I am gazing ahead into 2022 and all I see is the love of God that never fails (1 Corinthians 13:8). Segments of 2021 made me feel broken, shattered, to pieces, completely unwound, but I am whole in Christ. I am one whole child of God, whollly and unconditionally loved.
I walk by faith and not by sight, because Christ is at my side, ready to catch me if I stumble (” For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways.”Psalm 91:11)
I am covered in the full armor of God, (Ephesian 6:10-18)
I am rooted and grouned in love. (Ephesians 3:17)
I am chosen (Ephesians 1:4)
These truths are all reason to go into 2022 with a sound mind. We anchored in the love of the lover of our souls, and if this be the case, then we will not waver, not even unto death.
Today I bought some frozen pillsbury southern style biscuits, ones that taste closest to my own homemade biscuits made from scratch, —that is when I get up the nerve to gather raw ingredients and do all “dirty work” involved in making biscuits. Along with them, I bought Bonne Maman Strawberry preserves and ordered clotted cream. Phew. It felt good to finally do something that takes me right back, front and center stage, to the living room of my tiny apartment in San Antonio, Texas where God would move so much, and the aroma of all things home permeated my apartment.
It was where I hosted girlfriends, shepherding them directly to the heart of God, which I believe to be healing, and enjoyed piping hot cups of tea with a side of buttery biscuits or scones and preserves.
Tea, as it happens, is actually so inexpensive to host with. It goes a long way, feels like home, and has healing properties. There is nothing better in my opinion to accompany a cup of tea than a biscuit or a scone. Both are so subtle in nature, only inviting you to have as much or as little as you need at a time. “Come home”, they whisper. “But only when you’re ready.”
Instead of having had to make my way home, home came to me in the form of these biscuits. It is hard for me to fathom what a sacred act I made of eating and serving biscuits and tea. What a sacred place I made of my home throughout the series of conversations in which God made himself real to my friends and I. I still thirst endlessly for intimate moments like those again, and for genuine encounters with God.
This is all significant because it has been difficult making Denver home again. I’ve moved to several different properties and experienced a host of changes since arriving here in July 2020. I’ve fought tooth and nail to create home everywhere I’ve gone, and most things have not come close to what I created over the years in San Antonio. Yet God, in his perfect timing, and by his grace alone allowed me to stumble upon these biscuits at my local grocer, and to be thus brought mysteriously home into the sacredness of a tradition I created: Biscuits and Tea.
Creating Deepest Fellowship
I believe most ardently that there is a profound sacredness in breaking bread together. We even see so in the way that Christ blesses us in partaking in the Eucharist (the blood and the body of Christ). As it written in the gospel according to Saint Luke: “And he took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them saying ‘This is my body; do this in remembrance of me. (Luke 22:19-20)” He could have asked them to do anything in remembrance of him, but he asked them to break bread and drink wine, which I believe knit them together in deepest fellowship.
So friend, I invite you to open up your home more often and to serve something that will warm souls and inspire people to draw near to Jesus. It can be anything from a loaf of bread, to a tray of fruit, but serve! Open your heart and home, and you will find that Jesus makes himself known profusely among you.
“There is a time for everything and a season for every activity under the heavens.” -Ecclesiastes 3:1
I am trying to reconcile the incongruence between my extroverted self, and my painfully introverted self. On the one hand I present, without an effort as amiable and warm. I am bubbling over with joy and a desire to be social with everyone around me all the time. My heart is bursting with vibes of love and genuine good will toward every creature around me. On the other hand all the life is zapped right out of me due to the series of mental illnesses that I battle and I don’t so much as want to look at anyone.
I’m tired all the time. I’m weary. It is by the grace of God that I arrive to work each day by means of a 20 minute bus ride followed a 20 minute walk because the bus doesn’t take me quite all the way. I’m constantly thanking God throughout the day for the strength to endure the shift, and then comes the big debate about how I am going to get home. It is my responsibility to save money so I must trot my way back to the bus stop somehow. I must muster up the strength. More often than not I find that I cannot strain past my limits any further and I end up spending the money on an Uber home. I thank God I at least have the money, and I pray that next time I will find the strength just to walk instead.
My body constantly aches from head to toe. I’m not in any extreme pain, but I feel overcome by those aches you feel when you have the flu. Yeah those, except mine is derived from depression. My body is so overwhelmed by chronic depression that it manifests itself as physical pain, and I find myself swallowing ibuprofen and wondering how much my stomach can actually take before this is bad for me.
It really just feels like a long dream. I’m experiencing the world from a really deep place within myself, constantly in some profound state of rest and inner meditation to avoid sensory overload. It’s all in someway so damned beautiful and yet it needs to end because I wasn’t made for this. I cannot do this forever.
I’ve resolved it in my heart that I will not let this overcome me. I am too much of a fighter for that. Then again an echo of honesty reminds me that I do not know how long I can do this. I need rest. So much rest. So I find myself lulling in and out of sleep countless hours throughout the day. Moments that I am awake are spent staring into space…in a sort of peaceful daydream just resting my thoughts— sort of talking to God without speech.
Part of me thinks I was made this way. This is the beauty and the uniqueness of my life. These are the things that make my soul so unsearchably beautiful. How mysterious it is that God has formed me this way…
I cannot find fault in my maker. His ways are higher than my ways after all. That said. I do long for rest. I long for stillness, poetry and the sounds of running water. I long for cozy snuggles with throws piled on top of the bed. I long for hugs and fellowship. I long ultimately for more of my creator. More of Him.
Prayer: Father I know that in your wisdom you have formed me the way that it pleased you to form me. You know what hurts, where it hurts and how much. Give me this season father to rest, to heal, and to desire more of you!
Jesus & Tea 