of both the mountain tops and the valleys of her life. Her book, Peering into the Tunnel: An Outsider���s Look into Grief is a collection of real stories, as well as helpful suggestions for how to come alongside someone who is grieving.

Angie has been married to Greg for over three decades, and they especially enjoy time spent with their grandkids.

Personal note from Brenda: Angie is one of “my gift of people” at-the-text ready for one disappointing story I’m walking through. She is not afraid of my pain. She prays for me, and I believe her. She says the right things somehow. Angie is this gift, be challenged by her words.

And! If you loved my book, I Wish I Could Carry Your Pain, you will love Angie’s book. It doesn’t have color or doodles but it has these truths to give you the practical helps so you will know what to do.

Photo by Dieter K on Unsplash.

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The Brave Decision to Rest

We, our bodies and our souls, are desperate for rest, yet we are so fearful of it.

Sabbath rest is an act of trust in God. Like sleep. Will you trust God by being inefficient?

Making space for rest is beginning in your worthiness. I am worthy to rest and then I can go change the world with all of my Bravester decisions. But first I must make this brave decision.

The opposite of this is the lie that you must rely on yourself. This is the lie of scarcity that bullies you into thinking that Sabbath rest is unrealistic. This is the good girl and good boy voices that drive you to produce. Production does not equal rest (listen to your soul cry).

Did you notice that word ���Sabbath rest���? I���m guessing you have some baggage attached to that word ���Sabbath.���

I asked this question to my church group and did I get answers! Yes to the baggage. Such answers that easily came were unsustainable; something outdated; one of the 10 Commandments so it is heavy; something that reminds me of failure; not possible these days; and Sabbath means finger-pointing disappointment. Who likes to get a finger pointed at them making this a ���should���?

This baggage is in the way of this brave decision.

In Sabbath rest we allow our brain to make sense of our busy lives. It gives us space to process what we���ve learned over the week and apply meaning to what we���ve overlooked while moving at our fast pace.

In Sabbath rest we are given space to debrief from our spiritual experiences. This is when we learn the real lessons.

Brain science shows that Sabbath rest also allows our brains to daydream. When is the last time you daydreamed?

In Sabbath rest we bring a strength of stillness to our busy lives. When we don���t rest, we react more to all of the over-stimulation. These reactions may be what is making you more cranky. We miss the moments of the slow way of God. You are not able to pay attention to what your soul needs.

Rest is a gift, a pure gift. There is no need to try to ���perfect��� rest to please God. God is already pleased and nothing you do or don���t do can change that reality.

Sabbath rest is a way of loosening the grip. Rest is an invitation into an identity that is free of enoughness. Rest is declaring, ���I am worthy enough to have this rest.���

I will bless the Lord who guides me; even at night my heart instructs me. I know the Lord is always with me. I will not be shaken, for he is right beside me. No wonder my heart is glad, and I rejoice. My body rests in safety.

Psalm 16:7-9

Your body rests in safety because you don���t have to hustle for your worth.

This from writer Amanda Anderson sings to my soul:

https://www.amandaandersonwriter.com/...

This breath prayer from Black Liturgies sings to my soul too:

https://www.facebook.com/blackliturgi... what are the reasons why you are not making the brave decision to rest. What are you justifying to be valuable and cranky?Sabbath rest is a long period of stillness and quiet to read, pray, and nap. My current life situation doesn���t afford this lavish gift, so I am exempt from Sabbath.Sabbath rest is only possible after I get everything done.Sabbath rest is only for those who are spiritually mature.Sabbath rest can only be observed on Sunday. And because I have Sunday responsibilities, Sabbath is impossible for me.Sabbath rest is something I do in order to become more productive. I must rest so I can produce. (I don���t hear any rest in the words ���must��� and ���produce.���)I can���t rest because I don���t want to feel my ���feels.��� (Sabbath is actually a safe place to feel those ���feels��� because you can grow to see them rightly. All emotions lead us to God. BTW, social media is not a place to feel your emotions.)Guilt. This one is tough. If you had hardworking parents or grew up in a disadvantaged household, no one modeled rest for you. You honestly wonder, ���Who am I to take a Sabbath–or even a nap–when my single mother never could?������Rest shaming��� is real. It comes from parents and caregivers who actually criticize, embarrass, or resent you for taking time to rest. This is the root of that good girl and good boy voice that drives you to scarcity.Sabbath rest is for the middle and upper class. The lower class doesn���t have this luxury. This one I do wrestle with because it is true.What would rest feel like for you?

