Use Twitter for good, not for burns

I got in a Twitter war with one of the students in youth group today. Sunday's usually a pretty Twitter-filled day for me, because I like to tweet things that resonate with me from the sermon or the lesson. This is usually not to distracting to anyone (although there was that super awkward time where I finished sending a tweet, only to look up and see the pastor staring at me) but because of my habit of sitting in the front, my phone-fiddling is usually pretty visible to the room. I don't try to hide that I'm on my phone. I forget that other people don't know I'm tweeting about the lesson.

So this student saw me on my phone during the lesson, tweeting about the year of jubilee and God's thoughts on wealth inequality. He called me out on it over Twitter and like a total n00b I took the bait, and we went back and forth for a bit, until he released this zinger: "Yes, you'll teach the whopping 2 people that look up to you that tweeting is more important than God's word. #CalledOut"

Aaaah, hashtag burn! 

It burned, it really did! What I had thought was our typical banter seemed to have evolved to a legitimate rebuke . . . even if it was over social media. But still, hashtag harsh! We were dismissed to small group and I turned to the junior high girls ready to complain, "Waaah, this punk hurt my feelings!" And they were like, "Can we please talk about the lesson instead?" And the conviction burned even more! 

Still, I found him after youth group and laid out my case. 1) I was tweeting something relevant. 2) This student was tweeting me during the lesson; hypocrisy! I was big-time on the defense, talking fast to save my face and spluttering at his audacity. And while he was laughing at me and maintaining his position, it began to dawn on me . . . I was being ridiculous.

Okay, whatever, I don't feel convicted that using my phone in Sunday school is wrong. I feel like I have freedom in the Spirit to tweet away. Fine. But sometimes I forget that not everyone in youth group is like me. Sometimes I forget that there are kids in that room who hold their faith quite loosely, who use their phones to converse with their friends and feed their distraction from the word being served. Sometimes I forget that the example I give is not based on my intentions but rather my actions. Tweeting in church is #NBD to me, but I need to take the message my actions are sending far more seriously. 

The student was totally right. 

Even now, hours later in the safety of my home, I feel squishy with shame over how poorly I received his rebuke. How defensive I was, how indignant I was. How my concern over something someone tweeted at me communicated to the junior high girls in my small group the exact opposite of graciousness and humility and self-control. Instead of letting it roll I got all worked up. Over a little tweet. Oh, que vous sotte. It's a wonder they even let me be a youth leader. But you can be sure, no one's going to catch me touching my phone in youth group ever again. Baby steps.

This time last year

It was on that month-long trip around Europe last year where I first instituted that annoying habit of punctuating conversation with an exaggerated, "Story of my life!" And while this "witticism" presumably got way old way fast for everyone else, it came upon me when I first read these lines at the start of George Macdonald's novel Lilith: "Then first I knew what an awful thing it was to be awake in the universe: I was, and could not help it!" And how very like this I felt, a spectator to history in these places so traversed over hundreds of years. Story of my life.

And so Lilith proved to be a fantastic literary backdrop to a jaunt around Europe, the adventures of Mr. Vane as he abandons his library and enters a new, mysterious world. (With lots of cats.) A read-aloud put everyone else to sleep as we drove through foggy Luxembourg, but in the car rides and quiet times I was captivated by the hero's confusion and cowardice. I remember sitting at the top of the third floor stairs in the cute house near Roubaix, reading by the light in the sitting area, dead to the world around me and blinking back tears while I read of Lilith's plight. “'Yes,' he answered; 'and you will be dead, so long as you refuse to die.'” Chilled by the thought of the hand she could not open in surrender.

It grew a bit too tattered to give back to Michael, after nearly getting washed away at Praia Grande and living in my purse for four weeks. But it traveled with me, and gave me a piece of the trip that was not shared in common by anyone but was wholly my own. Standing at the foot of so many crosses in grand cathedrals, "Those are not the tears of repentance! Self-loathing is not sorrow. Yet it is good, for it marks a step in the way home, and in the father's arms the prodigal forgets the self he abominates.” And that blessed book gave me something to do on that very first day when a poor breakfast choice kept me confined to my room and retching for hours. (TMI?)

