Hearing the Voice of God

I was raised as a Christian under an ideology that taught me that the God of creation speaks. This concept wasn’t necessarily the basis of my faith in God, but it was a thread that was woven into my relationship and understanding of who God is. “Hearing the Voice of God” was not a class that was taught in my Bible College nor a prerequisite to receiving my ordination.  Yet the ability to hear from God was a measurable marker in my development as a person of faith as well as a spiritual leader.  

The idea that “God speaks” is a foundational pillar of Christianity that has its origins in the creation story.  In Genesis 1, God speaks the world into existence. “God said, let there be…” and “there was.”  God then speaks and creates man, and then speaks to man as they walk in the garden together.  The instruction God gives man leads to the fall and we learn within the first few pages of the story that obedience (or disobedience) leads to life or to death.  From the very beginning, God speaks and interacts with humanity. This theme continues throughout the story of the Bible from Adam and Noah, to Abraham the father of the faith.  God speaks to the prophets and even in and through the life and ministry of Jesus.

Christianity aside, I think it’s fair to assume that most people who would identify themselves somewhere on the spiritual spectrum would agree that God speaks in one way or another.  Spirituality is birthed at the crossroads of humanity intersecting with Spirit. This intersection takes root in a greater power or energy that exists within the universe or within yourself. A spiritual person lives in harmony, connecting to Spirit and hopefully finds peace within their relationship and communication with God, however that is defined.

As I've been on this journey of deconstructing and reconstructing my faith, I've spent a lot of time exploring this beautiful characteristic of God considering my experiences. If you, like me, spent time in similar faith circles you might relate to some of the challenges that this brought into a relationship with God. 

Everyday conversation in my previous faith community included phrases like “God told me to... (fill in the blank)”.  Or “Wait for a word from God before you (do anything).” There was a lot of emphasis on seeking God to discover God’s will for your life and doing it. This was the rhythm that was created in a life of faith. Seek God, get a word from God, then do the thing God told you to do and be blessed. Sounds simple, right?   

It becomes complicated when you are taught that “doing God’s will” is crucial to living a life of faith and receiving the promise and provision of God. Just like in Genesis, obeying or disobeying could have significant repercussions in my life. Being “out of God’s will” was dangerous as it took me out from under God’s protection here on earth as well as could jeopardize the eternity of my soul. The will of God was this mysterious compelling force that presumably catapulted you into the plans God had for your life.  I both feared and loved this God who somehow held the secrets of my destiny like a hand of cards that he revealed one play at a time. I was supposed to trust that the cards were good. If I was dealt a bad hand, no worries, God would work it all together for my good. Because it was all a part of God’s plan, right? I believed this at a very core level. Learning to hear the voice of God was more than just prayer and communion with God, it was one of the core disciplines that would determine the success of my spiritual life and whether or not God would find it worthy.  

I was taught that God speaks primarily through the Bible, and oftentimes through the Holy Spirit that lives inside of me. There was the occasional coincidence or sign that “might” be God speaking, and God could even speak through other people that exercise spiritual gifts of prophecy, words of knowledge or words of wisdom. If there was any confusion about whether or not God had spoken, the Bible was the final authority. "Take the word from God to the word of God!" (I'll save the unpacking of that statement for another day.)

The message was that I shouldn’t trust my heart, my emotions, my flesh or my own understanding because I am a mere human. Being human made me sinful and wicked and in desperate need of God to save me from myself. Somehow, I was to follow the “leading of the Spirit” based on a “spiritual word or feeling” yet at the same time I wasn’t to trust my own feelings. It was a complicated dance that was measured by the authority of the scriptures.  The bible was supposed to be the fallback. A collection of stories written down over hundreds of years and compiled into a book by a group of men who decided what was and wasn’t sacred was supposed to confirm if God told me to marry someone, go to college or take a job.

