BE with GOD

The Spirit said to me once, recently:

Be with God...

In your home, alone, with company, at night asleep or when awake,

At your workplace, in meetings, and in your office,

Whether together with friends or alone or in the company of enemies,

When you drive the highways and byways, the freeways and lonely tracks,

In the depth of confusion or turmoil of conflict,

Attending the emergency room, and the idle doctor’s office waiting room,

In chastised boredom and in pervading fulfilment,

By the pleasantries of breathing—inhaling and exhaling,

When enduring abuse and throughout the hollow expanse of neglect,

Through celebration...

Be with God.

Be.

Be with God,

Because God is with us,

In noise and quiet and all volumes of spirit between.

Enjoy God,

Knowing he is present,

Knowing his care is ever more loving than our care is even for ourselves.

Be with God,

Simply be.

No matter what,

Be with God,

Because when we are we know what we’ve got.

God is good in that we can just be...

Yes, as we are, where there is no judgment.

Be with God,

We are who we are, and, in that, so is God who God is.

No disputes and indwelling piracies of enigma,

We be with God and accept,

Life is easier when we be with God.

***

There is no shred of doubt about this for the believing person: they have equilibrium and wellbeing in the fact of simply being with God.

We love our God for the majestic Divine Presence we experience in the silence—as God waits on us and us on him.

The fact of God upon our experience is an amazing thing; that this entity that breathed life into Creation is making his personal Presence known in our lives, in the moment of our reality, with nothing judged of it. God simply is. God has made a way to share in communion of that moment with us. He bears himself silently as we consider the wonder in the fact.

Think of God operant in the scene of our present moment; this Lord of All is here with us, present as we are present in life. God is. God was. God will be. Always. When we are able to simply be with God we attribute to life what is true.

There is nothing truer than being. It requires no doing, just being.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

When Past Is the Springboard for the Future

God is more interested in our future than our past.

We can know this is a fact by the following: because we are blessed by the privilege of a living, breathing life—the evidence of which is a brand-new day—we can know that God has plans for our present, and, assuming the present continues as it becomes the future, God has plans for that too.

God knows that our past can just as easily hem us in as it can liberate us.

What, then, is of God?

Surely we can know what is of God by how it feels in our deepest, most God-congruent self.

The things that hem us in tend to be condemnatory by effect. We feel the weight of guilt; the burden of shame. But the things that truly liberate us are of God, because they’re the sustainable things.

The things of the past are fuel for our futures, and God can use anything.

There is no condemnation for those sincerely in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:1). They who are sincerely living for him who saved them are gifted the grace to know the forgiveness of God and the wisdom to know that this is from God. They believe it boldly.

They look to their pasts, and the shaming that they’ve endured at the hand of the evil one, and they accept they were duped. We’ve all been there. We’ve all faced the accusations of the one who would discourage us so much as to convince us to flee from our only real hope and help: God.

When we can access our pasts because we’re beyond shame and guilt, we suddenly see God’s use for it. Indeed, this is how God makes good out of the things suffered for those who love him. God is faithful in this. There is nothing that precludes us from the blessings of this reconciliation in our practical circumstance.

God can use the conveyance of sin for his glory by taking that past thing and working it for our and others’ good into our futures. There is no glory in the sin, but there is unfathomable beauty and glory in the thing that God makes out of it. Let’s never doubt it!

***

The things of the past are fuel for our futures, and God can use anything. The present and future are more important than the past because they’re loaded with potential, but the past is done. God wants us to be honest about our past; then he can heal us and use it for his glory.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

Healing via Inner Creative Emotional Acts

Spiritual healing has been known through the ages to provide ‘an answer’ for the desperate complaints of those afflicted mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. And if there’s one common angle all disciplines adhere to it’s in simply facilitating the afflicted to a place where they may see their reality as it is; and find an imaginal way of seeing their reality differently that also works in real life. Every ‘problem’ is fixable.

This involves an inner creative emotional act:

“Healing of a lasting kind is the product of an inner creative emotional act.”

— Neville Symington (psychotherapist)

The only difficult thing about such an act is it requires a great deal of responsibility; to affect our own healing, even when aided by counsellor, pastor, or psychotherapist—by continually being able to surrender our losses to God.

Such a thing as surrender is not as easy as it sounds. It requires a process of problem-solving, and by virtue of that we take responsibility—to design and implement, often with help, our programs for renewal and growth onward.

