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35 is…All the Way Live?!

Hello World!!!

“Forty is so old the only time I will ever be referred to as a young man for the rest of my life is if I die at 40,” said comedian Chris Rock in an interview with the now deceased Ed Bradley of “60 Minutes” on the night before Rock hosted the Oscars in 2005.

     As I write this post on my 35th b-day, all I can say is at least I’m not 40…Now my blog is supposed to be about faith after the altar call, and a post about my birthday may seem to be off topic – but it’s really not when I think about it. If I’m supposed to believe that life is supposed to get better, rather than worse, after 35, that’s a real act of faith (at least for me).

     Five years ago, just a month or so before my 30th b-day, my father and I sat in the living room of my parents’ home and talked about my impending b-day. As we talked, tears fell down my face. Yes, it really happened! My dad, a sympathetic man in most cases, looked at me as his head turned sideways and said, “What’s going to happen when you really get old?” I said nothing as the tears continued to slide down my face.

     A few months after I turned 30, the movie “13 Going on 30” starring Jennifer Garner came out. I ADORED the movie for many reasons!!! (If you haven’t seen it, you must – particularly if you are nearing 30 years old.) But my absolute favorite thing about the movie was this slogan “Thirty, Flirty and Thriving!” After I saw the movie, I said to myself, “Well maybe 30 isn’t so bad.”

     Today, five years later, I wonder what slogan or quip will help me frame this b-day in my mind. I’ve decided that “35 is all the way Live!” Can I get a loud “Amen?” (Maybe that will help me really believe it, ha,ha.) Seriously though, as I have pondered this birthday almost since just after I turned 34 years old, I have wondered how I’m supposed to see things. Let’s face it. Yes, I have advanced in my career (at least somewhat). Yes, I know more about myself than I ever have. Yes, I know God…But is that supposed to make up for rapidly graying hair that I have been dying cherry red almost since just after I turned 30? (My family grays early.) Is that supposed to make up for skin that already is starting to look not as taut although I work out on a regular basis? Is that supposed to make up for the fact that when me and my girls go out and try to “style and profile,” there is a group of similar girls that are hotter than we are just because they are still in their 20s? Goodness, I sound shallow, but don’t act like you haven’t had similar thoughts if you’re a female…self awareness ain’t everything!!!

     Jokes aside, yes, there are some downsides to getting older, but I actually do cherish the fact that I’m more confident in my own skin than I was in my ’20s although the previous paragraphs don’t support that. And for the record, I look 10 years younger anyway, according to a college student I met yesterday at a journalism convention. When I told her that my 35th b-day was the next day, unprompted, she said, “Wow, I thought you were 25!” I wanted to hug her. (Ironically, her name is Imani-so maybe that was God’s way of giving me a dose of faith after all, ha,ha!) But back to my more philosophical conclusion, I do revel in the fact that I’m more confident in my own skin than I have ever been before, and I thank God that He continues to reveal more to me about true self everyday and His purpose for my life- if that makes sense.

     So in keeping with my made up slogan, I have decided to be who I truly am – without apology or affectedness. What does that mean? For me, that means I will be the same person wherever I go…I have this habit of tailoring myself to fit whatever crowd I’m hanging out with at a given time – sometimes that’s the “cool” crowd or the “not so cool” crowd. (Yes, an element of that, unfortunately, still exists after high school.) Sometimes, it’s the black crowd and sometimes it’s the not black crowd. Sometimes, it’s the “Godly” crowd, sometimes it’s the “not so Godly” crowd.   I’m not going to do that anymore – or at least I will try.

     I just want to be me…I just want to live the way I truly am on the inside. I just want to be person that God has created me to be. Maybe “35 is all the way Live!” As you ponder that, check out this song, “It’s all the Way Live,” by Lakeside below. Any thoughts?

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Crazy For God?!

 

Hello World!!!

 

It’s my first post, yeah!!!

 

Okay, back to business…

 

     “Crazy for God.” When I first saw this title in an Asheville bookstore just over a month ago, I knew I had to at least stop and take a look at the book.  After I got closer to the book, read the subtitle of the book and thumbed through its pages, I knew I had to buy the book. Once I got back home to Georgia later that evening and started reading the book, I knew I had to write about this book and some of the concepts that were presented in the book in my first post on this blog.

 

     The full title of the book is “Crazy for God: How I Grew Up as one of the Elect, Helped Found the Religious Right, and Lived to Take all (or almost all) of it Back.” It is written by Frank Schaeffer. Now there is some great dish on some of the Religious Right that we are familiar with this in country, which may be compelling information as we are in the midst of a vigorous election cycle, but that is not really why I found this book so compelling. (If you want to get the gossip, you’re going to have to buy the book. J)

 

     Frank Schaeffer is the son of famous American evangelicals Francis and Edith Schaeffer who founded Switzerland’s L’Abri, an idealistic community that attracted spiritual seekers from all over the world – a kind of Christian hippie community. Essentially, his parents, who are now deceased, were missionaries, and Schaeffer reveals much of their lives as well as his own in the memoir. The premise of the book is that his “parents’ call to ministry actually drove them crazy.” “I think religion was actually their source of tragedy. Mom tried to dress, talk, and act like anything but what she was. Dad looked flustered if fundamentalists, especially Calvinist theologians, would intrude into a discussion and try to steer it away from art or philosophy so they could discuss the finer points of arcane theology.”