The challenge in living a life of "hearing from God" is that it isn't as black and white as you would expect it to be. Tangled up in the best of intentions to do the “right things” were messages that I could be in God’s will one day, but out of it the next. It gave God ultimate control and painted an image of a God that dangled carrots and did magic tricks to provide but only if I was obedient and worthy. I had to please God with obedience to see the blessing of God.

For a lot of years, this game I watched God play at the table of my life felt like my “purpose”. I would wait and see what card was played next to determine what my next step was. Somehow this translated as being “spiritual” and “faithful”.  I held very loosely to my possessions and traveled the world for Jesus. I often would use every resource I had for ministry. I moved my entire life to another country and even got engaged to a man because I was convinced God “told” me to. I frequently prioritized ministry/church over family functions, I put myself and others in potentially dangerous situations… and called it a life of faithful service to God. 

As I sit here writing these things, hindsight is not 20/20 for me. I wish that it was. I wish I could look back at that season of blind faith and “obedience” to what I thought was the “call of God in my life” and define for you exactly what was and what wasn’t God.  It has taken me a long time to untangle the messages that were woven into my early experiences in Christianity while still holding in the same hand the beliefs I have about a God who is present and loving and still speaks to me today.  

What happens when you are sure you are doing all the “obedient” things, but the blessing of God doesn’t come? What happens when things don’t turn out the way you thought “God promised” they would? Did we miss the mark? Is God punishing disobedience?  If that is how it works, what does that say about God?

The process is complex and messy, both painful and beautiful. There was a time I held so tight to the mess because I didn't think I could let it go without throwing away the God that I know and love. It simply isn't true. Little by little, I've learned to loosen my grip and let wonder and the possibility of God into the mess. I've been able to reconnect and open my heart and mind to the ideas that God isn't black or white, and maybe there isn't a determined path of right and wrong turns. Maybe the path is simply a messy, overgrown garden and walking it is simply a series of choices we make with God as we discover and wonder and create.  I write these words and share them in this space because even though I don't have it all figured out yet, I know God lives in this mess. God loves me, in this mess. God still speaks, in the mess. 

Refuge

“God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. Therefore, we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging. There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy place where the Most High dwells. God is within her; she will not fall; God will help her at break of day.” (Psalm 46:1-5)

Port Au Prince, Haiti, January 12, 2010.  I remember sitting outside the guest house the evening of the earthquake. We sat under the gazebo for hours waiting for the next aftershock to hit, listening to the people cry out in fear as the ground would move, waiting to see if it was a minor rumble or if the whole ground would roll and quake as it did that afternoon. We watched the water in the pool splash around with every aftershock like a glass of water being sloshed in an unsteady hand.  Fruit kept falling from the trees and we would back away from the structures as we waited for more buildings to fall.  We sat together in the courtyard, struggling to respond to the terror we experienced driving through Port Au Prince to get back to our guest house. The city was in collapse and people everywhere were wounded, dying and dead. People were trying to reach their loved ones in the rubble, desperate for a miracle or at least some sign of hope that they were alive. Parents carrying broken babies, loved ones being carried out and wrapped in bloody blankets. People seeing the white missionaries and approaching our vehicle, begging for a ride to the hospital or some kind of help as it was determined that even the hospital was in ruin. We were not a medical team, we were there to teach and equip pastors, evangelize and work on the school sponsorship project. As I watched the horror around me it became apparent to me that this “call” on my life to help people in poverty wasn’t enough. We came to “help Haiti” and I had never felt so inadequate and unprepared as I did in that moment. The God inside of me wasn’t enough to save anyone. Prayer seemed ridiculous and the miracles were not coming, it wasn’t enough.

Our vehicle eventually carried us back to the compound where we were staying, and the guest house was still standing. This gave a false sense of security and assurance to many of the missionaries that were staying there. After much discussion and against my better judgement, everyone eventually decided to sleep inside the guest house when it grew dark. I was convinced another tremor would bring the building down and I tried to convince everyone to stay outside through the night with me. We all had seen the cracks in the walls, yet everyone seemed convinced that the worst of the shaking was over, and the building would stand.   I was not convinced; I was terrified we would become trapped beneath it with one quick shake of whatever unsteady hand was holding the earth and causing the world to tremble.