Does this rest have to happen on a Sunday or a 24-hour period (complete with finger-pointing)? Perhaps Sabbath rest could look different and possible for you?

For John and I it looks like watching sports together. We both love sports. It is a love language from my birth family and between us and between us and our sons. The grandkids are so-so in this love language.

John and I both work from home, sharing office space, sharing work with Bravester, our church, and our moneymaker, Paintball Media. Did you know I own a paintball media company?!!! We work a lot. We are together a lot. We are stressed together a lot.

Thankfully there are 162 baseball games a year. This gives us 162 reasons to stop all of this stressed togetherness, get off of our computers, sit on the couch and actually talk to each other. Often trash-talking each other. We rest. We don���t produce. We find ourselves holding hands often. Until a big play happens.

Sundays during the NFL season becomes Sunday Sabbath rest. There are three games to sit side-by-side and rest! It is just a coincidence that this falls on a Sunday���or is it?

John and I built an outdoor TV set up to get outdoors and to invite many others to join us.

True story. John and I were married in March because it fell between the Super Bowl and before the baseball season started.

What gives you rest and joy together? Maybe it is a glorious nap? I think rest should always involve good food. Often Sabbath rest is better with others.

I believe a part of Sabbath rest should always require some time of Bible reading, prayer and reflection. To take extra time to ponder the work of God in your life. This doesn���t have to happen on a Sunday afternoon. It can happen in that time slot that you prioritize so that it does happen.

Choosing rest is the practice of loving yourself. Which can feel like a selfish decision so let���s add that to the baggage list.

Here���s why you need to make this brave decision. You must become compassionate toward yourself first in order to become compassionate toward those around you. Do you want to live more compassionately?  Do you want to not be cranky to the people in your life? And the strangers? Have you noticed your crankiness lately? Make this brave decision to rest. Do it for you and do it for us.

From other conversations we have in our church, we came up with this definition of Christian living: 

With boundaries I know who I am, who I am maturing to be in my identity in Christ, so I can give up my privilege and show compassion to the world.

Sabbath rest is placing the boundary on you stating that I will start my life from a place of rest. Like the Jewish practice of the day beginning in the dark, our schedule begins from the Sabbath. You are declaring, ���I am worthy to rest and then I can go change the world with all of my Bravester decisions.���

We need you to help change the world. We also need you to be less cranky.

Make the brave decision to rest.

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Waiting Long Enough to Expand the Heart

How long, Lord…

So wrote the Psalmists 22 times.

So I pray too many times to count.

I trust God. I pray for the things that are dear to my heart. My life is one of brave decision to brave decision to brave decision. But I do an awful lot of waiting on God for the things I have hope for. This is why my hope has bloody fists.

Wait patiently for the Lord. Be brave and courageous. Yes, wait patiently for the Lord.

Psalm 27:14

This is such a vulnerable statement. We don’t have the patience to wait. We want some control over the outcome. We want to know the outcome.

Do we trust God for the outcome? Probably not.

I’ve been disappointed before. I trust God as I have trust issues with God. I am this mix of fear and faith.

I write this as John and I just had to make a hard boundary decision of no. What was “supposed to” didn’t happen. To have our beautiful reunion is going to require more waiting and more trusting in God for the larger story. Disappointment is grief.

How long, Lord? Why not now, Lord? What if…, Lord?

