desperate times.

07 Feb 2011 32 Comments

by mary kathryn tyson in hard truth: about calling, life abundant., one word 2011: truth, taking care of self & one another

this post has been rolling around in my head for a while now. like, weeks. perhaps months, if i’m so self-aware. over the weekend, it pressed heavy and i realized it was time to put the proverbial pen to paper. (or fingers to keyboard, as the case may be.) i’ve tarried on writing this, i think, because it’s hit me in such a personal way that i didn’t want to write out of emotion lest i hurt feelings. that would never be my intent.

however.

sometimes our feelings need to get hurt a little bit. because, in my experience, my hurt feelings usually mean i have some work to do on myself. if something (or someone) rubs me the wrong way -if i feel jealous or angry or insecure- then i need to go to the cross. and only in going to the cross can i ever be set free. and isn’t that why jesus came? so that we can be free?

nevertheless, i have resisted writing this for so long because i don’t like to personally be the one to send people to the cross. let someone else do that and i’ll just hug & love, okay? please, god? no? okay.

i also don’t want to compromise truth and integrity; more importantly, i don’t want to misrepresent christ in any way.

my first inclination is obviously to go to scripture, which i can do easily in this case and will incorporate as i go on with this message.

it makes me sick to my gut, though, to hear in my spirit, ‘no, mary kathryn. be obedient to the message. it’s time.’

{and, no, i do not think god was superceding his own inspired word with what might otherwise be my own indigestion. but what’s on my heart to share didn’t start in scripture, so i think part of maintaining the ‘truth & integrity’ of what i believe god is speaking to my heart also means to speak the hard, raw, unedited, un-pretty version of the message.}

and so, as much as i believe this message is for you, it is also very much for me…

friend, do you know what you’re called to do with your life? i mean, really? specifically? what is the thing that you feel god’s delight over you when you do?

is it dancing? performing surgery? running the field?

i remember my granddad saying he would die as soon as he stopped doing ministry. it was the thing that he was gifted for, the thing that infused life into him. the breath of life was his reason for breath and life. not because he was great doing it -even though he was- but because god was great in him. god made him an effective communicator and he affected lives for christ.

but this would have been just as true of him had his passion been for business or for farming. or collecting trash. or teaching in the public schools.

in doing ministry, he did the thing he knew he was meant to do. he didn’t do it just because he wanted to do it or because he needed the attention or craved the accolades he received. he did it because it was what he was gifted to do, and he had the grace on his life to do it. and he didn’t just get up and preach – his ministry to others was an overflow of his ministry to jesus. his passion for bringing the truth of god to others came from a personal relationship and discipline learned from daily fellowship with christ.

what i’m saying is, he didn’t just read a little bit when there was something coming up on his calendar, put together a message and then preach as he traveled and then was a different person at home. he was only able to minister from a lifestyle of devotion to jesus. i mean, to be honest, i never even saw him preach from any notes, he was that grounded in the truth & knowledge of christ through his relationship with the holy spirit.

my point is: he couldn’t not preach.

friend, do you understand my question? what is it that you are so sold out to, so gifted for, so completely and utterly passionate about, that you can’t not do it?

is it playing guitar? climbing rocks? sailing?

that is the thing you are meant to do.

i tease often and say that, by virtue of being a member of my family, we all get called to ministry (some later than sooner). we can’t help it. there’s no point in apologizing for it. we all have an individual story of how god brought us each into the ‘family business’. so it is with me. i know i am meant to speak and teach and love people in the name of jesus. i’ve always known this but for many, many years -because i was so bound up in myself and not free in a life with christ- i was the one who said, ‘me, lord!? are you KIDDING!? i wish you could use me, but there’s nothing to use here.’

eeyore. woh is me. BOO. selfishness. vanity.

