digging into it: II

our crazy lives. how does this happen? i was never told about this simplicity nor this complexity. how do we end up making all of these strange choices, having all of these bizarre encounters, and then somehow end up as these bandaged and bruised, yet 'whole' people?
there are very few real answers. but, hell. it's all beautiful. the chaos is exhausting, but stimulating and exciting if you can keep up.

i had a hard time getting up for a 4pm church service b/c i was up until around 7am writing. part of me winced at the idea of going to service b/c i've been feeling a little dulled @ Onnuri these days, but i dragged myself out of bed anyway. obedience isn't always easy, but inevitably, i have a deep sense of blessing at exactly the right time.

P Eddie spoke about the manifestation of faith. what faith looks like--how our love will move and compel us to engage.
oh, relationships.
our love for on another moves us to hold hands and touch faces, save funny and/or outrageous stories for each other, think of special small and big ways that might lift a smile from their lips. such is the same in all relationships that have meaning for us.
ah. relationship.
though i've heard it all before, there was something more yesterday. this living organism. a sweet piercing. the intense reminders of deep deep grace; i felt Him holding my hand. a warm touch on the top of my bowed head. as i tasted that styrofoamy wafer and over-sweet grape drink, tears formed and dripped.
are you there Jesus? it's me. you're still into me, right? i can't fathom why, but You love me?

so, damnit. during this service, some old promises i made began bubbling up. i stopped listening to P Eddie and started talking to God. these are promises i have made to myself and to Him. i put them on the back burner when i got here to Korea. i kinda forgot.
i'm lying. i didn't forget the entire time, but i was being lazy. i know that not keeping these kinds of promises spin me out of control and keep me stranded on this little island of lies and wasted time. is it time to finally move forward? to pick up my head from the sand and brush off my cheeks?

but, what is it that i'm worth exactly? what am i made of? so often i've answered these questions w/ all of the mistakes that i've made and continue to make. so often i look backwards and only see the gloom of my emotional problems and end up identifying myself w/ those things.

i've fought the demons of chronic depression since i was about 9-10 years old. that crushing, palpable sadness that makes you feel like you can't even move on another inch. but my deeply ingrained Korean sensibilities refused to allow me to succumb to the torpor and unproductivity that is typical of the chronically depressed. i know how ridiculous that might sound: "unproductivity"--but it was partly this culturally-instilled deathly fear that forced me to resist crawling into a ball beneath my desk and crying my eyes out till i shriveled up into a purple scab.

when i was in those deepest of darkest places, i dragged myself up and moved forward on shaky limbs--not really feeling anything but pain. dimly knowing something was terribly wrong--going through the motions of existence. i got the grades, i got the degrees, i started the career, i dealt w/ the agonies of a twisted cold marriage. i lived in these downward cycles of pain until they passed and i could begin moving again at a normal pace. i self-medicated. i discovered drugs when i was 12. i understood what 'taking the edge off' meant, and following that, the lows were very temporarily not so so low. but the weight would come back down even heavier whenever the highs would wear off.

i rediscovered Jesus when i was 20. after that time, when i was truly fully trusting in Him and not relying upon my own ability to self-actualize, i began to realize what He meant when He said, "Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light" (Matt 11:28-30).

if you are reading the chronology correctly, there is obviously overlap w/ the depression, self-medication, downward spirals, and Jesus. i'm not saying that rediscovering Jesus suddenly made my life a velvety bed of rose petals. i am still the person that i am--w/ all of my emotional and circumstantial baggage. imperfect and wounded and still caught up in some pretty nasty cycles.
until recently, i never understood what Jesus meant when He told me to take His yoke. an "easy" yoke? how that could possibly be easy? sounds like slavery, no? but in the last decade of stumbling over and over in this 'walk w/ God'--this mysterious 'relationship', i have begun to understand the ease of Jesus's yoke. i'm beginning to understand what real freedom feels like. what that makes your spirit feel like. the visceral 'lightness'! to finally, (albeit grudgingly,) give up these burdens over to Him.

i have begun talking to Him about this crazy chronic sadness and letting Him remind me about who i am.

yes. all of this churchy Biblical language--but somehow it makes sense for me in this very real 'today'.