Digging Deeper Than We Are Comfortable

To retrieve our creativity we’re required to work, and work hard, to invigorate the imagination and even imagine many different possibilities—some of which will be painful. But this is what we need to do to break past what we have cycled manically through again and again.

We need to somehow break the monotony to cause the cycle for healing to initiate.

Our creativity necessarily requires the use of our emotions, because it’s an effort to break past the ease and routine of our everyday thinking lives. We need to explore these feelings we’re having trouble with.

With an open mind and an open heart we open ourselves up in our surrender before God, especially via prayer, and we allow our Lord to help us touch our inner voids, chasms of loneliness, and structures of abandonment. Even a glimpse will do to begin with.

Exploring The Inner Life

We all have an inner life. This is largely closed up to us in our unconscious. But within this inner life holds the secrets for our adaptation to our world. Within this life all things are possible. God holds this inner life as our spiritual prize, and those seeking it will know the most practical of salvation experiences.

Exploring this inner life is a courageous act, replete with the responsibility of the person demanding, through honesty and effort, to know themselves.

Exploring the inner life is the task exposing us to the greatest reward. To know God is the courage to know ourselves, knowing that everything about God is gorgeous, and, likewise, so it is with us. There is good reason why God loves us: all of us are beautiful.

When we understand these truths, and we can enjoy an inner creative emotional act, which is knowing ourselves, we can experience healing.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

Living in the Footnotes, Not the Headlines

“While personality, skills and charisma have their place, my preference is to watch a person’s manner and character. Do they listen well? Is there a love for people shining through their eyes? Can they live in the footnotes, or must they be in the headlines?”

— PAUL WINDSOR

The real leader is not about themselves at all. They are about the innate capacity for others and would only promote themselves if others are to be served centrally. Everything about them is about serving the greater cause or goal. There is something about them that has an allure; because they are not about themselves at all, as all the focus is on the broader landscape of life, all of what they are serves simply and with power, because they are not the slightest bit swayed by partiality.

People cannot help but wish to follow such a person, because they hold to a truth that is commanding: there is a universal respect about such a person. Their life is no longer about themselves at all; not in any dominant way.

Living in the footnotes and not the headlines is the call of God on every Christian’s life; to be willing (because we are able—in our surrender before God) to switch our focus away from our selfish priority and onto the broader needs of all.

Truly Dying to Self

We speak so commonly in Christian circles about dying to self, but what does it really mean? It becomes part of our language, our vernacular, but the more we talk the less we act. Talking is the enemy of acting. We must act and let our actions speak. Don’t our actions convey a commanding language?

Truly dying to self doesn’t really happen until we understand how God’s power works in and through us when we choose the broader perspective—the truth as it pertains to every life situation.

Truly dying to self is not really a hard thing at all when we understand this broader perspective: the truth. No one chooses a lie when they are conscious of the truth in all its power, particularly if they can be part of that power, and that’s what God promises us.

There is no better inspiration than sharing in this power that comes from God.

Having experienced this power we are fools to not do all we can to bring about the broader perspective—working for the needs of all to the best of our abilities. None of us are perfect, but we have all been gifted with minds for choice. We have the power to choose, to decide, to go one way or the other. We consciously choose wisdom or folly.

We are not controlled, but we have been given control. We have power. The more we live in the reality that we have access to this power, the more we can choose to live in the footnotes and not the headlines, for the betterment of the broader perspective.

***

Leadership is the greatest privilege we are all given; to inspire and encourage. We all lead, but we may not do it well, unless we understand that the greatest honour within the privilege is to lead for the broader good of all. We not only inspire others, but ourselves too, when we find ourselves satisfied in the footnotes of life, whilst shunning the headlines.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

Repeating Our Stories of Grief

When we’re reeling from grief, from a life-changing event imposed on us, we find ourselves repeating our laments, our justifications, our trials and tribulations. It’s normal to repeat ourselves.

As I helped someone discharge some of their grief recently, just by listening, I noticed something bizarre; they repeated themselves from two previous sessions; as if they hadn’t recalled they had told me already.

I wondered about this, slightly bemused. I thought this person was the type to have remembered what they had said to whom. I pondered it some more then left it.

Then I recalled my own expounding grief—near on ten years ago now—where I would lay upon the hearts of my parents the same old and repeated stories; and they would just listen. Stories are the making of us; of our identities. When our identities are stripped bare by grief, we reel from the reality that we have the story yet no basis from which to bear it.

We circle about, within our stories, as if in an aircraft holding pattern, and we look for a place to land. But no place comes into vision.

