Alan Fadling's Blog, page 10

UL #314: Embracing Your Journey to Belonging with Cameron Lee Small

 

Adoption is often framed by happy narratives, but the reality is that many adoptees struggle with unaddressed trauma and issues of identity and belonging. Adoptees often spend the majority of their youth without the language to explore the grief related to adoption or the permission to legitimize their conflicting emotions.

 

Today, Gem is speaking with counselor and author Cameron Lee Small about his new book, The Adoptee’s Journey. 

 

You might be wondering what adoption has to do with spiritual leadership. Well, here at UL, we care very much about people and their stories. And this story is very personal to me in that I am an adoptee.

 

Gem is also sharing her own journey as an adoptee and giving you real time insight into my current personal process. She shares things that she's never spoken in a public setting. 

 

Learn more about adoption and Cameron's story:

Adoptee Consciousness Model
Harlow's Monkey // JaeRan Kim
Grace Newton // Trauma and Healing of Consciousness
Adoptive Parenting Consultation Group hosted by Cam
Schedule Cam to speak and train at your next event
Cam's main website

Connect with Cameron on Social media:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/camleesmall/
Instagram: @therapyredeemed
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/therapyredeemed

From Pain to Compassion: How I Found Empathy in Suffering

Blog by Gem Fadling

Here is an uncomfortable truth: You can’t grow in wisdom and maturity unless you traverse difficult circumstances.

 

I’ve wrestled with this on and off over the course of my life. I have asked “why” more times than I can count. Why must I suffer? Why do I experience trials? Why can’t I grow simply by cognitively understanding the situation?

 

I’m not claiming to have the answers to these questions, but I can share some of my musings on them.

 

One notable trait has emerged as a result of my difficulties: compassion.

 

The tectonic plates of pain shifted dramatically for me when I suffered a disc extrusion in my lower back many years ago. Nerve pain is beyond any pain I ever imagined. I had no idea such agony existed. Up to that point, the worst physical pain I ever experienced had been recovering from cesarean sections. But nerve pain is another animal altogether.

 

My eyes opened to the amount of pain that could be experienced by people. If this is happening to me, I thought, then that means it’s happening to other people around the world. Compassion surged from this realization, and it moved to the center of how I understand and hold space for others. My heart expanded.

 

How else could such compassion—and its companion, empathy—awaken in me if I had not experienced pain myself? A cognitive understanding of suffering doesn’t automatically lead to empathy.

 

I suppose experiencing that kind of pain can lead a person to bitterness rather than empathy. But guided by the Holy Spirit, I expanded within and bitterness did not emerge. I was able to see at a deeper level that people are suffering in so many ways—not just physically, but emotionally and relationally.

 

Suffering is a dynamic for most of us. Life invariably offers up challenging and even devastating seasons. We can fight against this, or we can learn to receive pain and suffering over the span of our lives as an important part of maturing. We can grow in empathy and compassion for others even as we endure our own hardships.

 

And yet, even as I type this, a familiar voice rises within me asking, Why?

 

I could get stuck on this question forever. I don’t know why. I just know this is how the world is set up. In 2 Corinthians 1:3-7, the apostle Paul shows his acceptance of this process. He speaks about troubles matter-of-factly and says that comfort from all directions can arise from within these sufferings.

 

“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God. For just as we share abundantly in the sufferings of Christ, so also our comfort abounds through Christ. If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer. And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort.”

 

Receiving God’s comfort and sharing that comfort freely with those around us is an important part of our connection with one another.

 

Do not shy away from your own pruning or trials. Don’t be afraid to face them and move through them. Yes, this is messy and not fun in any way. And yet we can learn to receive God’s comfort in the midst of pain. This makes us more empathetic and compassionate toward others. It opens up a new place inside of us where we can hold the suffering of others and care more about them.

 

For Reflection: 

How have your painful circumstances moved you to greater compassion?
If you are in the middle of a trial right now, how might you meet the God of all comfort?
Wherever you find yourself, bring yourself to God. God sees you as you are and receives you as such.

UL #313: Unlearning to Know: A Journey from Head Knowledge to Heart Connection

 

Thirty years ago, I was visiting one of my very favorite sorts of places—a bookstore. It was a Barnes & Noble in Pasadena, California, and I was browsing through the Faith section of books. There I saw a book by an author I’d heard of but never read. The author was Thomas Merton, and the title was New Seeds of Contemplation. 

 

It was Fall 1994 when I picked up a copy of Thomas Merton’s book New Seeds of Contemplation. I was a college pastor in the San Gabriel Valley in Southern California, and I’d been on a spiritual formation journey for a few years by then. 

