Come Alive

Easter is an awesome time of year where we celebrate what Jesus did. It's huge, it's powerful, it's life-changing, and sometimes, it's difficult to put into words what the Cross means.

But, lo and behold, I was asked to craft together an item for this year's Easter service at church. The theme for the morning was 'Come Alive'. It's quite daunting putting together something creative that can be open to interpretation by people and their personal ideologies, history, and paradigms. But after spending much time mulling over what it means to come alive, and to have a Savior bring you alive, the words below formed.

Props to our creative and dance teams who pulled off a diverse and thought-provoking item, with a little bit of Mumford & Sons thrown in for good measure. And double props to Andrew our tech extraordinaire who put together the video.

It's a beautiful thing when everyone works together to pull something great off.

/ / /

There are universal themes that weave their way through our lives. They are the threads that pull us all together, the common stitches that anchor the fabric of our existence into a garment of love and joy, pain and disappointment.

We all wear this garment and whether it’s comfortable and familiar or an ill-fitting cloak that wears at our senses, our humanity and our collective threads, are common and relatable.

But it’s when these threads become loose and unravel, where the safety and security of what we’ve always known - our beliefs, the foundation of what we’ve built upon, the safety of our created reality - when these fall out beneath us, questions and desperate pleas become the rhythm of our song.

It's in this place, where the chapters of chaos and pain read the same, that a story of hope rises out of the ashes of disappointment. It's in this place, where a Savior, who is not common, who is not one-size-fits-all, comes and mends our broken and loose threads into a garment far more stunning and majestic than we could ever purchase with our own efforts and striving. It's in this place, where we cry out, that we come to realize that our pain and disappointment do serve a purpose... to draw us into a dance with the only One who can bring us to our feet again.

It’s in this place, where we learn to believe and come alive.

/ / /

A few things I know...

I know. I said last year that I would write more regularly. I know, I know. So much for new years resolutions. I managed to keep the majority of them. Well, probably about half of them. But hey, that's a vast improvement on setting none, keeping none, right? Lame, I know.

But in all seriousness... let's get down to business.

Lately, I just can't shake this voice in my head. I've tried ignoring it, I've tried placating it, I've tried keeping busy to drown it out. But I just can't shake that repetitive mantra in my mind... I should be writing, I should be writing, I should be writing. It was like a quiet shout. No-one else could hear the yell from inside my spirit... you're a writer who has stopped writing. But I sure as hell could hear it. And it got too much for me to ignore anymore, like I was failing to recognise a limb, or forgetting to exhale a tightly held breath.

So. I pick up the pen again, my weapon and my burden, to wield the words that will cause dry bones to rise, that will bring a relieving salve to wounds long nursed but not healed, that will deliver a cathartic release to the silent prisons many face in their own minds. Wow. Lofty words. But ones I pray, in time, will come to pass.

There are a few things I know:
• I know that regardless of how good they are, intentions don't mean anything unless you put them into action. Every morning I intend on getting up early, but when that alarm rolls on around early in the morning, those intentions mean about as much as my promises as a kid to pay my parents back for that loan to buy the latest Super Nintendo game.
• I know that in life, you will stumble, trip, fall down, and bite the dust. It sucks. But it sure makes you stronger. You find all these new muscles that you haven't used to their full potential until you have to get back onto your feet.
• I know that if you don't get back up again, you'll stay down. Profound. It's okay to feel winded, it's okay to feel things. Just don't stay on the ground. You can't move forward when you're stationary.
• I know that sometimes, your carefully laid plans won't come to pass. 'A man's mind plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps and makes them sure' (Prov 16.9). Often our ideal pathway is God's easy-way-out.
• I know that there comes a point when you have to fight for your own freedom. People can encourage you and cheer you on and pray for you and say nice things, but, damn it, there comes a time when you just have to roll up your sleeves, pick up the sword, and go to battle for yourself.
• I know that you have to want freedom, otherwise you'll stay bound up. If you don't really want something, then you're not gonna fight with everything you have to keep it.
• I know that we don't have to do life alone, but you can certainly choose to remain solitary if you want. It's not the best choice. And we weren't designed that way. Sometimes you have to actively seek out company and friendship, not because you want to, but because it's good for the soul. Community is God's idea, it's who he is, and you're made in his image.

Just a few things I know. Maybe you already knew them. That's cool. Maybe this blog was boring. That's not cool. Either way, I'm writing again. And that's very cool.

Be Bothered

2014. It's a new year, a fresh start, a second chance to get things right throughout the next 365 days. It's an opportunity to set goals to achieve and to re-evaluate where you're going, what you're doing and where you'd like to be heading.