I must remind myself, “Wait patiently for the Lord. Be brave and courageous. Yes, wait patiently for the Lord.” Because those “what ifs” cause me to spiral.

Patience is not passivity. I don’t get to “let go and let God.” I can’t “easy button” this to God. As if I actually could.

Patience as listed in Galatians 5 is often called long suffering. The original Greek word is makrothumio, meaning “long temper.” A long temper is not passivity.

A long temper means I must stay engaged as I pray and wait and trust and pray and wait and trust and grow angry.

A long temper is filled with tension because I just want this whatever to be over with. I want God to do something, be given all the glory for the wonderful story, and for my life to have the happy ending so I can move forward.

My picture of a long temper is me holding on to God’s robe at first at the neck. I’m right in his (or her) face pouring out my heart. But God keeps moving forward so my hold on that robe starts slipping. I’m grasping to stay a hold of that robe. Sometimes grasping and being dragged as I hang on to the bottom hem. “I will not let go until you bless me” as Jacob bravely declared when wrestling with God. Genesis 32:26. That is me. This is not passive.

This doesn’t mean my soul is not damaged in this. I walk with a limp also. I have a relationship with God whom I love and whom who breaks my heart.

Patience does not mean that I am not trying hard enough. When I feel so overwhelmed, I could easily convince myself that I should do more to fix this. Often at the expense of my soul. That there must be something I can do to control this outcome. Justifying that God is asking me to do something so I should do something—but that something is really me trying to control the outcome.

This is not having a long temper either. This is me ending the temper because I am uncomfortable. This is me letting go of God’s robe and finding a way to fix it my way.

Patience is a middle point of not becoming reckless and not becoming overly emotionally engaged. Patience allows you to stick with it so you don’t give up. Patience is willing to suffer and stick with something.

Patience is uncomfortable. Patience is love. Patience is vulnerable. Patience grows muscles.

No wonder we are bad at it.

The Psalmist added to this, “Be brave and courageous.” How Bravester. We just mentioned how patience is vulnerable.

Bravery always requires vulnerability. In a cartoon sense, bravery is the opening of the door without having any idea what is on the other side. There is vulnerability in that—often in the form of Bugs Bunny. Vulnerability defined is having the guts to show up when there is no guaranteed outcome. It is the going “in” again and again and again because deep down you believe you are worthy of good things happening to you so “I will not let go until you bless me.”

Even when you don’t understand what is happening to you.

God’s love for me is a love that also waits. Love defined by me would be to rush to someone’s side to help and to fix. To have an end to this pain. Yet sometimes love also has to wait. You know this is true.

Because I have to wait for something doesn’t mean that my love is any less or that God loves me any less. It means I love so much so I am waiting for the better thing. This must be what Ann Voskamp means when she wrote, “The longer the heart waits, the larger the heart expands to hold the largeness of the abundant life.” Please read.

I do have an abundant life also.

God is a larger story God. Meanwhile he waits with me. This I have learned over and over. Especially when I have these long tempers with God. I am not afraid of my pain. I am not afraid to tell God exactly how I feel. I’m not afraid of the gamut of emotions because I have learned that all of these emotions lead to God.

I have learned this…the painful way. This is the definer of my brave life.

Even now as I pray again (and grab that robe by the neck again), “How long, Lord.”

“Waiting is never passive–waiting is passion:  Loving long enough to suffer.”

–Ann Voskamp, Waymaker, p. 120

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The Inefficiency of the Good Things

���The result of busyness is that an individual is very seldom permitted to form a heart.���

–S��ren Kierkegaard

How did someone who lived from 1813 to 1855 describe our life today so well?

���Crazy busy��� has become a definer of who we are. It is a value we give ourselves. We say the words and we feel important. We think this unsustainable pace is justified (we spend so much effort justifying it) because it is making you into a somebody.

A somebody who has a protected heart. An unknown heart. A tired heart.

There is a hole in your heart so you amp up your productivity so you can numb the ache from that hole and find the affirmation somehow.

