thinking things about life and Jesus and stuff
Thursday night was one of those nights.
You know the kind. Racing pulse and mind snowballing at a terrifying speed: replaying past events and planning for future ones.
I texted a friend in a panic:
Everything feels so out of control.
And the response came:
Get some sleep.
My first instinct was to push back. How could I sleep right now? Do you even know what hangs in the balance? I have to DO something!
I wish I could take you back there with me: kneeling on the floor in that studio as I listened to my friend defend the Gospel with a fierceness that I have rarely seen in her soft sweet spirit.
I wish I could explain to you how laughter blended with tears bubbled up as I spoke the deepest, most authentic words of my days, laying on the floor of a hotel and begging God to save the world.
It’s hard to know what will come out as I start typing these words. My spirit is a mess of emotions.
I only know this: I can’t go back. 
I can’t go back to talking about the baby Jesus in the manager as if He’s safe and cute and cuddly, instead of the King of everything. I can’t go back to talking about the Church like she’s a product to be evaluated instead of a family full of broken but blood-bought creations, treasured by the living God. I can’t go back to using the word forgiveness to describe a lack of hatred instead of a glorious love and unity.
Around 11 years ago, I sat down cross-legged in the middle of a room filled with thousands and thousands of college students at Soul Survivor in England. I sat there - like a rock among their trees, their arms swaying like branches to the sounds of songs about a Man I had never met.
I faced a question in that moment: can I believe this? The question was not ‘do I’? It was ‘can I’? Am I able? Is it possible for a rational thinking creature to submit to the belief that their mind is a faulty source of authority?
A couple of weekends ago in Austin a bunch of churches talked through the question of what we do with suffering and pain: where is God when bad things happen?
This post (written by a partner in the Gospel and someone I respect a lot) has been shared about a million times, so it got my attention.
I have sort of a girl crush on Jen Hatmaker. I love her writing and her passion for people and seeing our city redeemed. I LOVE her humor. And I love the message that I think she shares which is: give grace to hurting people.