We should name our walls

Yesterday I was watching "The Pillars of the Earth" Mini-series.  The story is set in the medieval England when struggles for power, wealth and revenge were brutal, secret, and led by swords.  The town of Kingsbridge is going to be attacked...this will not be the first time.  They get a few days warning and decided to build a wall to help protect their people, homes, and fleece (the main staple).  It isn't a pretty wall.  It isn't substantial as city walls go, but it helps.  The attackers are confused and more vulnerable when the town erects a wall to keep them out.   The wall gives the townspeople what they needed to protect themselves to live and survive another day. 

Walls are important for safety.  Walls can help to delay those on the outside from coming in too quickly before we are sure we are ready.  But sometimes I find that walls do such a great job of keeping people out, that they keep people out who are welcome and would help if they came in.  I have yet to meet someone that didn't have a few walls put up.  Walls are defenses that help us to manage our vulnerability with the people in our lives.  They are good as long as we know what they are and when it is appropriate to let them down.  When we are too comfortable with keeping our walls up it is like we invite a third person into a relationship.  One who monopolizes the conversation, is oblivious to the feelings of others, and makes it really hard for the other two to get past the surface of their relationship to something deeper.  In the end the very walls created to help, to protect, and to enhance our ability to determine who we will let in, can be the things that keep us from the relationships of depth, care and love that we hope for.

I wonder what it would be like if we named our walls?  If we were even a little more aware of the things we do to protect ourselves and were able to speak of them, would that help us to consider the best times to let them come down?  Would we be able to see opportunities to trust the people in our lives with the unprotected us?  It's a hard thing to vulnerable.  We risk being hurt.  We risk hurting the people who honor us by letting down their walls with us.  But without those risks relationship cannot go past a certain point.  Wouldn't it be great if before seeing a friend you could say, "by the way, Shirley the "last time it didn't work out" wall and Bob the "what if you see the real me and don't like me" are coming with me.  Maybe it would make no difference but I know that when I work to be more aware of what I bring into any relationship...I am more able to consciously choose when to take down a wall or two.  It can be really scary but it also can result in better, deeper relationships where I am safe to be who I am.

This isn't a practice that should be taken lightly...taking down walls should be done carefully and with people will take the time to learn and grow with us.  But if we never pay attention to our walls we might miss opportunities of letting in the people who will give us the most and help us to see ourselves with more grace and love.  Imagine the possibilities and let a wall or two crumble so you can build something more... 

Treading Holy Ground...the Divine and me!

 “This is amazing,” Moses said to himself. “Why isn’t that bush burning up? I must go see it.” When the Lord saw Moses coming to take a closer look, God called to him from the middle of the bush, “Moses! Moses!”  “Here I am!” Moses replied.“Do not come any closer,” the Lord warned. “Take off your sandals, for you are standing on holy ground.  I am the God of your father—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” When Moses heard this, he covered his face because he was afraid to look at God.  Then the Lord told him, “I have certainly seen the oppression of my people in Egypt. I have heard their cries of distress because of their harsh slave drivers. Yes, I am aware of their suffering.  So I have come down to rescue them from the power of the Egyptians and lead them out of Egypt into their own fertile and spacious land. It is a land flowing with milk and honey—the land where the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites now live.  Look! The cry of the people of Israel has reached me, and I have seen how harshly the Egyptians abuse them.  Now go, for I am sending you to Pharaoh. You must lead my people Israel out of Egypt.”   Exodus 3:3-10 (MSG)


I grew up in holy places...and so did you.  Holiness is inherent by God whose presence is Holy.  So in the places of our lives where God is, which I believe is everywhere, we find ourselves on holy ground. The story of Moses and the burning bush always comes to mind when I hear the words "holy ground."  And I remember that God tells Moses to remove his shoes.

I'm a barefoot kind of girl.  (Ask my mom and she'll tell you that growing up it wasn't rare to find me without my shoes and socks on at any time of the year.)  I always loved visiting our friends with the practice of taking shoes off at the door.  It was, for me, like a fancy treat to walk around barefoot in some else's home.  Something about it made me feel like I was "at home" there.  I am sure it was a practical thing to keep the floors clean but when you think about it...there is an implied intimacy to inviting people to remove their shoes in your home.  Instead of the impersonal shoe touching your floors, the person touches them.  The connections are made and illuminated when we make ourselves "at home."

Now back to Moses, I always thought that it was disrespectful to walk on the holy ground with sandals...but what if it was an invitation for closeness.  Imagine how different it is to touch the ground barefooted.  It's risky on the gravel, hot pavement in the summer, and in the woods with who knows how many branches and other things just waiting to stick you (no pun intended).  What if it was a way to connect more fully with God in the moments of the burning bush conversation?  What if it was God's way of saying find yourself "at home" with me?

 So in the stories about people walking on holy ground and taking off their sandals I imagine that they too had a sense of finding themselves "at home."  Although to be honest the thought of being "at home" with the Divine although amazing...also makes me a little wary of what I will be invited to do.  I know God to be radical and loving in ways that call me out of my comfort and into an amazing freedom of finding abundant life.  God has rarely invited me into the life I expected but I have always found that God's ideas were better than anything I could have imagined.  So I have learned and am learning still to let go of what I expect and to live into what God intends.

I want to be close to the Divine.  So shoes off and toes down...holy ground here I am, where do we go from here?