 

Today, I’m sharing from my journal entries in that season as I read the book. The first chapter posed a question I was asking at the time: “What is contemplation?” There weren’t many of my colleagues who were using that sort of language about their spiritual lives, but I was finding it increasingly inviting in my own life with God. 

 

One of Merton’s insights that spoke me then was that, “In contemplation...we know by `unknowing." 

Choosing Rest Over Rush: The Courage to Work with God’s Rhythm

Blog by Alan Fadling

I’ve said it many times, and I believe this to be true:

 

Good rest is hard work.

 

When we’re exhausted, true rest seems beyond us. And when we’re worn out, we don’t have a lot of discernment about what work matters most and what is urgent but unimportant.

 

What I’ve found in my own experience is that when I’m deeply weary, I often make bad choices about my work. I’m not very discerning about what I say yes to and what I say no to. When I’m exhausted, I can embrace an easy, distracting task so I don’t have to think about my deep weariness anymore. I add more meaningless work to my overwork as a way of numbing my awareness of just how tired I am.

 

Does it help? It really doesn’t. Being numb to my exhaustion does not refresh me. It just postpones the inevitable crash.

 

The years since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic have been some of the most challenging in my forty years of ministry work. I wonder what your work experience has been like over these last few years. I’ve said elsewhere that Gem and I have had to double down on our intention to live and work at the pace of grace rather than letting ourselves succumb to the temptation to hurry and overwork. Financial pressures and radical changes in our work have tempted us to overdo.

 

There’s a sense in which my overwork says that my hurry can get more done than God’s unhurried way can. It’s like imagining that I can make an oak tree grow in weeks and months instead of the years and decades it takes to mature.

 

I still believe what I wrote about in An Unhurried Life when I said, “Overwork can end up like progress made on a treadmill. Furthermore, there can be an ironic laziness about such work. The sheer quantity may be impressive, but quantity does not require as much effort from us as work that results in creativity, vitality or joy. In that sense, overwork can be lazy work” (p. 47).

 

I want to do the hard work of discerning how to do my job in closer collaboration with the Spirit who guides and empowers me. Unfortunately, mindless busyness is usually easier than mindful, strategic work. It takes time to discern well how to do my job in a way Jesus might do it. It requires creativity and humility.

 

Something I have found helpful here is to ask myself:

 

How will this help others and bring grace into their lives?

 

Productive work helps people. What I do matters because somehow or other it blesses people.

 

Another good question that Gem and I have both been asking ourselves recently is this:

 

What kind of space for communion with God do we need to do all the work God’s entrusted to us well?

 

We’ve found we needed more uncluttered space and unhurried time than before. When my body and soul find the rest they need in God’s presence, I am far more creative, wise, visionary, and energized in my work. My best work really does grow out of a soul at rest in God.

 

When I talk about hurry with busy leaders, a common objection I hear is, “If I don’t keep up with the busyness that surrounds me, I’ll fall behind and miss out.”

 

Paul says something in his first letter to the Corinthians that has often been a source of encouragement and guidance for me in how to work hard without hurry. Look at how the grace of God impacted the quality of Paul’s work:

 

“By the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me.” (1 Cor. 15:10)

 

Grace gives Paul his sense of purpose and meaning. Grace gives Paul his identity. But grace also has a profound effect on his work. He claims that he worked harder than any of the others who were called apostles. He says that it wasn’t so much him working harder, but grace at work in and through him to motivate, energize, and bless the work he did for God’s kingdom.

 

When I believe more deeply that I’m not so much achieving my work as I am being entrusted with it, I have more confidence and courage in my work. I receive what I need to work hard and work well in the experienced presence of God. And when I struggle, I offer up little prayers of request about feeling stuck or discouraged or confused.

 

Hard kingdom work is energized by the generous and empowering presence of God.

 

I’ve appreciated the wisdom of Henri Nouwen over the years, and he says this about the work we do:

 

“Our task is to help people concentrate on the real but often hidden event of God’s active presence in their lives. Hence, the question that must guide [us] . . . is not how to keep people busy, but how to keep them from being so busy that they can no longer hear the voice of God who speaks in silence.” (quoted in An Unhurried Life, p. 49)

 

My prayer is that you’ll discover a pace in your life and work that is more gracious, more rich in the unhurried and loving presence of our Father in heaven with you.

 

For Reflection:

How do you currently distinguish between work that is urgent and work that is truly important in your life?
What would it look like to trust in God’s unhurried way rather than your own efforts to get things done?
What practical steps can you take to create more uncluttered space and unhurried time in your daily life to hear God’s voice more clearly?