This poem may help:

***

The depths of despair,

Made poignant in grief,

Are seemingly rare,

Where there’s just no relief.

What helps is the repeating,

The repeating of our story,

It smoothens our soul’s meeting,

With the Healer from Glory.

***

That Healer, pseudonymously identified, is the Lord Jesus Christ. By repeating and rehashing our stories of loss, the hard times, etc., we are granted space and time to ponder our grief with the One who has saved us.

Space and time are all we need—that, and compassion. Such space is not a physical things; it’s spiritual.

Space and time—with the remnants of our shattered identity to piece together—are the resources we need—along with the compassionate support of loving, trusted others.

When we repeat the remnants of our pasts, vacillating between holding on and letting go, God works within us by his grace, in giving us the opportunity to let it go at the proper time.

The proper time we do not know—until it comes with a whirlwind, and then we know! And we are thankful when we can surrender our stories into the safety of divine sanctuary—for keeping until we need them for better reasons next time.

Let’s not condemn ourselves for the retention and repetition of our stories; they are the narrative of our lives and the glue that binds us intact in the midst of our grief.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

The Honour in Heartfelt Lament

“How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever?

How long will you hide your face from me?”

~Psalm 13:1 (NRSV)

It would be a lie to think that accusing God would comprise blasphemy. But many Christians, we can suspect, may feel they have to respect God so much as not to speak a word out of line; out of anger; to not speak their hearts. Why would we hide our words when we cannot hide our desperation and anger?

Yet, being Christian is being in relationship with God.

If there is any relationship that can bear the communication of anger it is our relationship with God that can. The Lord knows we need an outlet, and an outlet that doesn’t hurt others is a premium which God allows through our relationship with him.

What do we experience when we are raw with our honesty before God? When we communicate in tearful words we hear ourselves as God might hear us.

We may sound pathetic, but God has compassion in mind, because of the fact we are leaning on him. Paradoxically, our desperate plea reeks of faith. And faith pleases God.

Real Prayer Is Heartfelt

Perhaps the honour that is due us, that which we, ironically, cannot really feel at the time, is coming because our prayer is heartfelt.

For all the prayers we pray that aren’t heartfelt, we can know now, through comparison with our usual depleted authenticity, the power in God’s grace for this more heartfelt prayer. This power communicates itself to us by an indecipherable healing. Heartfelt prayers are healing prayers.

The Lord can only bless heartfelt prayer. And though we persist in going through the motions on those issues we would like to feel passionate about but aren’t, God would always prefer us to work on our passion first. If we feel led to pray, best we pray for the passion to pray in a heartfelt way.

No Condemnation, But Compassion

If we can see grace as a thing that has no condemnation about it, but is abounding with compassion, we can understand that God honours our heartfelt laments.

If we can hope beyond our present circumstances, to see God’s plan for us beyond the present contempt, we can imagine God is compassionate and non-condemnatory.

If we can dream to the point of possibility, beyond the shadowy ruins of our transient numbness, we embellish our hope and in this God does not disappoint.

There is no condemnation, and only compassion, from God to the heartfelt lamenter.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

Feeling and Healing the Bitterness of Betrayal

We can give our whole lives to something and still feel like it has come to nought. We somehow find ourselves in a place where all we have contributed is being fed to the dogs of war, and there just isn’t any respect for it. What we long fought for is now no longer. The dreams that came to pass, that became real in our sight, those things that changed lives, are now compromised and perhaps made nothing. That’s how we feel.

We give over what we have to God and we ask that God would protect it, but that prayer is not always honoured, and we have no idea why. All we can know is that we gave it our best, and, even though our work is currently being digested as unpalatable and seemingly spat out, our intent will inevitably be blessed. For this we have faith and there is more than cold comfort for the matters that help us move on. And we can move on when we have said goodbye to this once precious venture, as we bid it farewell and ask God to make of it what he will. Our work will not be wasted.

Feeling and healing the bitterness of betrayal is about 1) becoming aware and feeling the feeling, and 2) trusting the Lord enough that we can let go of the bitterness by letting go of everything connected to the history we so long cherish. When we let go, God gives it back to us; cleansed and made powerful in our sight—eventually.

Feeling and healing the bitterness of betrayal is a necessary step before we can truly get on with the next step. It is wisdom to feel and to be healed, but there is surrender involved. God must be Sovereign.