 

     I am a Christian. I am also the daughter and granddaughter of ministers. I have two to three uncles (depending on who you ask in the family) who are ministers. Growing up in Christianity, I felt attracted to it and repelled by it at the same time. And sometimes I still do. I love the Jesus that is presented in the Bible, but sometimes Christians can seem crazy or just plain weird. According to his book, Schaeffer and I are “kindred spirits” in that he was both attracted and repelled by Christianity. Schaeffer does a good job of presenting some examples of some crazy and weird Christians. And he also discusses some Christian concepts that nearly drove him crazy as well.

 

     I heard about witnessing all of my life, and apparently Schaeffer did too. Here is an excerpt of his take on witnessing. “Everything we did was to be a witness. (To ‘witness’ was to ‘share Christ.’; in other words, talk about your faith in hopes that you would convince the other person listening to convert. To witness also meant to live in such a way that people would ‘see Christ” in you and want to convert because your life was so admirable.) People’s eternal destinies hinged on a word or tiny event, maybe on no more than an unfriendly look. Even an improperly served high tea on Sunday afternoon could send someone to hell.” He essentially said that his parents’ instruction about witnessing made him second guess his every action from eating to playing with his childhood friends and their eternal consequences.

 

     Okay, I don’t know anything about high tea, but I, like Schaeffer, have always been instructed since I was a child that I am to live my life as a witness of Jesus Christ so that others people would be inspired to convert to Christianity. Wow! I don’t know about you, but I don’t want anyone (including myself) watching me all of the time. Although I have been consciously trying to live as a Christian since 1996, I still mess up a lot, and sometimes, I mess up in a big way, so if you’re looking at my life as a roadmap to Heaven, be prepared to make some hellish detours from time to time. A friend once told me that she admired my faith in Christ. I asked her to explain more. She said that sometimes she could almost see an angel on one shoulder and a devil on the other shoulder. She said that sometimes I listened to the devil, but I eventually listened to the angel. I smile every time I think about her statement. So at best, I am a witness to earnest imperfection.

 

     Another persistent theme in the book is his parents’ visible struggle between living what they thought a Christian life should look like or the bohemian existence which is what they really wanted to live. In the book, Schaeffer describes a girl named Lynette who gave up dancing to be a Christian and how his mother rejoiced when she heard the news. However, in her old age, Schaeffer’s mother loved to dance to that “jazzy music” [that was] banned from our home when I was young: if we were changing radio stations and hit upon any of the tunes she sings so gleefully in old age, Mom would turn off the radio with a snap and reproachful stare. In the early unreconstructed fundamentalist years, Mom always said ‘Real Christians don’t dance. It isn’t pleasing to the Lord.’”

 

     I have felt this tension as well. As a child, I somehow got the message that dancing in general was not encouraged, and in particular, dancing to secular music was frowned upon. That message is one of the reasons that I resisted the whole Christian thing when I was in college. I just couldn’t see myself not going to parties and shakin’ it  fast and watching myself, ha,ha! I know that being a Christian involves self sacrifice – that theme is throughout the Bible. But thankfully, according to my relationship with God, that doesn’t mean that I have to give up listening to secular music or dancing to it. It is so irritating when I come across Christians that feel that you should never listen to secular music. On any given day, I may be blasting Canton Jones or Lil Wayne in my car. And as an artist, I feel that that I have to have the freedom to explore any avenue that I may find interesting. (Of course, there are exceptions, e-mail me if you want to know more.) I really don’t feel that God wants to squelch that impulse within me.

 

 

     And what about religious paraphernalia? Some of it is downright weird Schaeffer talks about some of the paraphernalia sold at a booth at a Christian Booksellers Association convention years ago. He described items at the booth which were “copied from the secular world, but made bizarrely religious.” He described the “evangelical version of the ‘Budweiser’ towel, a rip-off of the then-popular Budweiser commercial ‘This Bud’s for You!’ There was a lookalike beer on it with two crucified hands and the logo, ‘This Blood’s for You!’ being offered at the convention. It was very popular.” How crazy is that?

 

     And to be honest, sometimes I really cannot stand to listen to some Christian songs. Apparently, Schaeffer has experienced the same distaste for some Christian music. “I wished God had never made any men or women with a ‘ministry in music.’ I wished he’d strike them all down so I’d never have to spend another minute listening to another fat lady (even the men were ‘fat ladies’ to me) sing another Jesus-is-my boyfriend song to synthesized violin playback.” I’ve experienced that same phenomenon in which people (in particular women) try to equate their relationship with God as a relationship with a spouse or boyfriend. When I turn to the empty side of my bed on some nights, I am not thinking that Jesus could be my man. That’s ridiculous! Can I get an “Amen!” from my saved, single and smart ladies?

 

     I really enjoyed reading this book, and I could pull out more points, but I don’t want to seem like I’m bashing Christianity. I love God with all of my heart, soul and mind, but I’m not “Crazy for God,” thank God! Any thoughts?