UL #312: Why Your Worth Isn't Tied to Productivity

 

“Your identity is a gift to be received, not a paycheck to be earned.” I love this profound insight that echoes throughout Alan’s writings. They resonate with a truth we often overlook. They capture the essence of grace—a grace that defines our existence not by what we achieve, but by who we are as God’s beloved.

 

Our lives are gifts and yet how often do we find ourselves caught in the trap of earning mode? We measure our worth by what we do, by how much we accomplish, and by the approval we receive from others. This striving can become exhausting, leaving us empty and disconnected from the truth that our identity is not something to be earned but something to be received and embraced.

 

Gem offers a 3 ideas to help you embrace your belovedness as you learn that your productivity is NOT tied to your worth.

The Power of Raw and Authentic Prayer

Blog by Gem Fadling

Long gone are the days when I have the energy to put on any pretense when I talk with God. This has been a welcome and freeing change in my prayer life.

 

At this point in my journey, it is much more life-giving to simply declare the way things are, rather than trying to tidy up my mess and present it in a nice, neat package.

 

If I’m mad, sad, joyous, or frustrated, God already knows, and so I am free to express what is…and meet God right in the middle of it.

 

Over the decades I have steadily made my way to more open and honest prayer. I know and rely on God’s love as it’s declared in Isaiah 30:18—“Yet the Lord longs to be gracious to you; therefore he will rise up to show you compassion.”

 

Once when I was early in my midlife undoing, I entered a season of regret that culminated in anger. Expectations and assumptions about how life works were unraveling around me, and all I could do was fume. I would lock myself in my bedroom and pace the floor, uttering my prayers through gritted teeth.

 

It was during this time that my understanding of God’s immense love expanded. I trusted with my entire being that no matter what I was feeling or thinking, God was holding me as I flailed. I knew God was big enough and strong enough to be patient with me as I made my way through that experience.

 

The gracious image God granted me—yes, right in the middle of my fuming—was that he was holding me in the palm of his giant, loving, capable hand. Even though my most accessible feelings were frustration and anger, way deep down inside was an assurance that I was not alone and that God was, in fact, walking with me through it.

 

Some people may think this is wrong. Their arguments may sound something like this: How can you show your anger to God? Where’s your respect? Having doubts is not okay, and expressing them is even worse! He is the King of the Universe, you know!

 

And yet all I have to do is open the Psalms to see that this is misguided thinking. The psalmists were unafraid to share all their emotions with God in prayer.

 

The writer of Psalm 13 cries out, “How long, Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and day after day have sorrow in my heart? How long will my enemy triumph over me?” (vv. 1-2).

 

In Psalm 44 the psalmist demands, “Awake, Lord! Why do you sleep? Rouse yourself! Do not reject us forever. Why do you hide your face and forget our misery and oppression? We are brought down to the dust; our bodies cling to the ground” (Psalm 44:23-25).

 

Of course, I’m not saying we should wallow in anger or doubt. With time and support, we can move through it. But while it is occurring, it doesn’t do any good to deny our situation.

 

It is best not to be angry for anger’s sake or to allow bitterness to grow. But acknowledging and feeling our emotions helps us move through them. And doing this with God is a part of life.

 

Many of the Psalms allow for the full expression of emotions, and if we follow them all the way through, we ultimately see trust in God emerge. The psalmists don’t leave themselves in the anger or sadness, but they acknowledge and move through it.

 

Only a few verses later in Psalm 13 we read, “But I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in your salvation. I will sing the Lord’s praise, for he has been good to me” (vv. 5-6).

 

And the very next verse of Psalm 44 says, “Rise up and help us; rescue us because of your unfailing love” (v. 26). Underneath these honest proclamations of frustration, the psalmists still trust in and declare God’s love.

 

We can follow their example by allowing ourselves to acknowledge what God already sees. This enables our freedom.

 

The trick is not to rush through this. The psalmists may shift from lament to trust within a matter of a few verses, but in our day to day lives that movement may take days, weeks, months, or even longer. Grief has no timetable. Healing from years of hurt takes time.

 

Don’t see this as permission to wallow unnecessarily. Rather, see it as permission to acknowledge, feel, and move through your emotions and experiences so that they won’t express themselves in ways that are truly unhelpful to you or those around you. It is good when we allow enough time to pass for this to take root.