Today, I sat down to take advantage of this new year to set some goals, and one phrase that I could not keep from running through my head, and one that I believe is a Holy Spirit prompt:

Be bothered.

How many times in a day do you say to yourself, I can't be bothered? Maybe you don't ever say it and you're just one of those super motivated people who never stops and who never puts things off to the next day and who are just overly organised to the point that you and I can't relate and therefore will never be friends... Ahem. Sorry, I got a little carried away.

Leading a busy and full life allows me the excuse of putting things off because I just can't be bothered. Either I don't have the time or the energy to do whatever task is at hand. But I realised something today, and it's that I spend a lot of energy thinking about how I don't have the energy to vacuum or get some groceries, which can often be more exhausting than just doing whatever needs to be done in the first place. I spend time debating with myself how I don't have time to empty the dishwasher or put on a load of washing or to sort my paperwork, all the while taking up time that I could've used to get myself organised.

So today, when I was writing out my goals, I decided that I would heed God's advice and just BE BOTHERED. When I find myself saying, I can't be bothered... I imagine myself using strikeout font with the word can't and just doing it.

I feel more productive already. It's a good feeling, getting organised for the year, because in order to do what I want to do and see God move, I need to nail the smaller things in life. I like to think of it like this: an efficient engine that is well maintained will go further for longer. I don't want to burn out and drown in 'stuff' because I couldn't be bothered. I don't want to miss out on meeting people because I couldn't be bothered to get my booty over there and introduce myself. I don't want to let an opportunity pass me by because I wasn't bothered enough to grab it with both hands.

So that's it. That's my number one goal this year. Be bothered. I can't wait to see the fruit of my motivation unveiled throughout the coming months.

#bringiton2014

- N

Twister

It’s funny sometimes the twists and turns that life takes. When I say funny, I don’t mean the hilarious, side-splitting type of humour that people enjoy, although there are often occasions where that type of funny exists. It’s more the, ‘when I was 16 I did not ever in my wildest dreams imagine my life looking like this’ type of funny. I wish I could say that my twenties were the best, most enjoyable years I have ever lived, where I lived like a queen and achieved my dreams and desires and saw great feats accomplished. Rather, this decade of my life has been the most difficult and arduous journey of my life to date.

There has been disappointment, my goodness has there been disappointment. There has been heartache and heartbreak and many months and years of the weary battle for freedom. I’ve seen dreams come and go. I’ve seen relationships fade into the distance and I’ve become familiar with the bitter sting of loneliness.

But you know what? I wouldn’t change a thing. Not for a million billion trillion gazillion dollars could you ever make me say that I would’ve been better off never having experienced these years, because the lessons that I have learned, the battles that I have won, the experiences that I have gained and the notches on my belt I have scored are so valuable and they have set me up to win for the rest of my life.

It has been during this time that God, in His loving mercy and grace, has put my broken life back together and birthed dreams and vision and purpose for my life, something that I am eternally grateful for. It was during those tough years that God worked a number on me, where He dug a deep well and laid a strong foundation to build my life on, where He did some pruning of my beliefs and where He showed me the truth in His word.

If I had never felt that sinking battering ram of disappointment, I would never have come to learn that God has plans to prosper me and not to harm me, that it’s HIS hope that anchors me in the storms, not the financial security of a job, that His ways are higher than my ways and when I can’t figure out my next step, it’s His WORD that is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. I would never have learned what it is to trust Him completely, in the times when I felt on top of a mountain or when I felt so low I could taste the dirt in my mouth. I would never have experienced that knee-wobbling faith when you step out into the world without the safety net of yourself and being in control

 So when I look back at the twists and turns that my life has taken, I’m choosing to see it through the eyes of heaven, that the highs and the lows have been the training ground for something much greater, that these years haven’t been in vain but rather they’ve been in preparation of something divine. That’s why I’m so thankful for every step of this journey, because I know God is at work and He’s not finished with me yet.

 “God rewrote the text of my life when I opened the book of my Heart to His eyes” Ps 18:24 MSG

The OC's Saving Grace

Well, it's been six months since I went AWOL from this blog. A small thing such as a post-grad degree got in the way. However, the semester has finished, results have been logged and graduation is on it's way in September, so this writer is one happy girl who is now free to blog.

Even though I didn't actually write any blogs for a few months, I did come up with a few ideas for some inspired pieces:
- baking a cake is like mixing together the right ingredients for a successful life (choke! terrible analogy Naomi)
- driving in traffic is much like life, coz you've got to read the map, follow the law... oh please, shut up Naomi. Talk about corny...
- writing a script is like God's plan for your life (some potential in this one...)
And finally...
- The OC and the salvation message

What the? How could Satan's teenage television drama have anything to do with salvation? Have you completely lost the plot Naomi?

