Somewhere along the line, all the blogging voices, all the
faith failures and victories, the devotions and encouragements and bickering
and conference hoopla and book promotion and linky parties and giveaways and
friend requests and…well, all of it…started to clamor. And the Christian
blogging community, though not in any
way bad by nature, became in my head a record day at the New York Stock
Exchange, with beautiful, hard-working people all shouting over each other in a
crowded room, and my head hurt and my heart raced and I had to retreat, and I
don’t mean the kind with workshops and book signings. And if I haven’t read or
commented on your blog as often as you’d like me to, and if I haven’t seemed to
have an explanation for it, or if you’re one of the many that assumes I’m just “too
busy to be bothered”….that’s really, really not it.
For so many reasons, I’m tired. Not tired of bloggers or
tired of blogging, and not at all tired of writing, but I’m tired for a lot of
unrelated reasons, and also because going through the ringer with Jesus? It’s an
exhausting business already, even more so when you’re trying to extract a 600-
to 800-word something that makes any
kind of sense and has application to a general audience with a few nice
pictures thrown in. My spiritual journey and my writing journey both
simultaneously took a few complex and beautiful twists and turns, and while I’m
grateful to be in the midst of it, I can’t manage to put it all into any words
I can live with putting out into the world. Everything I’ve tried to write for the
big, wide space I’m navigating right now feels like half Fight Club and half The 700
Club, and it just doesn’t make for great content for the “Best Christian
Bloggers” checklists, I’m afraid.
There is great and terrible beauty, as the saying goes, in
this down and dirty open-hearted life. Not all of it transfers cleanly to the
page. Not all of it has spiritual application for the masses. I am, just now,
basking in the wild and intimate uniqueness of God and how He relates to us each
in ways that cannot be quantified, and sometimes speaks messages for us that
are not for sale, and that cannot even be given away, even with the purest
intentions. There are love letters, gifts and challenges in the world, I am
finding, that are embroidered boldly with only my own name (and some with only yours
too)—devoid of usefulness for anyone else, but priceless even so.
For a long time, I fought it and wrestled myself because
when writers who are also extreme introverts struggle in any real way in their
lives, they can’t really get through *anything* without working it out in words
on pages. And when you’re just trying to get through the days and you know you
ought to be doing “something for Jesus,” blogging as a ministry makes a lot of
sense. And when your calling to write is clear, and you aren’t writing about
Jesus for the masses, there can be a big fat gap in the idea of purpose and
giftedness and all the things we’re taught about what we’re supposed to do with
ourselves in this life.
There are those of us who don’t find dialogue with Jesus
easy or particularly natural but even we still get the chance sometimes to hear
the still, small voice amidst the blinding clatter. And of all the things I can’t
clearly make out in this season of faith, within the big silent echo I hear so
often in response to my exploration, one big thing comes through loud and
clear.
I am not a commodity.
And that’s kind of the final word on the matter for now. He
is not for sale, for profit, for show, or even for the people I want most to
love and give everything to. This supernatural and private and wild and
wonderful secret place of the soul is just between us for the moment, and
though I am divided into so many segments in this life, this little bit is, for
now, just ours alone. I will have more that are intended for this community in
the future, I hope.
I’m still in the thick of things. I’m still writing and
seeking out loud, and telling it like it is, and I have no intention of
disappearing. I just value honesty, and I don’t like to leave folks wondering
what in the world is going on with me. I am not losing my religion. I am not
leaving the fold or straying or backsliding or any of those things. I am just
navigating the depths of what my faith looks like from the inside out, and it
is time to be quiet and thoughtful about it until I know where He is taking me
in all of this. And so, this place will continue to be a tad bit unmanned until
further notice.
Thanks for loving me and walking near me and being my
friends. I’ll be around. Mad love.