A bit about "salvation"

This morning I was doing my morning meditation thing with a couple of lines from Psalm 13, which is titled Prayer for Deliverance from Enemies (we’ll talk later about all the breaking of teeth, cheek smiting and general beat-downs the poets in Psalms seem to revel in).

The lines were: “But I trusted in your steadfast love/my heart shall rejoice in your salvation.”

(How this works for me: generally, I just pick out a couple of lines at random that I like, then for 15 minutes, I inhale while repeating the first line in my head, and exhale the second.)

I was about ten minutes into the thing when I realized I’d been replacing the words “my heart” with “I” so, I shrugged, and reverted to the text, and then got completely clobbered with gratitude.

Three years ago, I was driving home from work on a rainy day. I was in this place in my life where everything felt terrible. I’ve always struggled with depression, but this was crushing. Every morning I’d get up with that impossible weight and dread. When people would be excited about something, I’d be cynical and point out all the ways it could suck. I was becoming negative, bitter and really, really unhappy.

So I was stopped at a stop light and I thought: if I believed in sin (in the sense that sins are thoughts or actions that keep me distant from god/spirit/celestial-wonder-dog) this is maybe the biggest one – to not be willing to feel and see all the beauty that is in this daily life, and to be so crippled by my own depression/fear/insecurity that I can’t reach outside of myself to do anything more that make fun of people who are doing what they love, partly because I was starting to feel like I never would.

And I knew, as I sat there in my car, that my heart was broken and I had no clue about how to fix it. I didn’t even know if it could be fixed. I thought heartbreak was supposed to be related to breaking up with a significant other, but my heartbreak was this huge loneliness and realization that I didn’t know quite how to allow love into my life. My habit was to try to figure out in my head what people wanted and try to be that. And as far as any internal softness or need I felt – my response was: Kill it!!

Now, perhaps in the traditional version of this story, I’d say: “Then I found Jesus, and got saved and now I’m going to Disneyland….erm, I mean heaven.”

That didn’t happen.

But what did happen was that I committed to myself to start paying attention to the things I loved and the things that brought me joy. When everyone says: do what you love and all else follows – THEY ARE NOT KIDDING.

But how do I recognize what I love?

(A lot of you know this story, but for the newbies: ) Ten years ago, I lived in the county. One morning, as I was driving past a familiar field, I saw an animal. I thought at first it was a horse, but then I realized no….it’s a donkey. Actually, four donkeys. And I smiled and thought, huh. When I drove by the next day, I looked for the donkeys and kind of laughed. Sometimes I’d actually pull over and just watch them. I didn’t know why, but I just felt happy when I saw them. They were sweet and ridiculous and I loved how their ears would point downward when they ate.

And one day I was sitting there, laughing at these donkeys and I realized: this is what it is like to just purely love something, without agenda. For most of my life to that point, I loved what I was supposed to love, or what it was cool to love, or what everyone else loved. But here was this thing that just made me happy by being exactly what it was and I was happy because I was loving it just because I loved it.

This is how I recognize love now – the things or people that make me want to laugh when I’m around them. (Not because they are cracking jokes, but just because they are who they are and I am who I am).

 I mean, not everyone loves donkeys, the color yellow and but I do.

And it’s one of the simple things I was put here to do.

 “I trusted in your steadfast love” today reminded me that I started looking for those things, people and actions that brought out the love in me. And while it wasn’t an immediate thing, eventually my heart started healing; and by choosing to do this thing (seminary) that I was terrified of doing (and yet wanted to do with my whole heart) I get to feel joy again.

When I say salvation, at least in this sense, I mean that I no longer have to walk through life numb and cynical. My heart is being freed of these things that keep me from loving myself and the people (and critters) around me. It’s a kind of gentling process.

And once again, it compels action. It is impossible to be able to see and feel and not challenge myself to do more, again, because it’s one of the simple things I was put here to do.