Not lost the plot. Rather, found a parallel in the plot. The OC's plot. Touche.

Whether you hated it or loved it, or you don't even know what I'm talking about, the TV series created a stir when it was on the silver screen. If you're not familiar with the, dare I say, awesome, show, allow me to fill you in:

Ryan, a troubled teen from a bad neighbourhood, gets busted stealing a car with his brother. Luckily for Ryan, he gets probation. Even luckier is that Ryan's lawyer, Sandy, is a compassionate kindred spirit who pities him and takes Ryan home to Newport, where his wife, Kirsten, and misfit son, Seth, adopt him and rescue him from a life of crime, violence and hopelessness. Ryan meets and falls in love with his neighbour, Marissa, whose life is full of more drama than an acting school. The show follows the lives of Ryan, Seth, Marissa and her best friend and Seth's love interest, Summer, as they navigate the tricky world of teenage life in upper class Orange County.

Okay, so I probably didn't sell the show. And maybe I shouldn't have tried. But whatevs. I liked the show when it was on and have since purchased the four seasons on DVD and occasionally crack them out for a mind-numbing marathon session. Don't judge me. But that's exactly what I did recently. I got the DVDs out and had a bit of a flashback moment to relive the glory days of my early 20s. As I was halfway through the first season, I noticed something that I hadn't picked up on before. I couldn't help but notice the underlying themes of grace and redemption that are woven throughout the storyline.

Ryan was a kid who was going nowhere fast. No purpose in life, no hope that his situation would change, stuck in a desperate life that proved futile. His family was dysfunctional; his mum was a drunk, his dad was in prison and his brother was heading the same way. In Christianese, Ryan was 'lost'. Enter the Cohen family in their compassionate mercy and we see Ryan offered a chance at a hopeful new life, which he takes, and begins to overcome his past and starts living for his future.

I know life isn't always like a movie or TV show, but for what it's worth, I can absolutely relate to Ryan's story. Sure, his struggles were polished for prime time viewing, but if you look at the themes of the story, what we've got here is a textbook case of mercy and salvation. You see, like Ryan, I was also lost. I was living a life that was going nowhere. I was a hopeless kid who had given up on myself and didn't have the strength to pull myself together. But God (two of the greatest words in the Bible), in his gracious mercy, came and found me. He offered me a new life. He didn't care about what I'd done. He loved me back to life. You might like to say, He pulled an OC on me.

That's why I like The OC. Not because of Marissa's drama or the clothes or the music (I do like the soundtrack, actually...). It's because of the power of mercy. The Cohen family saw a kid who needed a second-chance, and they offered it to him. They rescued a kid who needed rescuing. They took on all the legal implications of being his guardians, provided for him, loved and accepted him and set him on a new path.

That to me is a great illustration of my merciful God, the One who redeems, whose grace is more than enough, the One who is mighty to save, the One who has the power to change circumstances and who has a purpose for my life, who loves like noone I've ever met before. That's the God I believe in.

So the next time you watch The OC, think of this little blog. It'll change your whole perspective of the show.

Califorrrrrniaaaaaa, Califorrrrrniaaaaaaaaa, here weeeeee coooooooooommmmmmmmeeeeeeeeeeee...

Fearless

Daily voucher websites are a wonderful thing. For only $20, I can buy a teeth whitening kit, complete with gel and UV light, delivered to my door for only a few dollars. I seriously considered buying it in a moment of credit card weakness.

There's plenty of useless items up for grabs on the daily deals, and I was fortunate enough to have nabbed myself a bargain a few months ago. I purchased a half price voucher to take a trapeze class.

I'm not really one of those daredevil, adrenalin rush junkies who enjoy heights and falling at great speeds and near death experiences. I much prefer enjoying gravity normally, and sipping soy flat whites. So when this email came through, I dismissed it, saying 'I could never do that'.

But as I did that, a little voice inside whispered 'What's stopping you? Fear?'

Let's delve into that internal monologue a little deeper.

"So Naomi, what's stopping you? Fear?"

"Well, yeah, actually. I'm deathly afraid of heights and I hate the feeling of falling. I don't think I could," I replied defensively.

"So are you always going to let your fears hold you back?"

"No." A quick retort. Not a good look.

"Well they've held you back so far."

Darn this enlightened reasoning. I could feel my heart racing at the probing questions. It was like ripping a band aid off and exposing the wound.

"It's not that I'm afraid, it's just that I prefer to stay on the ground."