I sat awake all night in a lawn chair reading my Bible, clinging to the “power” of the Word of God. I believed at that time that I could speak peace into the chaos and that God was going to show up and save us. Jesus spoke to the storm; I was going to speak to the earth.  God was going to “be my ever-present help in times of trouble” because “God was within me, and I would not fall”.  I waited and waited for the presence of God to come in power and calm my storm. But all that came was more fear, and more aftershocks.  I wish I could tell you that God was absent that night. It would make the memory easier to digest and the story simple to tell. The truth is I had this overwhelming sense that God was with me, even though it seemed God was doing absolutely nothing at all.

As the night grew dark, I heard voices lifting up songs of praise and prayer. The sound was coming from the city outside of the compound walls.  A local church in the community gathered for an overnight prayer vigil that lasted until dawn. They cried out to God and their songs filled the streets alongside the cries of grief and desperation as people were being dug out from the rubble.  These beautiful Haitian songs of prayer would turn to cries and screams every time another aftershock shook the earth. The seconds of shaking felt like eternity, and I’d watch the pool water splash and wait for the buildings around me to come down. When the earth would become still and the screams would grow quiet, the voices of prayer and praise would fill the streets again and I imagined them covering the city like rain. Rain that flooded and filled every crack in the ground, creeping into the deepest, darkest, most desperate places where people were trapped and suffering. In my mind I imagined my faith joining with theirs as I read the psalms aloud in the courtyard until the dawn broke. I waited all night believing that somehow my rescuing God would come and save us all. Reality was nothing like my imagination.  The sun came up. The singing stopped. The rescue efforts continued, and the bodies of those lost began to pile up on the sides of the road.  

I took my first mission trip at 18 years of age in 2001.  I had just graduated high school and had dived deep into a charismatic experience at the invitation of a friend at school my junior year.  It was as though I had encountered an “amazing grace” experience in real time and God not only found my lost soul and “saved” me, but God was also active, alive, inspirational and in every corner of my reality.  I found what felt like a supernatural confidence in my connection to this God who loved me and accepted me and wiped away all my sin. This supernatural God who loved, provided, protected, and would never leave me was the connection and companionship I thought I had been missing my whole life.  Looking back, this idea was a thread that wove through my development both as an adult and as a person of faith. It influenced my call and growth into ministry for many years. I believed no bad thing could touch me if I was following God, because God would always provide a way out. I was untouchable because of God’s mighty protection. I had built my life around missions and ministry and traveled the world for over 10 years before Haiti.  The day that moved the earth beneath my feet also began the crumbling of these spiritual pillars of faith that I had built my entire life upon.  

I didn’t realize it at the time, but this belief and assurance of safety was the foundation to my faith. The crumbling of this spiritual pillar is what began my deconstruction process. I had wrapped my sense of worth, security and even identity around this false sense of safety and assurance that God was a protector, and I was somehow “chosen”.  This was the spiritual house that I lived in for many, many years as a person in ministry.  This spiritual home was destroyed in 2010. I didn’t realize it at the time, but this is when I became a spiritual refugee.  Looking back, it felt more like I had been orphaned than a victim of war or devastation. I wasn’t forced to leave my homeland. Rather I felt I was abandoned and left to navigate a world I no longer recognized.  God wasn’t who I thought he was. I was wrong, and I was alone.

It was a humbling experience coming back home to MN. Our luggage and personal items were left behind as we were evacuated days later on a cargo plane out of the US embassy. The baggage of emotional and spiritual trauma was more than we could carry and weighed us down and took up more space than any suitcase could. Our churches “praised God” for our return and we were greeted with hugs, tears and words of “thanking God for saving our lives” and awe at the “plans God had for us” since our lives were spared. People meant well, but all I really heard at the time was that God chose who lived and who died, that I should accept and be grateful that my life was somehow determined more worthy than the thousands of people piled up on the roads in Haiti.  God protected me.  I came home with a broken arm and an expectation to be grateful for the call of God in my life because “God had more for me to do. Praise the Lord!”  But what about them? God didn’t have more for them to do? What kind of God wipes thousands of people off the planet because they aren’t useful? Were they born to suffer and die? Who the hell is this guy, and how did I think God was good and a refuge if the people I thought he was trying to "save" were disposable?