There were times on that trip I was bewildered beyond belief, made sick to my stomach over what I didn't understand and couldn't address. There is the amusement of fiddler crabs and squid-huntings, and there is the slow death of an innocent beetle. There is the charming and insolent graffiti, and there is the uncomfortable acceptance of clipped responses. Many happy moments are slightly colored with shades of begrudgment. And so it is not always pleasant to look through pictures and swap stories, because sometimes my memory chooses to recall the clouds and not the sun above them.

But when I think of Lilith, these are the memories untinged. Sitting on the wharf full of Nutella and crepe. “Annihilation itself is no death to evil." Happy music wailing as the Eiffel Tower sparkled at midnight. "Only good where evil was, is evil dead." The moon so small but so bright against the twinkling lights of Paris. "An evil thing must live with its evil until it chooses to be good. That alone is the slaying of evil.” And choosing the good memories, to think the best, because "A man is as free as he chooses to make himself, never an atom freer." This time last year, I can hardly believe I sat right there. It seems a blessing to magnanimous to be real.

Sorry. No one really likes hearing about someone else's vacation. But read Lilith, 'kay?

How To: Organize Correspondence

I don't get letter-writing. I mean, I get that writing letters is thoughtful and fun, but it's not my first choice for communicating over a long distance. This objection is less about the ideological implications about "old time" communication and media, and more about the pragmatics of the thing.

1. Postage: As the USPS continues on its slow but inevitable descent, those intent on delaying the inevitable are also intent on gouging their customers 'till the very end. Fifty cents doesn't sound like much, but I could subscribe to Amazon Prime for the same cost as sending four letters a month. And that does not sound like it ought to be analogous.
2. Time: Just as a dollar sounds like a steep price compared with gratis email, the varying transit time required for letters sounds needless compared with instant email. While there's something to be said for delayed gratification, it's a challenge to carry a real conversation and keep up with the daily small talk when days pass before your letter is received.
3. Carbon-Copying: Letter writing also has the curious characteristic of depriving you of the words you've written. Whenever I receive a response to a letter I've sent, it always requires a degree of mental gymnastics to remember what exactly I said and what the other person is responding to. This adds an element of guesswork to making conversation. 

As much as letter-writing confounds me, however, it's always fun to get something in the mail. I've exchanged letters off-and-on with various individuals through the years, and I've accrued quite a stack that holds sentimental value. As part of my grave-dressing processes preparation to leave the country for a year, I've been cataloguing/liquidating/preparing to store my possessions for easy transportation through the rest of my life. Which brings me to the purpose of this post: how do I store all these letters I've accumulated? Pinterest has been of little to no help.

Nevertheless, I've considered a few different options.

The Digital Method

A lot of my memories are already housed in the space-efficient annals of my hard drive. This is of course simple for school assignments, pictures, and even some video, because cloud computing and the digitization of life began about the time I started using computers. I've been on that bandwagon for a while. It's a pretty simple system, just scan the letters, save as images or PDFs and organize by folders. The downside is twofold. 1) What if your hard drive dies? All your data is lost. So fun. 2) Legibility may suffer. Many of my correspondents have horrendous handwriting, and though my scanner is pretty sharp, there's always the potential for data loss when transferring between media. 

The Folder Method

This approach involves ditching the envelopes. It works best if most of your letters are 8.5x11, then you can paper clip any pages together and slide them into page protectors. Group page-protected letter sets in a folder or binder. What I don't like about this option that it not super seemly. Once you get all the letters in the binder, what do you do with the binder? It becomes an endless circle of "What am I supposed to do with this?" I have the same problem with photo albums. We have boxes and boxes of these things in a closet somewhere; they're not quite the right size to keep on a shelf and they're not quite pretty enough to leave hanging around as decorations. 

The Box Method

You take your letters and notes, and you put them in their envelopes (and if they don't have an envelope, you give them one and label it), and you put them in an archival box. You can put in little separators that sort the letters by year or by person. Or if you're feeling crazy, topic. (I.e. graduation, birthday, thank you notes.) Then you can take your box and put it with all your other boxes. Maybe make it a decorative box that you can keep on your coffee table or bookshelf so you can peruse it when you're feeling particularly nostalgic.

Any suggestions for how to tame my collection of sentimental papers? And while we're on the subject, what criteria determine what's worth saving and what is a waste of space? I'm coming to terms with the fact that I can't save everything and it's majorly bumming me out. At what point does memory preservation become too obsessive? (And does asking that question indicate that I am fast approaching that point? Possibly.)