 

As Trevor Hudson was about to reenter the pastorate, Gordon Cosby spoke these words to him: “Whenever you teach, whenever you preach, whenever you pastor, don’t ever forget: Every person in your church sits next to their own pool of tears.” It was a timely reminder to Trevor that when he looks out on his congregation, he can acknowledge that everyone is in their own place of suffering.

 

Pray from where you are, not from where you think you should be. Pray from inside your feelings. Pray honestly. There’s no reason to hide or sugarcoat anything. Reality is your best friend. Meet God there. His love will hold you, and he will walk with you as you make your way toward healing.

 

“Pray as you can, not as you can’t.” (Abbot John Chapman)

 

 For Reflection: 

What does your own “pool of tears” feel like these days?
Is there anger hidden in your heart somewhere? Have you locked it up, hoping it will dissipate on its own?
Wherever you find your heart today, meet God there. Say what you want to say and leave it at the feet of Jesus.
The loving Trinity can hold you and longs to show you compassion as you make your way.

UL #311: The Scandal of the Kingdom (Alan)

 

The parables are perhaps the most potent expression of the message of Jesus. Parables were one of his key teaching strategies. But even his inner circle struggled to understand what he was saying. 

 

Today, I’ll be sharing a review of a new book from Dallas Willard on the parables titled The Scandal of the Kingdom.  

 

Through insightful analysis and practical wisdom, Willard empowers readers to transform their lives and communities by embodying the radical love, compassion, and justice exemplified in Jesus's parables. This book is a beacon of hope for Christians seeking to deepen their faith and live more authentically in accordance with the teachings of Christ. Willard empowers us to:

Become more passionate about living the gospel in the full scope of Jesus's vision for us
Better share the faith of Jesus with those disillusioned with Christianity
Unlock the excitement of living in the upside-down kingdom of God
Share the gospel of Jesus in the way he did

 

Content of additional interest:

The Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard
The Spirit of the Disciplines by Dallas Willard

 

God’s Good Work: Finding Purpose Beyond Frantic Activity

Blog by Alan Fadling

I often suspect that when busy Christian leaders hear me talk about living and working unhurried, they assume I don’t get much done. But I’ve come to believe that by working unhurried I get more important things done. Busy doesn’t always mean productive.

 

In An Unhurried Life, I wrote a chapter titled “Productivity: Unhurried Isn’t Lazy.” In it, I speak to our tendency to assume that productivity is always about doing more and more. But what if true productivity is, at least in part, about doing qualitatively better work, even if it seems we are less busy than before? There is a cultural bias for always staying busy. Many of us wear it as a badge of honor.

 

In that chapter, I quoted a passage from Thomas Merton that has lived in my imagination for a long while now. He says,

 

“[Some] are attached to activities and enterprises that seem to be important. Blinded by their desire for ceaseless motion, for a constant sense of achievement, famished with a crude hunger for results, for visible and tangible success, they work themselves into a state in which they cannot believe that they are pleasing God unless they are busy with a dozen jobs at the same time.” (pp. 206-7)

 

Merton wrote these words more than sixty years ago. Don’t they describe our lives today? We seem terrified of stopping, even for a moment, to ask ourselves: 

Is what I am frantically busy doing right now actually all that important to me?
In another month or another year, will I be grateful for everything I’m currently doing?

 

Those are questions that will grow your discernment at work.

 

The scriptures remind us that “we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do” (Ephesians 2:10). I wonder if when we hear that, we assume it’s only talking about good deeds or about volunteer work we might do at church. Do we connect Paul’s words about “good works” with “good work” we might do in our jobs? We could.

 

I believe God cares about the work we do in our jobs even more than we do.

 

I believe that God is at work in advance of any particular workday, making ready good opportunities for us to engage in our daily work.

 

I believe we can learn how to become more discerning so that we learn how to do our jobs, whatever they may be, in a way that is more in keeping with God’s preparations and intentions.

 

I really believe that we are meant to do good things in our jobs that will ring into eternity.

 

But frantic busyness rarely if ever bears this kind of fruit. Hurry is shortsighted. It produces work done without a vital, long-term vision.

 

Back to Merton. It floors me how he says that people “work themselves into a state in which they cannot believe that they are pleasing God unless they are busy with a dozen jobs at the same time.”

 

We imagine that the only way to please God is to be frantically busy with more and more simultaneous projects. This is the way in which our bias for overwork and overbusyness actually ends up being far less productive in a way that really matters. And this exposes how hurry is too often less productive than a more unhurried pace.

 

Merton continues in that same passage, saying,

 

“Sometimes they fill the air with lamentations and complain that they no longer have any time for prayer, but they have become such experts in deceiving themselves that they do not realize how insincere their lamentations are. They not only allow themselves to be involved in more and more work, they actually go looking for new jobs.”

