John Michalak's Blog

The New Book Is Here!

"Unto Life: Reflections on Both the Journey and the Destination" is an encouragement book, a traveling-companion for the spiritual journey.

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Returning Our Focus to Hearth and Home

In this age of distraction, where is our center? There's nothing wrong with returning to square one.

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Are We Living a Secondhand Life?

Too often we can mistake our daily engagements for the real thing—when really, we're living life secondhand.

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Do All Dogs Go to Haywood County?

I'm both a huge dog-lover and adore living in the mountains. Dogs in the mountains? A gift from God above.

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Inspirations Along the Waynesville Greenway

Most are starving for human connection, especially with Covid-19. Our local greenway has inspired me to reach out again.

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Some Exciting Announcements!

John is excited to share about a couple new items coming your way.

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The Paraclete’s Apprentice

It's time to surrender your striving.

We Are Not as Strong as We Think We Are

My hypocrisy knows no bounds. In the not too distant past, I was reminded of this when I went to live and serve in Honduras. Having traveled internationally before, I often boasted that I was the opposite of an “Ugly American.” I was adaptable to different cultures; I was above the need of convenience and […]

I’ve Come Here to Be

Happy New Year, dear reader.

While it may seem like I’m writing again due to some New Year’s resolution, it’s just coincidental to other circumstances. We recently landed back on US soil and have moved to the mountains of Virginia. We’re settled enough now that I can focus on moving forward. And moving forward for me certainly includes writing again.

Why have you not heard from me since we left for Honduras? The easiest answer is probably laziness. But I also have a compartmental and conservative temperament. When faced with a serious task, I choose (whenever possible) to focus just on that task. So, for the most part, while serving the church in Honduras, that’s all I did.

I’m not certain how much reflection you’ll see from me on
my time there, at least at this moment. It was both a fruitful and challenging
season—more challenging due to my own deep-seated insecurities than due to the
location or the people. I shouldn’t devalue the gift in those lessons, so I
will likely write more about them in the near future.

I will disclose that I’ll always treasure the people in Honduras: the native people and their richness of heart, their bright spirit in serving others, their optimism in difficult circumstances, their absolute flexibility and creativity to take what has been given them and live life to the full. And also, I’ll remember the people of Union Church where we served—there is a cohesion of generosity and fortitude in that community that I haven’t found matched in many other churches.

I return to the States humbled and a bit “in limbo” to be
honest with you. I’m not sure what’s ahead. My wife, for reasons that surpass
reason, continues to follow me wherever I go. She’s a miracle walking—always in
love with wherever we move, finding instant community wherever she goes. To say
I don’t deserve her is a profane understatement.

Between Two Straight Creeks

As mentioned, in this next phase of my nomadic wanderings, we’re currently staked in Virginia—to be more specific, Highland County in the town of Monterey. Founded before the Civil War, the town of under 200 (once known as Bell’s Place) was first described as “a patch of woods and laurel thickets on the saddle between two straight creeks.” It has since grown, but thankfully, not by much.

I hesitate to describe it in detail yet as we’ve just arrived. It feels like I must earn the right to write authentically about it by living here a while. I will say though that photos and video don’t compare to seeing it in person, even in this leafless winter season. Called Virginia’s Little Switzerland, the area does have that feel with valleyed hamlets and roaming flocks of sheep and cattle.

But the Swiss allusion should only be what gets you here. Once here, you’ll see that it deserves its own demarcation. More than an hour from interstates and dissonant commerce, it has in some ways an out west feel, away from the things of man. And yet as the county seat, the town of Monterey still has a thriving and active community that belies its small and isolated population.

Everyone we’ve met so far has been genuinely welcoming. Although I’ve already been told that we will be seen as Come Heres by the Been Heres—some with generational links spanning back near the birth of our country. But I’ve also been told that many Come Heres have been here for a number of decades and may shortly be equal in number to the Been Heres.

I must imagine that, like us, most Come Heres are here for a reason. Most of us don’t want to change things. We’re here to negotiate and perhaps find a home in what’s been here. We’re here to detach from the virtual and national and attach to what’s local and real. To embrace the slow, the organic, the grounding effect of the difficult and inconvenient. To think and live life firsthand again, or in some ways, for the first time.