"Well, it you're not afraid, buy the voucher."

"Fine, I will!" Reverse psychology. It was a lose-lose situation. Or a win-win if you looked on the bright side.

So I bought the voucher. And I did the trapeze class. And even though I was freaking out climbing the ladder and leaning over the edge to grab a hold of the bar, I did it. (insert applause)

Here's my spiritual lesson to take away: fear hinders us. It doesn't keep us safe, it stops us from enjoying life. Even though I was afraid of heights, I forced myself to climb that eight metres and jump off the edge. By the third time, it wasn't scary. It was actually quite fun.

I could've ignored that email or backed out of the class. But I would've missed an opportunity to thumb my nose at fear and prove to myself that I can do things I never thought I could do.

So now I'm taking stock of my life and identifying where fear is holding me back. What am I missing out on because I'm too afraid to try? Is it meeting new people? Developing relationships? Learning a new skill? Setting bigger goals? Speaking in public? Going on a boat? (pretty sure that's a long way off....) There's a reason God doesn't like fear - it holds us back. And I'm determined to take fear out. This is the year to end fear (that could be a bumper sticker?).

Whatever form fear takes in your life, look it straight in the eye and take it out. You might actually enjoy doing it.

I think I'll try something new next week... maybe whitewater rafting? (that's a whole different story...)

En-Courage

As I get older, I am becoming more in tune with what I believe, what I stand for and what I truly dislike. I guess some people would call it being 'set in your ways', but I think it's a little more than getting stuck in a routine of mediocre adulthood.

I think it's probably more along the lines of, 'another year older, another year wiser'. Amen to that. It's about time I grew up and starting acting like an adult. Maybe it's that nasty cynicism creeping into my world, leaving a bitter after taste of pessimism behind whilst cleverly disguising itself as being 'in touch with reality'.

But I think it's even more than that. I think it's when we finally get comfortable in our own skin and have developed enough self-awareness to realise just what makes us tick. I've been around me long enough to know what I'm like.

I've done the personality tests, the spiritual gift tests, the questionnaires, the psychological tests, the IQ tests, read the books, listened to the tapes, heard the sermons, and I've come out the other end knowing a few things. I know I'm a melancholic choleric who has the gift of wisdom and has a HUGE IQ. I also have the gift of exaggeration.

But even after all those written tests, there's a few things that time will eventually tell you, and often they will come from everyday interaction with everyday people. The beautiful people on the same team, the gifted individuals, the leaders, the sandpaper sisters, those darn sanguines and irritating phlegmatics who can't make a decision. It's through everyday life that I learned a few lessons about people, but also about myself.

I learned that I'm passionate about team. I love team, the very thought of team makes me smile. I'm sold out to the house of God. That's where you'll find me. I like to make big decisions carefully, complete with the pros and cons list. I despise it when commitment is lacking. And I believe that encouragement is one of the biggest weapons in my arsenal.

When I think about how vulnerable I used to be as a young person setting out on the Christian journey and how much it meant to me when a leader or friend encouraged me with a note, quality time, a kind word or something else meaningful, I'm reminded of the impact it had on me. I haven't forgotten those things, and literally still have every note someone ever wrote me in a box. So when I look at this generation today trying to find their way, their calling, growing in their ministry gifts, I think back to the impact that encouragement had on me and I pay it forward.

My dad says, 'You catch more flies with honey than vinegar'. I can make more friends and help more people to grow through encouragement than I can through reprimand. There are times when you need to deliver the hard word (my college lecturer used to say 'two positives then a negative' and 'sandwich it with encouragement'), but geez, there are always way more opportunities to deliver the kind and encouraging word.

Encouragement is free. It costs me nothing, but you can't put a value on what it could mean to the other person. I want the people I do life with to never doubt that I believe in them.

At the end of my life, I want to be known as an encourager. A leader? Sure. A great friend? Absolutely. But to be known as an encourager, that every time I led, every time I interacted with someone, every time I taught a newbie musician, I found something positive that they did and something positive within them, and encouraged them. That's what I want to spend my life doing.

'Hey mate, the way you played that chorus was awesome, great job!'

'You did really well tonight, I loved that you jumped in that song, that was heaps cool.'

'You led the band really well tonight, especially when you brought the chorus down and built it up again, well done!'

'I can see heaps of potential in you, you're pretty great.'

'I'm so glad I get to do life with you!'

Words can be cheap these days, so I never want to sound insincere, but it really doesn't take much to be an encouraging voice in a discouraging world.

At the end of the day, if you sow encouragement, you reap encouragement. It's a win-win situation really.