The New

New understanding necessitates new language. Words I rarely used before are becoming favorites – integral parts of my daily vocabulary that take on deeper and broader meaning all the time. The phrases that used to make me cringe now make me grin a big-wide-super-dorky-grin. Song lyrics that used to make me roll my eyes are getting replayed again and again. Scriptures I used to pass over are taking root. Life words are replacing death words; darkness is yielding to light… and it’s coming out in a bajillion different ways.

I’ve decided on a few things: Gratefulness, celebration, peace, and shadowlessness. These things mark me and they are my message. Stepping more into them is a constant adventure. Gratefulness and celebration are the appropriate attitudes for a child of God. I have been given so much, my life is so sweet and so rich, and remembering and expressing this awesome reality is what keeps my heart in the right place for all God is speaking and working in me. Peace and shadowlessness are the Spirit’s outworking in the depths of me. They define everything differently, and fly in the face of old patterns, creating crazy amounts of freedom for me to operate in and out of.

New themes for being me, new words for speaking Truth. New understanding of forever reality – just waiting to be jumped into.

Shadowless and empowered

I am shadowless. I am empowered. These are my words for now, as I embark on a new year. They are not goals, and they have no limits. They are promises, from my God to me, that will stretch and expand as I continue my walk in Grace this year.

I recently got sucked back into Old Living – recognized some things in me that still have heat, still hurt, still haven’t been fully transformed… and it freaked me out. I started catching whiffs of the Old Lauren, of the helplessness, weakness, and neediness, and it rocked my core. Something about that brush with the Old catapulted me into a mode where I was trying to force breakthrough, grasp at clarity, and obliterate unpredictable emotion. I was paralyzed by the fear that if I couldn’t “figure it out”, I would sink back into darkness in my mind and heart.

But I was forgetting all the things I’ve been reading and talking through and learning – about being non-resistant and letting those “heated” issues pass through me. I was forgetting the power of being fully present in the Now, of being the most current version of myself – with all the revelation and new identity I’ve been given – in the midst of any trace of Old I might feel. I was overwhelmed by the taunting familiarity and forgot all about my new reality. A reality of Truth, of Strength, of Peace, of Power.

So I stubbed my toe, got held up on my journey, and had to reorient a bit. And this is what I’ve resurfaced with… shadowless and empowered. The nasty truth is that I still have the tendency to victimize myself, to subject myself to the possible power of old wounds and of symptoms of my dysfunction. And the beautiful redeemed side of that is that I always have a choice to step out of the shadows... and the Power to make it.

Right now I know this much: Some lies and broken places are still enjoying some room in me, for whatever reason. I don’t know why, at the moment, and that’s okay. This means I'll still feel the pull towards defensiveness, fear, and hiding away. But I will fight. Because I have a choice.

And in the face of all of this I will choose Truth, I will choose Life, and I will choose Peace. I won’t be robbed of what God has handed me by the brokenness and dysfunction of the world. I will claim Light and Power, knowing that I have been enabled to walk in fullness and health despite the remnants of the Old that threaten to surface. I will keep taking steps in the direction of fulfillment I’ve been promised, trusting in Grace to be always more than enough.

Choosing the present

Every deep breath I suck in expands my capacity for knowing goodness in the most intimate way. Raindrops taste like honey. The space I exist in is cozy-safe and yet holds infinite possibility. I release deep-rooted desires from their hiding spots, and they take on form as my words lift them to the ears of the One who's always listening. My limbs are teeming with life... it rushes through them like the most powerful, loudest-roaring river you've ever stood on the banks of. My gut has a pulse, it's a truth-throbbing in the very core of me. This is what it means to be me - to be alive, to be free, to be empowered, to exist on substantiated, extravagant hope.

The lesson I'm learning today: it is worth everything to shake off the dust of your past and the fantasies of your future in order to be present today, right here, right now. Cliché? The words may be... but the REALITY is far from it.