Thanks, Robert.

Because I felt like living large on a Friday night, I stopped at Trader Joe's on my way home. (I know, how is my life so exciting?!) Having drooled over the circular they'd sent in the mail last week, I knew exactly what I wanted. Some supplies for Mother's Day french toast, as well as potstickers, dried mango strips, and a PB&J chocolate bar. Starting the weekend right. Woo!

But as I clutched my heavy cream and brioche rolls, examining packages of organic strawberries, a voice cut into my consciousness. "Excuse me, I just wanted to tell you, those are some awesome shoes." I looked up from my strawberry-perusing, and standing beside me was a neatly dressed twenty-something smiling at me good-naturedly. "All you're missing is a leather jacket to go with them." I thanked him and told him I'd left the jacket in the car. 

He starts asking me all these questions, just making conversation, like where was I from and what did I do? I told him about chicken zoning in Scituate, and Trader Joe's New England presence, and doing play therapy part-time, and where I got my sandals, and before I knew it our quick exchange morphed into a legitimate conversation. I mentioned I was going abroad to teach English and his countenance seemed to shift a bit. "Oh, when are you leaving?" he asked. I told him July and he smiled. "Too bad, I was going to ask you out to coffee." 

At this point I became acutely aware of all the shoppers around me, and the fact that I had been monopolizing the strawberry display. Wait, what? Is this real life?! In my head there was no presence of awkwardness, I just played it off all cool, "Aw, that's flattering, thank you. Good to meet you." But did it actually go down sans-awkwardness? Who knows. We shook hands and exchanged names, and he wished me good luck on my travels, and I said . . . "You too!"

Two things struck me about this encounter. For one, I felt very young. I tried to hint perhaps I was too young, by alluding to living in my parents' home and being an undergrad, as in, "Don't you feel creepy for hitting on someone so much younger than you?" And then it occurred to me, I'm almost twenty-two. That's actually not that young. And he couldn't've been more than 27. That's actually not that old. All at once I felt ushered in to part of the twenty-something fold.

For another, is this a thing, chatting up strangers in the supermarket? Is this socially acceptable? You know nothing about me except that I'm wearing steampunk sandals and shopping at Trader Joe's, but you feel this is enough of a basis to see what comes from a conversation? As in, "You endorse the values and novelty of this business model, so we at least already have that in common." Sure, I've begun to gather that it's harder to meet new people once out of college, but it never occurred to me that the supermarket might be a place to look. 

The upside of talking to strangers? Sometimes they give you an ego boost. Free of charge. 

Unmerited Favor

I'm graduating. This is a double-edged sword. I'm caught between triumph that I now have a BA and am employable by the liberty movement's standards, and also drowning in despair that I spent lots of time and money on a degree that is essentially worthless. My friends are getting real jobs, and I'm begging for other people to send me halfway across the world to do something I've never even done before. What if I'm a terrible English teacher? And even worse, what if I am so crippled by homesickness and culture shock that I can't venture out of my apartment to "do ministry" in my downtime? That's missional failure!

So why am I doing this, again? The LSAT prep books sit unopened, unfinished Perspectives homework looms, and the burden of all the stuff I've accumulated feels like it's perched on my shoulders instead of hidden away in the closet. I am overwhelmed and immobilized. For the first time in this whole process it is occurring to me that this may have been a very bad idea. 

This of course becomes cyclical. I hate feeling badly; more than anything I cringe at that pit in my stomach, the flutter in my lungs, the heaviness in my chest. Emotional swervyness translates into physical nausea. I create and indulge a learned helplessness from my incapacity, and all that is undone is left undone. Which creates more guilt and bad feelings. Which creates more avoidance and procrastination. The doubt sounds over and over, "You who are so ineffectual in your comfort zone, how can you be of use anywhere? How can your light be good enough for export when it is not even good enough for local consumption?" Valid, cutting questions. 

What can break the cycle? The lie is challenged in this: I am not helpless! The guilt cannot cover me! 

When I feel sick to my stomach over relationship anxiety or when I see my shortcomings as a daughter and a sister, He is there. When I miss opportunities and shrink inside of myself, He is there. When I am shrouded in doubt or when I am steeped in defeat, He is there. His grace means I am given a reward I don't deserve. My feeble efforts are returned to me as His refined results. I am a mess. And lo, I am not meant to remain that way. But because transformation is a plodding hiking trail and not a flashy teleportation, His grace covers me, and will cover me, continuously, unendingly. In my topsy-turvy, my incompetency, my confusion, He is true north. His kingdom is still coming.

