Loving God enough to break the rules

On her departure from London, my best friend gave me a card picturing two women growing old disgracefully.

As much as I loved my friend’s beautiful words of love which filled the space inside, at the time I found this card’s message hard to swallow. I find breaking rules very difficult indeed. Rules of punctuation, the highway, etiquette and sport have always inspired me to be the best I can be within those set parameters. What then, of Jesus’ suggestion that those who are persecuted for righteousness sake, will be blessed with and by the Kingdom of God?

Am I brave enough to through caution to the wind, to take risks, to open myself up to the possibility of failure? How can I call myself a follower of Jesus when the consequences of following him might mean breaking some of my own rules, expectations and norms and encountering persecution in doing so?

Context is of course important to consider and risk-taking for risk-taking's sake is probably a bit daft really. But maybe, just maybe, on this adventure called life I will start to break my own rules and find freedom in doing so.

Eyes to see

Have you ever met anyone who can see deep into your soul? I’ve met two women recently who have such a strong spiritual presence - a resonating, reverberating stillness – that I have felt immediately compelled to tell them everything about myself. I’ve felt unmasked by their eyes that peer deep into my soul and examine my innermost thoughts. Compelled to reveal myself, I suppose before they reveal me. Compelled to be honest, completely unveil myself because I know they can see straight past the mask I wear everyday. Their very presence makes me stutter, I feel unnerved yet strangely liberated by this urgency to unburden myself.

You belong to me

The other day I was sitting in an espresso bar in London’s West End and a Chinese couple by the window caught my eye. He fed her a spoonful of the froth from his cappuccino on a dainty teaspoon. She nodded appreciatively. Later they stood and walked towards me at the back on the way to the toilets. His hand guided her pregnant form through the cafe. They descended and then reappeared a few minutes later. My initial reaction was “How thoughtful he is – a caring, gentle, protective man”. As the tune on the café soundtrack changed I was struck by its lyric “You belong to me”. What a fine line it is between protection and possession. How delicate the balance between love and control.

How am I to interpret the couple’s behaviour? Was the man warm and loving in his care or was he exerting his possession of his wife and unborn child? These sorts of questions of gender and belonging constantly spin in my mind as I renegotiate what it is to be a woman of God, working in a feminist-yet-not work environment.

The fact of the matter is that we don’t belong to anyone but God. Husbands, employers, parents or children may lay claim to our possession but deep down we don’t belong to them. We don’t even belong to ourselves. This is one of my favourite quotes which sums this up perfectly:

What we are is God’s gift to us.
What we become is our gift to God.
(Eleanor Powell)

Identity is not Biography

I've been thinking a lot lately about to what extent we are the product of our circumstances. Is biography and identity the same thing? How we tell our story is central to how we see ourselves. If we tell our story as one of circumstance, one of events that have happened, things that have been done to us then are we presenting ourselves as a product of our past? If, instead, we tell our story as the people that have shaped us, the places we've seen, the joys and the sadness we've experienced, we perhaps begin to express our identity.

But that's not the full story. I am not, as Orange would have me believe, the sum of my relationships. I am not my family, my Scottish upbringing. I am not my education, my travels. I am not my faith, my beliefs. There lies a place, deep within me that is my identity. It is hard to express and harder to explain. Our creator knows who I am and He knows why I am. I am made in God's image and I must rest-assured that that is good. It is very good indeed.

If identity was the same as biography then where is the hope of a new tomorrow? There has to be that hope. The hope to someday, somehow escape the confines of your childhood and be free to be you.