The reality is that the realm of possibility brewing in this day is far beyond what I can even comprehend.

The reality is that the vibrating tension of the moment shared between life-controlled, truth-obsessed, freedom-dwelling people is divine energy that doesn’t happen anywhere else.

The reality is that I am living out eternal life right now, with each breath I take, and that all glory and power associated with the promise of eternal life indwells in me currently.

The reality is that every experience from my past that has defined me and all the hopes I’ve used to build my future are superseded by the rich fullness of NOW. And so I release my grips on past and future and immerse myself instead in the freedom available this instant, as I lean into and agree wholly with the TRUTH that is being ever-revealed to me in vast grace and deep love.

An answer (part 2)

My answer is based on the GOODNESS of the truth found in Romans 8. I am no longer in the flesh, but am now in the Spirit... He is my new identity. Therefore all that reeks of sin and death is overcome and replaced with all that shines with life and peace. There is no striving or waiting for fullness - it is mine for the taking immediately. My role is only to agree with truth, to align myself with the Spirit, to acknowledge my true identity. That is goodness and power and beauty all for free because of what Christ did on the cross. What he did through his crucifixion and resurrection eliminates the need for me to bear through process, to struggle, to dwell in a place of tension and conflict. Jesus' work means I can step into all that the Spirit is today, right now, completely and fully.

That's reason for hope, for joy, for peace that doesn't make sense in present circumstances.

An answer (part 1)

There’s that verse in 1 Peter about always being prepared to give an answer for the hope that is in you. I’ve heard a lot of sermons and youth group talks and small group discussions on this, and they always left me wondering “does everyone else get asked about their hope a lot?” Because I didn’t. Until recently. These days I’m fielding a lot of questions about why I’m so positive, so content, so unfrazzled, so “happy”…

My answer is simple and yet so deep. The reason for my hope rests in my identity as a child of God. I am who he sees me as: whole, strong, pure, delightful, powerful, capable, and beautiful. I am not weak, needy, broken, damaged, tainted, useless, or draining. I do not have to wait or work for blessing, goodness, and fullness; I can claim it all right now. I have much to offer, and do not have gaps to be filled. I am not a sinful lump covered by a translucent cloak of grace; rather I have been gutted and reborn and I am now a divine expression of life and Spirit. The Spirit who indwells and defines me knows no boundaries. The Father who designed and seduced me never stops whispering promise to my heart. And the Jesus who bought and restored me did it so completely that he enabled me to exist in utter freedom every moment of every day.

More on my answer later, because it’s just too big and great for one post…

Breaking up with limits

Limits. Somewhere along the way we all “grow up” into the “understanding” and “acceptance” that limits are a part of life. They’re natural, they’re realistic, and our best chance at happiness is learning to operate within them. It’s terribly practical, insanely reasonable, and painfully “mature”.

I have no need for limits anymore.

Call it what you will, but I’m breaking up with limits. We’re through. Limits look like things I tell myself over and over, that I begin to believe about myself, that don't even remotely resemble who God says I am. Limits look like fears that keep me “reigned in”, so I don’t embarrass myself by being too “naively ambitious”. Limits make me friends and earn me their esteem and acceptance as they drain me of the LIMITLESS ESSENCE OF THE SPIRIT.

So I'm going another way. I’m owning dreaming instead. I’m drifting into imagination. I'm claiming desire. I’m listening to the faintest whispers of my heart, those that have been “hushed” and swatted aside for many years. I’m calling to them now; “Come out of hiding! Find your voice again! Remind me how awesome possibility is!”

I’m embracing the childlike big-dreamer who doesn't worry about the balance in the bank account or the “necessity” of skills and a career path. I’m shrugging off the frantic grasping at “stability”. I’m choosing life in the Spirit… led by the promises of the God who fashioned me to be uniquely creative and hopeful and enthusiastic about the opportunity that life in Him offers.