 

We often have mixed feelings about our busyness. Sometimes we complain about how busy we are. But sometimes we brag about it. And neither complaint nor boasting is a great mode for good work.

 

There is an irony when it comes to our bias for busy: Overbusyness can be a greater sign of soul laziness than inactivity is.

 

There is another passage from Merton that I’ve shared with countless leaders in my coaching and training work. In it, he offers an antidote for our frantic busyness rooted in a bias for overwork:

 

“There are times, then, when in order to keep ourselves in existence at all we simply have to sit back for a while and do nothing. And for a man who has let himself be drawn completely out of himself by his activity, nothing is more difficult than to sit still and rest, doing nothing at all. The very act of resting is the hardest and most courageous act he can perform: and often it is quite beyond his power.” (An Unhurried Life, p. 123)

 

Too often we let our busyness completely distract and overwhelm us until we hardly remember that God is with us, that he invites us to himself, and that he has given us good opportunities he wants us to engage in a collaborative relationship with him.

 

Merton recommends that we instead do the courageous thing: Stop, sit back for a bit, and do nothing. Can you think of anything harder for someone who attaches to busyness as their primary identity? But can you think of any wiser counsel for the hurry-addicted?

 

There is an incongruity I’ve noticed in myself. When I’m soul weary, I find it’s easy to engross myself in relatively meaningless busyness, but it’s much harder to say yes to good work and then good rest.

 

In a couple of weeks, I’ll share more about how slowing down to rest can position us to do much better work.

 

For Reflection: 

What is one area in your life where you are constantly busy, and how might slowing down help you achieve results for which you’d be more grateful?
How do you currently define "productivity," and how might this definition change if you embraced a more unhurried approach?
When was the last time you allowed yourself to stop, sit back, and do nothing, and what did you learn from that experience?

 

UL #310: The Surprising Power of Curiosity (Gem)

 

Here’s a sobering idea: It is impossible to know and understand 100% of a situation. Now, I know that may sound a bit jarring for some of us. Personally, I like to believe I always have a handle on exactly what’s going on. I’m a master mind-reader, and an excellent future-predictor—or at least I’d like to think so! Of course, I’m speaking tongue-in-cheek here.

 

In truth, I don’t know the future and no one has complete knowledge of any situation. Once I settle into that reality, something beautiful begins to happen: curiosity emerges. And curiosity leads me to ask better questions, which broadens my perspective and deepens my understanding.

 

The small phrase "I Wonder..." is the core of what we're talking about today.

Finding Strength and Refuge in God

Blog by Gem Fadling

Over the course of my life I have relied on various scriptures to carry me through different seasons. However, there are a few passages that have been paradigms for my life and heart. The first of these is, of course, John 15. But another verse that I have held closely is Psalm 27:4.

 

Today, I simply want to offer a few selected verses from Psalm 27, followed by some reflection questions.

 

I do hope you’ll set aside just 10 minutes to sink into this important psalm.

Psalm 27

The Lord is my light and my salvation—
    whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the stronghold of my life—
    of whom shall I be afraid? (v. 1)

 

One thing I ask from the Lord,
    this only do I seek:
that I may dwell in the house of the Lord
    all the days of my life,
to gaze on the beauty of the Lord
    and to seek him in his temple.
For in the day of trouble
    he will keep me safe in his dwelling;
he will hide me in the shelter of his sacred tent
    and set me high upon a rock. (vv. 4-5)

 

I remain confident of this:
    I will see the goodness of the Lord
    in the land of the living.
Wait for the Lord;
    be strong and take heart
    and wait for the Lord. (vv. 13-14)

 

First, read the psalm slowly, underlining anything that strikes you.

 

Then take time to journal or pray the following questions.

 

Where are you feeling PRESSED TO YOUR EDGES right now?

Certainly there are relationships or situations in your life that make you feel spread thin. Or maybe you are in a circumstance that provokes fear. Meet God in this place.

 

What is the ONE THING you ask of God?

The psalmist asks to dwell with God and gaze upon him. What would you ask God as your most central petition in this season?

 

How might God be FORMING you in this?

This one can be difficult to answer in the midst of a situation, but if you have enough space, it can be good to wonder about this. You can always simply ask God.

 

How is God INVITING you to respond?

Pause now and listen for some invitations. What is God hoping for you? How do you want to respond to God right now?

 

Feel free to print this and use it in your next prayer time or unhurried time with God. May you be refreshed, encouraged, and held by Psalm 27.