What your heart and soul needs are the good things that are inefficient.Inefficiency is the opposite of crazy busy.Love

Making room for love is inefficient.

Love is all things vulnerable. Crazy busy does a good job of keeping you out of vulnerability.

Here���s the lie that keeps us in that crazy busy. We are driven by these ���good girl/good boy voices��� that says we are doing these things because we love our people. When really our people want us to slow down and waste time with them. Slowness and inefficiency grows relationships.

Kindness

To waste time with people is kindness. To do the extras for people is kindness. Both are so inefficient. Making room for kindness is also inefficient.

In your crazy busy you miss those moments of giving someone that extra long smile or sitting just a while longer to feel the story you just heard or seeing who needs the cup of coffee you can gift in the name of Jesus. Kindness definitely interrupts. Kindness is also unforgettable���for the receiver and for the giver. Kindness causes all hearts to grow.

Friends

Let���s just name it. Having friends is inefficient. Your gift of people are inefficient. Your friends need you like you need them. To invest in them so they can carry your pain is not done on an efficient schedule. Slowness and inefficiency grows relationships.

All Things Creative

To be creative, to be a creator awakens the soul. But it certainly is not efficient. To create this article, then edit, and edit again, and edit again is not efficient. It brings joy though to create in the likeness of my Creator.

Rest

There is a lot of baggage associated to the word ���Sabbath.��� Sabbath rest feels unattainable and is something we fail at. Sabbath rest is certainly inefficient. I very much believe in the rhythm of Sabbath rest to help me be more productive. This is what I���ve learned…the hard way.

Sabbath rest is an act of trust in God. Like sleep. I will stop those ���good girl/good boy voices��� for a set time and rest my soul. Maybe surrounded by friends. Very likely wasting time and doing inefficient things. I start my week with rest so I can be more productive the rest of the week.

Prayer and Bible

Prayer is inefficient. Any sort of devotional practice is inefficient.

Maybe you have one of those good books that gives you a 15-minute devotional thought daily. That is efficient. And remember I said they are good. Keep on.

What is inefficient is reading your Bible and journaling all of the questions that the Bible reading raised. Questions beg to be answered and you don���t have time to find the answers. So you skim your Bible reading or skip your Bible reading.

Prayer is hard because it feels like a waste of time. Is God answering your prayers? Is God listening? Are you praying the right way? Our wandering minds and muddled prayers of incomplete sentences sure do feel inefficient. But that inefficient time with the Larger Story God also gives me moments of awe and peace and rest.

Prayer really is inefficient because you don���t have any control over the outcome. It requires trust and time from you. It is so much easier to trust yourself to fix the situation and fix it now. Yet we are dependent on a Savior who isn���t us because we know our lives need more than what we alone can offer. We know we need the Larger Story God to do something which we are limited to do. So we pray. Even if it is inefficient.

All the Little Virtues

The ordinariness of Salesian Spirituality and those little virtues are inefficient. This is something we are trying to practice regularly as a church. Because when we practice the little virtues we are ready for those big virtues. Our crazy busy decisions are made because we need those big virtues for our big plans. This comes with the inefficiency of the little virtues.

So you can form a heart. To not become one of those heartless leaders you complain about.

The crazy blessing in finding space for these inefficiencies is how beautiful you become. This is a value that defines you a whole lot better than crazy busy.

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What is Really Happening During the School Day?

Three practical ideas to actually have a conversation.

You want to know what happened in school today. You have so many questions. So many curiosities. But when you ask your teen, you get nothing. You literally hear the word ���nothing.���

How about some better questions. Not the ���mom/dad questions��� that your beloved is expecting. Ask the interesting questions that require an interesting answer. We���ve created a list for you. This may lead you to think of some more to add to this good-sized list.

Of course, don���t ask all of these questions every day. You have enough here that you can ask one or two and have a good curious conversation. You have enough to have quite a rotation to keep this conversation going. Imagine this on-going conversation about what actually happens at school.