When we have placed God as Sovereign over this issue, and over our entire lives in this season, the bitterness is transformed. We are healed beyond any behaviour on the other side; in fact, the other side rots—if they don’t embark on a journey of healing themselves.

Feeling and healing the bitterness of betrayal is agreeing with the truth. We are hurt or we were hurt. Whatever hurt we have or do experience, we must be honest with it. Only upon honesty will we receive the glorious grace we need for healing, which is always a miraculous work of God.

***

Feeling and healing the bitterness of betrayal is the priority of the person who loves truth. They will be blessed by every work of feeling, by the Almighty’s Presence in the healing.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

Powers for Good and Evil

We learn a lot about a person by the way they use power.

We all have power, some of which we may assume falsely; that which others give us. Then there is the legitimate power we are given; that for which we are responsible and accountable for. It may be the greatest test of life: are we seen and known as trustworthy in the discharge of the powers entrusted to us?

There is a system of thought regarding the use of power, proposed by Rollo May that helps us organise our rationale of whether power is used for good or evil.

Of these powers, the best is integrative and the worst is exploitative. Between these two poles there is nutrient power, competitive power and manipulative power.

***

The best use of power is integrative—where we use power to serve others in uniquely respectful ways. People are safe under this inspiring use of power. They have safe basis for their trust and faith in those who execute power for the good of all.

The next best power is nutrient power—where we expect there is inequality and the person with the power compensates by ensuring growth opportunities for the other abound. A good mentor uses this sort of influence.

The use of competitive power assumes there is equality, but that is not always the case. Indeed, there may be an ebbing and flowing of power, but where competitive structures flow freely there may be little cohesion between ‘sides’ and even less harmony within either side.

The more overtly destructive powers are those of the manipulative and exploitative types. Manipulative power is covert and may come disguised in friendlier ways than is purposed. Exploitative power is overt and is the type of power that defies the entire world looking on. Yet abuse and neglect are rooted in both manipulative and exploitative powers. These are inherently evil powers that we ought always to be on the lookout for.

Committing to Integrative and Nutrient Powers

There is so much to be said for these inspiring bases of power.

Existing under such structures implies safety, security, learning and enjoyment—life.

Where we have power we are called to discern when we should be integrative—to be inclusive in sharing the power—and when we should use nutrient power—when to teach, instruct, mentor and coach.

Using these two powers is not about us; we have put our own selfish desires to the side.

What to do About Manipulative and Exploitative Powers

There is a good case, here, for reporting. All good systems and structures have reporting inbuilt. Mature reporting systems allow for complete disclosure in safety, but they also put the onus on truth, so people can’t be reported and treated punitively without cause.

We are all responsible for flushing out people and power bases that misuse, abuse or neglect power.

***

Power is not necessarily evil. Many use power in good ways; where there is an integrating of the embodiment of life and where learning is facilitated. We need to be watchful, however, for manipulative and exploitative uses of power. When power is given it is given for God’s purposes and for the extension of God’s Kingdom.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

The Ministry of Building-Up

Never underestimate the power of an encouraging word,

From a mentor or someone trusted, we feel freer than a bird,

Come on now, you know it, there’s no reason to wait,

Today is the moment; it’s never too late.

***

Discouragement is the language of fear, and there are many these days that feel inadequate inside; who insist on propagating their fear because of the discouragement of others. Our call is to get beyond these and go on into receiving our encouragement through trusted mentors or by being the trusted mentor; the person who can be relied upon to give good news to those who need it.

We all need to be encouraged. In a world where acceptance and rejection are hardly more poignant, encouragement works for the mode of acceptance, but discouragement works perhaps more destructively than we can imagine by matters of rejection.

Of course, in the right environment discouragement can be the best thing. Sometimes discouragement urges us on and pushes us where we need to be pushed.

But the vast majority of the time there is ample discouragement; yes, too much. We are burdened and broken down with life, and we all need our encouragement.

Becoming Committed to the Ministry of Building-Up

It is a noble quest to commit ourselves to the unpaid and unrecognised ministry of building others up; to express the gift of encouragement anyone can give.

It is good for us, very good for other people, and so pleasing to God to do this.

Becoming committed to the ministry of building others up is a gospel quest, where the gospel of God finds its relevance in love through intentions, words, and actions.

When we are committed to such a ministry we find ourselves surrendered within the abundance of the Spirit’s inimitable joy. Once we have surrendered, surrender feels perfectly natural; our default response. It therefore feels natural and the right thing to do and God confirms it. God does confirm it.