and this was even before i entered into a lifestyle of craziness, so it’s not like i was just feeling guilty from the night before. my very real feelings of worthlessness and unworthiness were from a sincere place of simple insecurities at that point in my life. it generated from my feeling of only being tolerated, not really being liked by anyone. i couldn’t even recognize that the devil had taken my simple insecurities to allow me to believe i could never be used by god.

but can i tell you something else?

i had to go through the rest of my crap in order to become free so that god could use me. i really do believe that god can use us exactly where we are, even in the midst of our mess.

however.

now being on the other side {other than this little ‘trauma’ glitch i’m working through now} of my mess -and having worked through it all and becoming free from it- i see now what it was all for. god had to utterly wreck my life in order for me to know just how utterly and completely dependent i am on him. he allowed me to walk through the junk of my past in order for me to truly know so that he could really and truly and finally use me in a complete and authentic and real way – with no personal agenda, no need for the attention or for craving any accolades. he did this so that i would know it had nothing to do with me and absolutely everything to do with him. so that he could receive the glory. and what’s funny and great and oh, how i love him for this is that he’s put in my heart a desire to see women set free from the life i also lived. we can’t minister very well from a place we haven’t traveled, can we?

at different points in my therapy, i knew when i was wading through the jordan and when i was in the deepest parts. i knew when the tide had swept me back over to the other side from where i wanted to be, and i knew when i was close to the other shore. i knew when i was drowning and when i was floating along.

and then i knew -in no eventful way, i just knew- when i had reached the other side.

i. knew.

and i was free.

i have done -and continue to do- the work in my life so that i can be free. put another way, i have done the work so that i could accept my freedom that was there for the taking. i wanted freedom so that i could enjoy my life in christ and be used by him, no matter what that means. i was desperate to be a prisoner set free.

d e s p e r a t e.

my service to christ -my ability to be used by him most effectively- has come at a cost. a HIGH PRICE.

and so has yours.

i’m not more deserving of opportunity to walk with others who are further along than i am in life and in ministry than you are.

and i’m not less deserving, either.

but i am responsible. i have a responsibility to live out the life

to

which

i

am

called

without apology.

and so do you.

and so, how dare we not be willing to do the work on ourselves -to look inward at the dirty and nasty and insecure places- in order to serve him better? he who took all of that in the first place -before we even existed- with him to the cross. how dare we withhold our true excitement for other’s successes or covet it for ourselves when he went to the cross for that person, too? who are we to be jealous or angry on our own behalf when a friend -another child of god- is reaping the benefit of a life devoted to jesus?

how can we not rejoice over someone’s life turned around when we knew them when?

{y’all, i’m the pot and the kettle here. the preacher and the choir. the four fingers pointing back at myself and all. hello there, plank in my eye.}

my prayer now is that we would each have the courage to dig deep and look within our own hearts and be willing for him to expose those areas of our hearts.

there is room enough for all of our talents and giftings in the kingdom of god.

and we are responsible to use them effectively and wisely.

but to get free so that the devil doesn’t pervert what the lord has intended to be used for good so that we can use our gifts and talents effectively and wisely.

oh, law. y’all, i feel a series coming on. honestly…and i say this with no small amount of trepidation because i am not one to carelessly throw out ‘in the name of jesus’ without a tremendous amount of caution…but i believe this is so passionately on the heart of christ that i need to stop myself lest i run ahead of him. i want to be careful with my words and thoughts that i don’t recklessly project my own mess onto you.

i can see where this is heading and it is good, i promise. hard, but good. 

can you hang with me this week, even if it makes us a little uncomfortable, while this all comes out?

i think there’s something in this we both might need to hear.

and before tomorrow’s post, will you dare to ask god -specifically- what he wants to do with your life?

and then…will you be brave enough to accept it?

also…will you trust him enough to ask him to show you those places in your heart, those areas that need addressing?

{don’t make me repeat them, you know the ones.}

i’m praying for you. truly, truly, i am praying over you.

{and i would really covet your prayers over the rest of this ‘message’ as i pray and listen.}