What made you smile today?Did you see a teacher laugh today? Tell me the story of why he/she laughed.Did you see an act of kindness today?Did you see an act of unkindness today? How did you respond? How did it make you feel?Did anyone cry at school? How did it make you feel?Did you tell anyone ���thank you?���What book did you read today in class? Do you think I should read it too?What was the most creative thing you did today?Did you learn anything amazing?Did you learn something you didn���t understand?Did you learn something that made you ���bored out of your mind?���Did you feel prepared for your test/quiz today?Were you inspired by someone or something today?Did you have to make a brave decision today? The kind of decision that turns your gut wonky?Did something happen that made you feel more confident?Did someone brag about you today?What are you looking forward to tomorrow at school?How is this year so far different from last year?Are you finding yourself to be different this year from last year?What do you hope to accomplish before school is out for the year?Are you seeing any negative changes in one of your friends?Do you feel supported by your friends?Would you rather be influential or popular?When do you find yourself praying throughout the day?Was there a ���Jesus moment��� today?

Another idea is to simplify this and do the daily ���highs and lows.��� What this little talker is doing is letting your teen know that it is okay for a low to have happened. It is so okay that it actually happens every day in some form. Read more about this here. And you have learned something about his/her school day.

Here���s another one-time practice that will give you a ton of insight into the school situation. Ask your teen to diagram the lunchroom.

There is a famous scene from the movie Mean Girls where the new girl is told the layout of the school lunchroom. This is what you are replicating because it will give you a ton of information, just like it gave the new girl.��

(photo credit:�� https://teendotcom.tumblr.com/post/12...)

Give your teen a sheet of white paper. Ask your beloved to draw out the lunchroom layout. Your first bit of knowledge is finding out if they have round or rectangle tables.

Then ask to describe who sits where, which groupings of friends. You will find out the names for the groupings of friends these days. Stoners are so 1970s.

When the diagram is finished, ask the following questions:

Where do you sit?Where does (the child your child was friends with in elementary school) sit?�� Think of as many of those former friends your child had.Who are the leaders of each group from the diagram?What makes those leaders?How does one move from one group to the next? Is that even possible?Is there a ���uniform��� to be a part of one group?Do the groups also have ���dedicated��� locations in other parts of the school?(If there is a caste system) how do the groups rank?Where do you fit in?Some schools have you sit by class or by grade. You will find that out also. But even on assigned tables, the cliques clump together.

You will learn a lot about school life through this little project.  And your teen may appreciate the chance to ���gossip��� about life at school and impress you with his/her knowledge of what is truly going on.

Now what do you do with all this intel you have gathered? Maybe nothing. Maybe something. Definitely pray. Allow the Holy Spirit to guide you. Breathe. Your beloved may not need you to rescue him/her. Your beloved may just need to be heard. Or given words of encouragement. Or hear ���me, too��� from you. Trust the Holy Spirit. God’s interest in your teen costs more than your love. Trust this Larger Story God.

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The Brave Decision to Sleep

We, our bodies and our souls, are desperate for rest, yet we are so fearful of it.

It is a brave decision to choose sleep. Sleep is a declaration of trust. It is admitting we are not God, who never sleeps, and that is good news.

Maybe this declaration of trust is what gets in the way of this brave decision. We feel like we should be doing so much more with our lives. Sleep feels like an extra nonsense. While sleeping you don���t have anyone saying ���good job��� and you have nothing to accomplish which you can put on your resume or take off your to-do list.

But���but���but���when we choose sleep, we rest in our limitations as created beings. When we sleep, we admit to our limits. This pace of life that ���everyone else appears��� to be running on is not sustainable. Sleep is not like recharging your phone. You are not a machine needing to recharge. You don���t sleep so you can work harder.

Besides amazing things happen through the night. There is life at night.