***

The ministry of building-up is about construction, cooperation and confirmation. When we understand that people in our midst are the construction projects of God, we cooperate with his Spirit and we provide confirmation as to their validity as thinking, feeling human beings.

The ministry of building-up is about encouragement. Not everyone has the ‘gift’ of encouragement, but everyone has a role to encourage those around them; to obey the will of God.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

Making Time Work Through Margins

“You can’t do traditional work at a modern pace. Traditional work has traditional rhythms. You need calm. You can be busy, but you must remain calm.”

— BILL BUFORD

We are so tempted to cram more into our already busy lives we give in to such temptation eventually. We take on this thing and that thing and we wonder why we run spare on time; we wonder why we have no time for the important issues of life, like family and quality time (which always translates in quantity time at the right time in the right ways).

Time is a mathematical prospect. It is finite and logical. Yet we assume and expect it to be abstract; something that is mouldable around our priorities and needs.

We tend to make more expectations of our time than we have time.

But we can smash open the terrific mystery of time if we work against the role of our expectations; if we can build in margins into our days, like margins on a page, where there is whitespace in our lives to gain perspective and to enjoy reflection.

If we do not build time into our schedules for reflection in order to gain perspective we are on the way to crashing and burning. Only this way is it possible to be busy, yet remain calm.

Right-Sizing Time

If we are to enjoy the regular 80-year life, we need love, we need to love, and we need hope. These are philosophical and spiritual facts. But one fact of our practical lives is our need to right-size time.

First, as I’ve mentioned above, we must get our expectations right and not expect too much of our time; not be driven to achieve more than we can; to be realistic.

Second, we must build margins into our lives. I quickly learned in the secular world that three full days of appointments in a five day period was unrealistic; I just found there was not enough time to do the important work behind the scenes. I quickly realised I could do one full day of appointments per week and two half days like this. I needed margins in the other days and half days. Between hour appointments I would need at least one half hour to plan for the next one, to have time to go the toilet without rushing, and just simply to slow down and become myself again.

We find when we build margins into our busy lives that we don’t lose anything; but we do gain time for reflection and the gift, therefore, of perspective.

***

Making our time work for us is about getting our expectations right and then building in margins so there is enough free space for reflection and the gaining of perspective. When we achieve this, we are able to be busy and calm at the same time.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

Smashing the Upside Down World of Addiction

“When you can stop you don’t want to, and when you want to stop, you can’t.”

— LUKE DAVIES

I used to prefer the term ‘dependence’ to ‘addiction’, perhaps because to admit I had an addiction was to admit a shameful weakness. Surely dependence was a more dignifying way of describing my pattern of alcohol usage. I have been ‘dependent’ on other things as well, but it was alcohol that took me into this upside down reality most poignantly.

You know you’re addicted when you face times when you can stop but you don’t want to or when you want to stop but you can’t.

What a horrible reality it is that there are times when we have the motivation but not the wherewithal or times when we have the resources to do something yet not the motivation.

Until something desperate happens we rarely take the step we need to; as it occurs in addiction.

What we need most of all is something that will shake us to our core.

We need something that will turn our upside down addicted reality upside down. There is nothing better than the kingdom of God to provide this reverse upside down reality.

God uses rock bottom experiences in convicting us there is no other way but over and through the present weakness that has taken us to this very rock bottom.

And conviction (the Holy Spirit’s conviction) is the thing we need—to be convicted that there is no other way but to take the hardest road to the best possible vision of a new life beyond this entrapping weakness that controls our lives.

If we are one who lives with an addicted person—no matter their addiction—because the manifestation of all addictions is similar—we have gotten used to feelings of the forlorn. We have given up so many times on the distant hope that our partners would get better. They promised again and again and again, and again and again and again they failed. If they were kicked in the guts we were stabbed in the guts.

The best thing for the upside down world of addiction is the upside down role of the truth that smashes the upside down world into a billion pieces. Truth sets free, but truth requires strength and a world of faith to thrive when pitted against addiction.

The worst thing can become the best thing, but only if we surrender wholeheartedly to the God of our creation. And truth must be the form of our surrender; that we are, indeed, honest against ourselves when we need to be.

***

Addiction is an upside down reality, where we don’t want what we can’t stop but we can’t live without it. We need two things to overcome it: 1) for God, by our circumstances, to institute a rock bottom experience; and 2) for the sheer will to be wholeheartedly honest in tackling the truth so as to overcome this nemesis one day at a time by faith.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.