Prophet

Hey blog fans! Sorry I haven't posted for a bit, I was crazy busy the beginning of this week and then tanked Thursday night. Ended up with a fever, no idea how high cause we don't have a thermometer, and spent Friday and Saturday getting mostly nothing done and feeling like crap. But onto better things.

Grad school rocks. I totally love my classes (even though I definitely need to set aside some time this week to catch up on the reading I slacked off on) and my profs are great. Super easy going, basically it's the best reentry into the oh so terrifying world of academia I could have hoped for. I also found out that the Methodist church does have scholarship type stuff for women going into the ministry. No idea what that actually means schoolwise, but it's hopeful at least.

Now for the important stuff:

(Trust me, this is way more exciting than listening to me whine about how gross being sick is)
Previous to feeling sick and gross, I felt awesome! Why you ask? Because I felt (and still feel, somewhere deep down on the inside) that I am exactly where I am supposed to be. Grad school was the correct choice, I'm enjoying work again, although it's still agitating sometimes, and I feel that the last year has shaped my inexplicably into the person that I am called to be. I know I still have growing and learning to do, but right here right now in this moment, I am good.

A little backstory, I have spent a good chunk of this previous year making some pretty big decisions about life goals. Made even harder by the fact that these decisions are things I have the power to act on right away. They were more decisions based on the direction I was leading my life than what to do next, but deciding on a path helped me to take steps (like grad school, and remaining at my internship) But first I had to decide. I'm pretty sure I talked about this in my post where I used Robert Frost's poem, you know, the one about about the two roads who's name escapes my sinus addled brain at the moment, but I suck at decisions. I have a lot of trouble making them without knowing how they're going to turn out, and unfortunately, God's road map doesn't an x to mark the spot. All I knew, was that whatever decision I made, God would be there, and I would do something great.

It sounds a little vain I know, to say my life will be great, that something big will come out of it, but I truly believe that it will. I've also talked previously about how God speaks to me through music, and that for a time (and still, although hearing it often has become less important as I've come to accept it) through Sidewalk Prophet's song, Words I Would Say. The chorus speaks about being strong in the Lord and always hoping, because the speaker already knows you'll do great things. That thought has really stayed with me, that the things I'll do are great. Maybe not for the whole world, or the whole church, but they will be great. Or so I thought. Then I started blogging.

This blog, which started out mostly as a security blanket as I ventured out on my own for the first time has become so much more than that. At least for me personally. It has become a way of knowing that my thoughts are valid, that you lot care, and a way for me to see those great things I'm going to do. I wrote Account Ability and Convicted (two other posts that you should go read if you haven't. Fo real) because I was working out my own thoughts, and I wanted to know what other people thought. And a little bit just to make sure I could actually think at a grad school level. The response, especially to Convicted, showed me overwhelmingly that this is what I should be doing.

A mere two comments and one phone message from a dear friend and God blew my world into a million pieces in the best way possible. I wanted to shout to the rooftops and have everyone read and comment not because I was a genius, or had the answers, or figured it out, but because God had used me, really truly used me to share his message with the world, and it had affect people, made them think, and changed them. And he had used ME. The me who gets nervous when she speaks publicly even though I love doing it. The me who spent the better part of my youth doing the exact opposite of what my blog talks about. The me who spends way more time cleaning up messes than getting things right. He used me. Just like he used Moses, and Saul and David and Rehab and Ruth and Esther and Aaron and Joshua and Joseph and everyone else utterly inadequate that He prepared and used for his glory anyway.

I grew up in a tradition that didn't spend a lot of time dealing with the Holy Spirit. We were fine that it was there, we liked having it around to guide us in our daily lives and decisions, but other than being a Holy floating conscience. It didn't do much. It certainly never spoke through people, and it was basically just a big ethereal referee that made sure we all played nice. And we certainly never talked about the prophets anymore than to say they were around, they helped out, they died in grand ways, and were called even if they didn't know why.

Coming to Seattle and talking with people who talked about her/him/it a little more gave me some more perspective but I think Godly Play taught me the most. The phrase they use when speaking about prophets is God "came close" to the person, and the person "came close" to God, and through that closeness, the person knew what God wanted. When we tell the story of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit sort of becomes that closeness for us. The way many of my friends here in Seattle have talked about it, is less Old Testament smoke and fire, and more about speaking truth.

These ideas and a million other things I've learned in the past year have led me to a truth I would have been embarrassed to utter six months, or even six weeks ago, before God showed me what I'm capable of.

I'm a prophet.

And I feel neither vain, or out of place saying it. Even though growing up I would have thought anyone who said such a thing was either crazy or totally full of themselves. Actually I think a big part of my openness to the Spirit, or God, or whichever part of the Trinity helps you feel most connected, comes from my upbringing. I'm surprisingly well rounded, well versed, and well educated, which helps me see lots of sides on lots of issues (even if I don't always represent them all when I talk about them). I grew up with enough fantasy in my life that the idea that the almighty being who made everything could literally talk to me is not a weird thought at all. And I know enough about reading and literature that the Bible, it's nuances and cultural relevance are both understandable, and exciting for me.I've also clung to enough of my inner child that belief comes easily to me, even if I don't always know why.

Basically everything in my life up til now has prepared me for this. And while this part of my journey is only beginning, and it will have many ups and downs I'm ready for it. I've spent my entire life getting ready for it, and I'll continue to improve as time goes by. I'll mess up. I'll get things wrong. I'll curse myself for not listening better, or working harder to get it right, and then I'll learn from it and move forward. I wrote once before about how excited I was to see what God gave me to do next, what more I would be given because I had done pretty well with what I had so far, and I think this is it. And it scares me to death that God would give me something to big. But at least now I have a name for it. For when it's terrifying, or depressing, or inexplicably life giving, or exhausting, or joyful, or I decide I'm terrible at at it. I'm be a prophet, and God will still be with me, leading the way as I wander and try to find exactly what that means for my life. So what more could I possibly need?