There is an entire class of flowers that only bloom at night. Moonflowers, evening primroses, and other night bloomers are in full glory if you find them after dark. Psalm 104:19-20 beautifully describes, You made the moon to mark the seasons, and the sun knows when to set. You send the darkness, and it becomes night, when all the forest animals prowl about. Life is everywhere.

a moonflower from my friend Dana’s yard

Our body heals overnight.�� Through sleep our brains, muscles, and hormones function better. Our cells are repaired. Our energy is conserved. We dream. We fight illness. We form, sort, and strengthen memories from our days. We also learn in our sleep.

I will bless the Lord who guides me; even at night my heart instructs me.

Psalm 16:7

There are things in our spiritual lives, too, that only bloom in the dark. You know this is true when you wake up with that new business idea or you wake up with a song that I believe God was having sung over you throughout the night.

But each day the Lord pours his unfailing love upon me, and through each night I sing his songs, praying to God who gives me life.

Psalm 42:8

This is all happening without our knowledge, consent or control. God designed the universe���and our bodies themselves���so that each day we must face the fact that we do not have to prove our worth to the world. We begin each day this way. Worthiness is our birthright. We begin our day in our worth because God prepared us for the day.

We know that Jesus slept during his time here on earth. Jesus slept because he needed to and because he had nothing to prove.

The darkness is where everything starts. Out of the darkness came all of creation. Including us. We go to sleep and in that darkness God begins his work. Tish Harrison Warren broke it down so wonderfully like this:

In Jewish culture, days begin in the evening with the setting of the sun. (We see this in Genesis 1 with the repetition of ���and there was evening and there was morning.���) The day begins with rest. We start by settling down and going to sleep.

This understanding of time is powerfully reorienting, even jarring, to those of us who measure our days by our own efforts and accomplishments. The Jewish day begins in seemingly accomplishing nothing at all. We begin by resting, drooling on our pillow, dropping off into helplessness. Eugene Peterson says, ���The Hebrew evening/morning sequence conditions us to the rhythms of grace. We go to sleep and God begins his work.

Though the day begins in darkness, God is still at work, growing crops, healing wounds, giving rest, protecting, guarding, mending, redeeming. We drop out of consciousness, but the Holy Spirit remains at work. ��� Tish Harrison Warren, Liturgy of the Ordinary: Sacred Practices in Everyday Life, p. 150-151

Our lives begin in the dark. Not when the sun rises. The work begins when we fall asleep. This is the start of our day. We start our day with rest and nothing to prove���at least we should. Make this brave decision.

By making this brave decision we accept that we are incapable of doing for ourselves what sleep provides. Is this why we stay up late, staring at screens, working late, or vegging out? Are we resisting our bodily limits every way we can?

Sleep is vulnerable. Maybe that is why we resist it?

When you vulnerably set yourself to sleep, when you give in to your human limitations, this is when the crazy thoughts come. The failures of the day. The life crisis you are managing through right now. Your doubts about God. All of the thoughts that your busyness distracts you from. The thoughts that don���t allow you to sleep. You cannot protect yourself from bad dreams or mosquitos or whatever that irritate. We are all at the mercy of the night…vulnerable.

So do you get back on your phone or turn the TV on hoping to tire yourself to sleep? Except there is this thing about blue light disturbing sleep.

Brave decisions always require vulnerability. And vulnerability is the birthplace of love, belonging, joy, courage, empathy, and creativity. These are the things I want in my life. I choose to lean into the vulnerability of a good night���s sleep.

Doesn���t that sound good? And desirable?

���Rest is an act of defiance, and it cannot be predicated on apology. It���s the audacity to face the demands of this world and proclaim, we will not be owned.���

Cole Arthur Riley, This Here Flesh, p. 157

I like this statement too from Black Liturgies. It speaks to the rebel in me. I will defy the norm and choose sleep. Where the work begins.

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The Doubts About TikTok

Everything is true that you see on the internet, right?