Come at me, bro!

I feel smothered, by regrets and memories, by anticipation and reflection. The times they are a'changing and, as usual, I'm struggling to deal. I carry the cardboard down the hall of the Memorial Union out to the dumpster on campus and I sigh a pitiful little sigh to myself.

No, not now. Please don't make me leave these people I love. They don't know how much I love them. I didn't even know it until I realized I would be saying good-bye. 

I'm comparing my transition out of undergrad to my transition out of high school in an effort to give myself some perspective. It's ironic, because I struggled so long and hard to preserve my time in high school, taking a homeschooler's prerogative and staying five years instead of four. It's been quite the opposite in college, a pragmatic's struggle to speed through her degree in three years instead of four, so I guess it all balances out. This hair-splitting of time reminds me that milestones are arbitrary, they sit where you set them, and so I am not afraid to move forward. The race is not against others, instead the competition is within my own heart.

College gave me some unexpected but rich experiences. Some practical, some useless, all ridiculous. Such as . . .

Learning how to use a freight elevator.

Attending my first Bonnet Shores house party. 

Losing a sorority scavenger hunt.

Hosting my own radio show.

Slack-lining on the quad.

Filming a television editorial.

Discussing general education reform with the Arts & Sciences dean.

Presenting my research project to the honors department director.

Selecting the honorary degree recipients.

Sitting on a committee with the provost.

I can graduate college and assert, I have work experience! I have a BA! Even in this sickly economy, I can potentially support myself! I'm graduated, come at me bro.

Also, look me up in four years and see if I ever made it in and out of law school. I'm interested to see how that one works out.

There are no small callings in His Kingdom

I caught sight of this article by Anthony Bradley on WORLD Magazine in my newsfeed. Entitled "The New Legalism" the article discusses the evangelical church's emphasis on being radical, missional believers marginalizes the kind of life Paul calls believers into in 1 Thessalonians 4:11. It caught my attention because I am one of those millennials whose "greatest fear in this life is being an ordinary person with a non-glamorous job, living in the suburbs, and having nothing spectacular to boast about." I want to be radical. I want to be missional. But I fall so short of this every single day.

So when I saw this byline, I wondered if there was hope for me. Thinking maybe I'd misunderstood the gospel, that following Jesus really was as simple as being nice to my family and being diligent at my job, that maybe I could continue in an under-achieving existence, so I read the article eagerly . . . and was disappointed.

And okay, maybe I'm a sucker for an inspirational lyric, or maybe Ryan had it right when he sang, "You were meant for amazing things." Please note, there is nothing wrong with being ordinary. I would know, guys. I'm told on a nearly regular basis how incompetent I am. I competed in forensics for seven years and I still experience speaking anxiety. I'm afraid of people. My spiritual gift is helps. I am not the kind of person who dazzles with their brilliance, graciousness, and passion. I am a do-my-own-thing-over-here-in-the-corner kind of person. I have a depreciating major from an average university and I'm a little too neurotic and I'm just very regular. And I'm pretty okay with that. 

But I believe in radical living.

I don't disagree with Bradley's insinuation that we have idolized the glamor of individual achievement. There is nothing admirable about boasting in what we've accomplished ourselves, nor should we be motivated by the fame that comes from doing something visibly awesome. Additionally, there is no cookie-cutter way to live a sold-out life. There is no one path to "radical" living. I can get behind this frustration that perhaps we're undervaluing modalities and glorifying the sodalities when it's important for the Church to have both. It's not okay that we rank the Bible translators as more "cool" than the office Bible study leaders. Being a good citizen is no less valuable than being a social justice advocate. And maybe in our hurriedness to get "back to Jerusalem" we've glossed over this distinction.