I hesitate to wax too poetic about my own specific goals
in this pursuit, even though I have many. I’ve done that in past writings and
didn’t then live up to everything I set out to do. For now, I’ll just say that
I’m still moving forward and haven’t given up satisfying my ache for resonant
and authentic living. And so, while I’ll be journaling my progress with folks
like you, I do want to be more a student right now than teacher.

Wendell Berry

In that light, I’m beginning to read and get to know the words of the Kentucky naturalist, Wendell Berry. I’ve put off reading Berry for some time, mostly because so many I knew thought he was “it”—and I tend to resist the latest cultural trend or what’s considered cool. But I believe most of the Come Heres of Highland County have come here because they share at least some of Berry’s naturalistic vision for living.

And while I feel a far cry from his earned intimacy with the soil and creation, I do think Berry’s language and heart are genetically linked with mine, and so I’ll be sitting at his feet a while amid these ancient mountains, valleys, and streams.

In his essay, Native Hill, Berry writes:

 “My mind is never empty or idle at the joining of streams. Here is the work of the world going on. The creation is felt, alive and intent on its materials in such places. In the angle of the meeting of two streams stands the steep wooded point of the ridge, like the prow of an upturned boat—finished as it was a thousand years ago, as it will be in a thousand years. Its becoming is only incidental to its being. It will be because it is. It has no aim or end except to be. By being, it is growing and wearing into what it will be.”

I agree with the idea, so present in Berry’s writings,
that we can often best uncover the universal and eternal by paying attention to
the God-made particular, in this case, by apprenticing ourselves under
the frameless supervision of the natural, created world.

Unlike Berry’s stream-formed ridge, I too often
micromanage what I’m becoming, morally, spiritually (that was a recurring
struggle for me in Honduras). But if my supernatural being is in any way
consistent with God’s natural world, I should understand that what I’m becoming
is only incidental to what God has made me to be.

As God in his great wisdom has created me to be something—physically, emotionally, spiritually—then I should focus more on being than becoming. Or perhaps I shouldn’t focus on this at all. I should just release myself from trying to conquer creation and instead seek to envelope myself within its ancient mountains and valleys and streams. I should join creation as it sleeps and thrives, as it groans and heals and restores.

I shouldn’t shut off my brain and remain passive, certainly. But my first activity should be accepting and joining in God’s natural and supernatural rhythms, being a part rather than standing apart. Despite my human ability to question and wonder, I am still a creature of my Creator. And this God who created me is ultimately responsible for making me what I should be.

And so, this January 1st, I shall embrace my Come Here status. We have come here to Highland County Virginia, and who knows what 2020 holds in store?

My self-confidence at this moment isn’t terribly high. But I can rest in the fact that these high Virginia mountains cannot compare to heights of wisdom within the plans of my Creator.

If I’ve simply come here to be…then what’s to come is in his hands, not mine.

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About John Michalak

An author and speaker, John Michalak has spent more than 25 years encouraging others in the areas of life-change and personal relationship. John’s inspirational book, 365 Devotions To Embrace What Matters Most is available from Zondervan publishing.

Need More Inspiration?

Click HERE to get more inspirational articles sent directly to you as well as updates from John on his writing and other items of interest.

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The Things We Leave Behind

The beauty of God’s eternal plan remains untouched by my worldly cares.

That’s the thought that caressed through my brain as I sat on our mountain porch this morning. I looked out and as usual, the hills stretched lazily in their Sabbath repose. The clouds strolled by as playful as ever. The light and color of the morning sky clothed the firmament with garments of praise. God’s creation moved on in supreme procession while I stood aside with my worrisome thoughts, worshiping the papier-mâché god of my petty anxiety.

Inside the house, we’ve been negotiating what to take with us to Honduras and what to leave behind. There is no right or wrong here necessarily. For us, it seems wiser to leave most of what we own behind and start fresh after we arrive. But, letting go isn’t easy. My wife in particular is no more materialistic than me, but our home is her craft work, it’s her artistic expression of love, family, and hospitality. To let go of these things isn’t easy. And yet, God pesters with this reminder…

Your life does not consist in the abundance of your possessions.