Suddenly this safe, loving God became terrifying and unpredictable, and I had no idea what to do with that revelation. This new information began to unravel everything I had ever thought I knew about God.  If I couldn’t depend on a God who would protect me, who was this God really?  If God doesn’t rescue and isn’t in control, then what else doesn’t God do?  It was a house of cards, pull one card out and the rest come crashing down. The understanding of my faith and all the things I thought I knew about God began to come apart at the seams.

This was only the beginning of over a decade of exploring, grieving, asking hard questions.  I remember wishing more than once that I could just throw this whole “Christianity” thing out the window. That I could just choose not to believe anymore and start over completely.  The problem was that I had experienced too much to go back. Woven into all of these false, privileged beliefs I had clung to so tightly was my reality and personal relationship with the God of the Universe that I knew was real.  I had seen the love of God heal, rebuild and bring hope too many times. I knew the embrace of God’s almost tangible presence and the power of the cross had changed my life.   Even in the darkest nights of my life, God was there. I couldn’t throw that away, you couldn’t talk me out of it, God was real. So, what now?

Maybe it was my naivety, or the charismatic bubble I had lived in at the time, but I had sincerely expected God to show up as a knight in shining armor that first night in Haiti. I had all the faith in the world that if I could just pray or believe enough that God would show up. That didn’t happen. I expected the chaos to respond to the spoken word and the tangible presence of God to drive out the fear and terror I was experiencing.  That didn’t happen either.  Even though I didn’t feel God, or see God do anything, I still knew deep down that God was with me. 

It was a confusing experience, and living in that tension began to break up the ground of my spiritual foundation. I didn't know it at the time, but this was the process that needed to happen before I could let the roots of my authentic spirituality begin to dig deep again. It’s taken years to see life come up from the ground again in my own life and ministry.  

As I’ve journeyed through deconstructing my faith, I’ve evolved and reconstructed many of my core beliefs that crumbled.  My foundation is no longer built on a predictable God who promises provision, safety and answers.  My faith it is built on a God who is present with me, a God who brings life to the seeds of faith sown as I have taken small steps courageously to trust and try again.

Jesus came to earth. Emmanual; God with us. What we have read about him is that he was surrounded by people who were suffering or in need of miracles. We read in the Bible that Jesus healed, fed people, worked signs and miracles and even raised Lazarus from the dead. His message was one of love and acceptance, or seeing others as God sees them. He responded to the people and modeled for us a life of presence. We see the highlights, the miracles, the moments in time where Jesus was able to meet a need and touch a life.  God showed up in the lives of people in the Gospel stories in miraculous and incredible ways.  Then Jesus died, leaving the holy spirit and a great commission for the disciples to continue the work Jesus did.  The disciple took their place in history and carried the message of Jesus, commissioning others to continue the work of Jesus, and that rhythm has carried us all the way to present day. 

I love the Bible, but it can be deceptive if interpreted in the wrong light.  I had been living my life of faith and limiting my understanding of how God shows up to the highlight reels I read about in the Gospels and the Book of Acts.  What we read about healing and miracles was temporary.  Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, which is incredible, but Lazarus still died sometime later.  His family had to say goodbye, again. For every person that Jesus healed, hundreds, maybe thousands of others suffered.  Jesus fed 5000, but millions were dying from poverty and went hungry.  How does that work? Did Jesus have favorites, or do we just simply only know in part what God was doing? Does it make the life and ministry of Jesus any less miraculous because it wasn’t predictable or logical?