But I feel as though the problem he describes is not the result of an overemphasis on being missional but instead a bi-product of self-focused living. Are we not called to follow Jesus by moving as He leads, not where we would go? (Be that end-point New Jersey or New Dehli.) And are we not instructed to daily take up our cross and leave our families, businesses, and funerals behind? (Be that a cross-cultural transition continentally or socially.) The issue here is not that we are too concerned with being radical: there are people all over the world doing cool things for Jesus, and I want to see more of that, not less of it. I love reading about former debate acquaintances doing social justice work in Africa. I smile at the Pinterest posts from a missionary in Ukraine who's started a Bible study with a bunch of spinsters. I have a friend who goes to Kennedy Plaza several times a week looking for a homeless woman she met there one night, and I think that's totally nuts, but I love it. 

These people have gone all out. They have abandoned the comfortable and predictable to follow Jesus where He is leading them, to the harvest. And there is nothing inherently evil about getting a nice nine-to-five job and marrying a nice guy and having 2.5 kids in a nice neighborhood, because the suburbs need to be reached, too! (Just remember that most of the world is not in the suburbs.) Wherever you find yourself and whatever your work, there is radical, missional living to be had. Are we so self-focused to believe that Jesus would only have us work for Him within the convenience of our daily routines? 

Have I bought into this "new" legalism? It's true, the thought of a white picket fence makes me shudder. I know my propensity to be cowed by routine and I am well-familiar with the dangerous lull of my comfort zone. And so I want spend my life running from the clutches of apathy into the arms of godly ambition, praying big and being an instrument of God's restorative love. (Because I know that I am daily tempted to do just the opposite.) It's hard to live radically within the comfortable confines of the familiar. At least, it is for me.

Being radical doesn't have to mean starting an NGO and petitioning the United Nations to build a well in a remote part of the Sudan. Radical living is a condition of being all out for making our Jesus greater in this world. And you can do that by vocational mission and loving your literal neighbors. But I am certain we are not called to a quiet and unobtrusive existence, because I have read that the rocks will cry out His praise if we don't. 

(For those of you struggling, as I am, to live radically from within the suburbs, read this book with me!)

Elementary, Part II

You know what's crazy? When you're scrolling through your Facebook newsfeed, and an update catches your eye. It's a Bible verse. And it makes you go, "--wait."

I mean, I don't know about you, but my newsfeed is full of Bible verses. Probably because a large percentage of my Facebook friends at least pretend to be interested in the Bible. And a large percentage of that percentage actually are interested in the Bible. 

I see a lot of the Bible in my newsfeed each day, but you know what makes it crazy? When that same update is from a friend that doesn't fall into the aforementioned percentage. Maybe you met them at libertarian camp. Maybe they go to your school. Maybe they used to be all about the Bible thing but flipped the truth the finger and left it behind. 

But in your Facebook newsfeed, so innocuous but so out of place, it's your hardcore partier friend quoting God on the internet. 

What is going on?

So you do some Facebook creeping. And then stuff gets crazier! You see that they're in a recovery program. You see "C.S. Lewis" under "Recent Likes." You see a picture of them tagged with what appears to be a Christian-esque small group, or sometimes even a picture of their baptism. 

And then you're like, this is so crazy! You get all excited like you've discovered an Easter egg convert in a sea of Facebook friends. You're astounded by whom and how God has drawn to Himself. You're encouraged by the substantive change and genuine transformation they've experienced. You grin with joy at this crazy random happenstance!

But don't you feel a wee bit sad, too? 

That person is my Facebook friend. However weak our connection, this internet archive testifies to the fact that our paths crossed. And yet, I can recall no instance where I asserted the truth to that person. I can think of experience or conversation with them in which I pointed to Jesus. I can't even comment as to the difference I noticed in my newsfeed with that Bible verse update, because I have no real relationship with that person.

That person was too different from me.

That person made me too uncomfortable.

That person was spiritually too far away.

It's not a mindful neglect, of course not, but a spiritual passivity. I forget sometimes that God is working. (In my network of Facebook friends, of all places.) And I forget that God wants to work through me. (To reach the people that may become my Facebook friends, of all people.) What does it look like to view every interaction as an opportunity for relationship? I'm thinking that's pretty creepy. (But then again, so is Facebook stalking, but we do it anyway!)

I love seeing these updates, but I hate seeing them, too. Because as much as they bring me joy that God is working all the time in unexpected placed, these updates also bring me regret that I have missed out on the blessing of being part of the process because I am too lazy, selfish, or scared. And that conviction stings. But it hurts so good. 

*Please forgive the use of the plural pronoun in lieu of s/he. I'm not a grammar rebel, I'm just colloquial.