Sure, that’s good to know. But for me, while my anxiety is certainly based in the loss of physical things, my stress lays more in their management. Selling cars, houses, and other items of value has left me with little energy and optimism for what lies ahead. Why do we own all this stuff? Will we have enough money for what we need? Will our house remain on the market for years? What about all the unknowns ahead?

I look up again from my thoughts and notice a beautiful cardinal dancing on a branch near my porch. He pays me no mind. He hops. He flips upside down. He looks left with a jerk. Then right. He has no idea what a mortgage is and wouldn’t know what to do with it if he had one. God speaks again…

Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?

Yes, of course. God cares for everything he’s created. But if I’m being honest, an even greater anxiety with this move to Honduras isn’t the loss of material things or even the security of future provision. For me, to pastor my first church, I’m leaving behind the right not to be criticized, judged, or rejected (if you think pastors don’t experience these things, ask around).

In the last few years I’ve been safe within these Smoky Mountains. Safe from judgment. Safe from deadlines and demands. But also safe from making any real difference in the lives of others. Jesus clears his throat (“ahem!”) and shares this pesky little truth…

If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.

I look out at the view again. It’s interesting. I wonder how safe the Smokies really are. I remember that storms still invade—in the summer, on an almost daily basis. The soft wind turns violent, damaging trees and other living things. The rain floods the earth also deluging much in its path. The thunder bellows doom. Lightning can start fires. The Smoky Mountains do indeed endure a great, recurring tribulation.

But then the winds die, the waters recede, and the world returns to its slumber. It moves on then to heal, to restore, to return to a place wholeness. Who am I to understand these cycles of upheaval and restoration? God whispers…

Whatever the Lord pleases, he does—in heaven and on earth, in the seas and all deeps. It’s he who makes the clouds rise at the end of the earth, who makes lightning for the rain and brings forth the wind from his storehouses.

So…what am I really leaving behind in this move to Honduras? Perhaps ultimately, it’s my illusion of ownership and control. I don’t imagine for one second that I own the mountains I see before me. Or the clouds. Or the morning light. These are owned by God. Why do I imagine I truly own this house? Or this furniture? Or this car?

Why do I think for one second that I, as one of God’s created works, own my very life? Isn’t it possible that all my fear and anxiety, my stress over the past, present, and future, are rooted in some childish illusion that I have control over anything?

And isn’t it also possible that I can live in true peace and joy if I leave behind my own plans and offer everything I am up to God’s plan? Won’t God guide me and feed me, won’t he sustain me through any storms of loss and rejection? Won’t God heal and restore me? An old pastor with some experience in these matters is bursting to chime in…

Not that I have already obtained it or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own because Christ Jesus has made me his own.

I’m not perfect. That’s a certainty! I’m one holy mess who God in his unfathomable wisdom has called to nurture and care for his people. But I can still press on into God’s plan, knowing I don’t have control over my life. Because as a created being, I’m no different than that contented cardinal, these resting hills, the playful clouds, this glorious morning light. They are his and I am his. The only thing I truly need to own or grasp in my life is this—that I am his.

So, I take a deep breath and mimic the hills in their Sabbath repose, resolved for all that awaits. My eyes return to the view before me and I form a response to God’s admonitions, echoing a prayer from a past theologian:

God, I thank you for this universe, our great home; for its vastness and its riches, and for the manifold life which teems upon it and of which we are part.

I praise you for the arching sky and the blessed winds, for the driving clouds and the constellations on high.

I praise you for the salt sea and the running water, for the everlasting hills, for the trees, and for the grass under our feet.

I thank you for our senses by which we can see the splendor of the morning, and hear the jubilant songs of love, and smell the breath of springtime.

I pray that you’d give us a heart wide open to all this joy and beauty and save our souls from being so steeped in care or so darkened by passion that we pass heedless and unseeing when even the thorn bush by the way is aflame with the glory of God. *

What he said.

Amen.

* Walter Rauschenbusch

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About John Michalak

An author, speaker, musician, and minister, John Michalak has spent more than 20 years equipping others in the areas of life-change and personal relationship. John’s inspirational new book, 365 Devotions To Embrace What Matters Most is now available from Zondervan publishing.

Need More Inspiration?

Click HERE to get more inspirational articles sent directly to you as well as updates from John on his writing and other items of interest.

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