I made the words of a book (the Bible) into a faith formula that I expected to work like a law of physics or a math equation.  A + B =C. God is not a math equation, God is not limited to my logic or understanding, God isn’t limited to the Bible or a measure of faith and expectation. The truth is we know in part, which is why faith is found in wonder, in curiosity, in potential. When we look at God through a lens of possibility instead of expectation, it leaves room for life and pain and beauty to grow us all up in the knowledge that God is with us.  

The Barefoot Pursuit continues...The "Comeback Tour"

It's me, again. This time it is 2024 me.

It's been 9 years or so since I've written or even really looked much at this blog. I'm pretty sure my words have sat here on this site like the pages of a dusty old journal that was forgotten on the very top of the bookshelf or fallen behind the dresser. 

There was a time I loved to think and study and wrestle with spiritual ideas and theology. I would spend hours trying to put words to the inspiration I felt, and I'd post my ideas and wonderings about God, the world, and my place in it.  I loved theology from the moment I began to understand that God was actually more than an idea or some far away entity.  I began to own my faith as a teenager in high school. It didn't take me very long to jump into Christianity and ministry with both feet. I grew in my understanding of Christianity under the influence of Evangelical and Charismatic leaders who loved and supported me and the call I felt to serve in ministry. My foundations of faith were formed under the teachings of these leaders who taught me how to interpret the Bible and love and serve God in the ways that they did.   

I loved my life, back then. I loved going to Bible School, I loved doing missionary work overseas and working with people living in poverty. I loved working with kids and young people and leading mission teams to other countries.  I was absolutely thriving in this season of my life for about 10 years, until I wasn't. 

I survived a natural disaster that shook my faith and all I thought I knew about God.  My connection to ministry and church changed as I became unable to continue functioning in ministry the way I once could. The things I had learned and believed about God and the Bible didn't make sense to me the way they once did. My relationships and community began to shift as my faith began to deconstruct. I left my position in ministry and essentially lost almost all of the relationships that I had worked with for all those years. More and more I realized that so many of the things I had believed about God were not as simple and black and white as I had been taught. I wandered in this wilderness for a long time, slowly rebuilding and reconsidering what I believed about God and the call I felt in my life to work in ministry. 

It's a long story; but one that I am ready to tell. 

Fast forward a lot of years, a husband and two kids later...we finally found a faith community that shared many of our values, a church where we could reconnect and grow both spiritually and in community. Fast forward a few more years, and I've found myself in a new season working in church again.  I've found a home in a Presbyterian Church (USA) in Blaine that my family absolutely loves. I serve as the Director of Family Ministries, and I get to spend my time loving students and finding creative ways to teach and connect them to a God who loves them while being surrounded by an amazing faith community. 

The spiritual paths I have walked with my Christianity have been filled with twists & turns, blind spots & break downs. I've gotten lost and been found more times than I can count.  I've wrestled through deconstructing and reconstructing my beliefs about God, the church and my spirituality. I've been in a process of healing from my own trauma and my journey through a spiritual wilderness. By grace and with a little bit or courage, I've managed to find my way back into ministry and a faith community again. It's been both painful and beautiful.

My hope is to revive this blog as a safe, sacred space to share my journey and connect with other people who may relate to some of my story or be looking for a space to share theirs. I find the more I grow in my faith that I have more questions than I have answers.  That is what makes this faith thing both profound and ridiculous, messy and beautiful.

A Barefoot Pursuit of a King: I started this blog years ago with the desire to create a safe space to process and have conversations about this beautiful journey of faith I had found myself on.  I called it a 'barefoot' pursuit because I had this image of myself traveling down a gravel path, barefoot. One foot in front of the other, my feet feeling the gravel beneath them as I stumble onward, feeling the sharp rocks cut into my skin and the dirt clinging to my exposed toes as I put one clumsy foot in front of the other. My pursuit is of a "king" because the Jesus I love was called "king" both at the beginning and the end of his life in the scriptures.  This "king" has been the source and center of my spiritual journey. 

I hope you will find safety and sacred space here and maybe even the courage to jump into this mess with me.