When school began again after the covid shutdown, TikTok spurred a weird trend. Boys (mostly) were stealing items from the bathrooms of middle and high schools���and filming themselves doing it. Items like soap dispensers, toilet paper dispensers, even bathroom doors. I know this to be true because the teens in my church constantly complained about not being able to wash hands and other bathroom necessities because of these ���stupid TikTok videos.���

Us adults may be asking such reasonable questions such as ���How?��� How did they get that bathroom door out of the school? I know from my local schools which I subbed at for 27 years that there are security cameras outside of the bathroom doors that are used to check on who entered the bathroom at the time of a fight. Couldn���t those cameras see a soap dispenser in someone���s hands?

I have no answers. I just know that my teens complained about this for months.

But that���s not all. At the same time there was the trend of high school boys pooping on the stairs or in the hallways. Pooping! And filming themselves for TikTok! I know this to be true because my teens have also complained about this and the teachers in my church know the names of the many students who have been suspended for this.

Teens have historically done dumb things. This is a part of adolescent development and brain growth and why the laws of the land protect them. But this may be the lowest of lows for the dumb things that teens do. Would you have ever pooped and filmed yourself pooping and posted it to social media while you are in school?

I cannot believe I just wrote that sentence. 40 years of youth ministry has led me to write this sentence.

Gen Z���s favorite app is a platform meant to attract and celebrate niche communities and their content. With the use of a hashtag, everyone can find ���their people��� in TikTok and learn all the things that they aren���t finding answers to from the adults.

Because everything is true that you see on the internet, right?

Witchtokers are now warning about the dangers of TikTok.

An active community on TikTok is manifestation videos. As in if you speak it, generally matched with a sound that is intended to go viral, you can manifest it, especially if it is shared a lot. The promises usually relate to money, finding a romantic partner, and generally ���good things��� happening to the person who re-uses the video.

The gimmick is obvious. By making manifestation seem as quick and easy as uploading a video on TikTok, the hopeful viewer helps the sound go viral, thus adding to the promise that this is a legitimate life hack to achieve all your dreams in less than two minutes of upload time.

If only���

WitchTokers are now speaking out against this practice because it is a complete corruption of their manifestation practices. Something to which they very much believe in. A 2-minute video with a sound is not that practice. Source.

Everything is true that you see on the internet, right?

There is something way more dangerous happening with ADHDTokers. There is a whole community connecting those with ADHD and those who think they have ADHD. They are finding understanding together–and medical startups ready to offer them Adderall.

With a 15-minute telehealth phone call with a nurse practitioner you can be diagnosed with ADHD and get your prescription. The medical startups ads are prominent in these feeds.

Of course, Adderall is one of the prescription medicines that is being abused and sold. Of course, 15 minutes isn���t long enough to figure out if something as complicated as ADHD is truly ADHD.

Thankfully major pharmacy chains have stopped filling prescriptions from some of the most prominent ADHD telehealth services. Source.

Because everything is true that you see on the internet, right?

TikTok is providing a place of belonging and education for the many secret thoughts inside our beloved teens. This is a real influence on their forming worldview. How do we as parents and human influencers compete against that?

By casting doubt that not everything in a short video is true. By having the honest and awkward conversations that can expose that doubt.

I personally do not have a TikTok account. I don���t think I need to be in the slimepit to be able to have these conversations. I do believe I need to be instigating the awkward conversations though. I trust the Holy Spirit a lot to give me those opportunities and then I take them every chance I get. I���m always looking for these opportunities. I recognize the awkwardness, trust the Holy Spirit, and start talking. Both the teen and I are grateful we had the conversation. As I also believe some teens do tend to avoid me here and there.

I know you don’t want to be avoided. Your teen’s closed bedroom door already has you feeling rejected. Still have these conversations. May I beg you to have these conversations? Please raise their doubts.

We have helps for you because this is so important, at least to this veteran youth pastor.

Try using your taxi drive time for these conversations.

Try this idea that teens like.

Try this free resource which this veteran youth pastor created over the years.

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