holy spirit

Bubble up, Holy Spirit

What if you could not trust your senses?

All of your life you were told up was down and blue was green. Every nerve ending tells you the wind is blowing but the people you trust with your life tell you it’s still.

When I was fourteen, I stood in church with my friends, hands lifted to God, longing to feel something. A woman named Grace walked over to me. I remember I was wearing my favorite black dress. Cotton, and nearly floor length. While my eyes were closed and my lips parted in praise to the Lord, she laid her bejeweled hand on my abdomen and proclaimed, “Bubble up, Holy Spirit.” I did not know what to do.

She prayed. And prayed. I knew something was supposed to happen. My mouth was supposed to open and words in an ancient language I had never learned to speak were supposed to come unbidden. The power of God’s spirit was supposed to overtake me and flow through me. You see, this was a tongues church.

I won’t lie to you. I began speaking in tongues that night. I don’t know if it was the Holy Spirit of Elohim or a teenage girl trying to fit in. I just know I did it.

There is this feeling I sometimes get. It’s a mix of excitement and anxiety. It does feel like something is bubbling up inside of me. All the varieties of butterflies that live in me take flight and rattle around me sending waves through my nervous system. When I was a Christian and this happened, I prayed, often in tongues. I didn’t know what to do with this nervous energy, where it came from, or what it meant. I knew my body was sending me a signal and I wanted it to abate.

And I have that feeling right now. But I’m not scared of it. This nervous energy coursing through me feels alive and empowering. There is something bubbling up inside of me but it’s not an ancient angelic tongue or the spirit of a deity. It’s a new wave of creativity and confidence in my abilities and talents. It’s fresh ideas flowing through me, not gibberish words.

When you spend the majority of your life surrounded by people who desperately want to control you, your behavior, and your belief systems, you can start to lose touch with your intuition. Gaslighting becomes all you know. You question your own senses. Is up really down? Is black actually white? Is reason madness and truth just lies? So much of my adult life has been spent trying to make sense of the dissonance between what I could see and what I was being told. People, I’m sorry to tell you, love to lie. I learned that I could not trust myself. The words, “Are you calling me a liar?” still echo in my ears. How many times was I told that what I believed was the lie, despite evidence to the contrary. And what they were telling me was the truth, even though it made no sense. I was the one who was wrong and I needed to just say “ok” and accept what I was being told.

Gaslighting is a special circle of hell for an autistic person. We already feel like aliens in a neurotypical world. We already spend too much of our time trying to understand what we don’t understand. And, to be honest, when we do figure out something on our own we feel pretty proud of ourselves. So to come along and tell us that we can’t trust our own senses is particularly cruel.

But nature is healing, my loves. The wolves of my intuition have stabilized the ecosystem of my gut and the river of my confidence is changing course. (If that sentence seems like gibberish to you, just pretend I’m speaking in tongues. Or click the link about how reintroducing wolves to Yellowstone Park improved the ecosystem so much that the river changed course.)

The longer I spend living a life apart from those gaslighting fucks, the more my confidence returns. I’m starting to believe myself, to trust my eyes and ears. My intuition is healing. New ideas are coming and the powerful urge to create, to write, to sing, to be myself unabashedly is stronger than it has been in such a long time. This thing bubbling up inside me is the power of me. It’s excitement at all of the ideas spawning in my mind. It’s the belief that I am strong, smart, talented, creative, and beautiful. It’s trust in myself. And being able to trust myself is such a gorgeous feeling.

I won’t be spouting any ancient tongues today. Instead of trying to rid myself of this bubbling energy, I’m going to let it fuel me to create the world I want to be a part of.

Let’s. Fucking. Go, my darlings. Let’s bubble the shit out of life today.

Tell me what to do (and don’t)

Genesis 3:4-6

4 But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not die; 5 for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” 6 So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate; and she also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate. 

This morning while I was meditating, I started thinking about reconciliation.  I remembered when Peter cut off the ear of the temple guard in the Garden of Gethsemane and Jesus reached out and healed the guard.  Do you know what Jesus didn’t do?  He didn’t make Peter apologize.

I had to think about that.  I know that Jesus preached on reconciliation.  I know the verses because I’ve read them many times.  “Blessed are the peacemakers…” “If you know someone has ought against you leave your gift at the altar and go and be reconciled…”  “If someone has sinned against you, go and talk with them about it…”  I’m paraphrasing right now because I’m in a hurry and don’t want to go look up the verses.  “Peacemakers” is Matthew 5, can’t remember exactly where “leave your gift” is and “sinned against you” is Matthew 18 I believe (or maybe it’s 15).  Anyway, if you want to read them yourself, I encourage you to go look it up.

So for 3 years, Jesus preached on a lot of stuff and Peter probably heard most or all of it but these parts on reconciliation seemed to get overlooked after he cuts off the poor guy’s ear.  But then later on after he has denied Jesus 3 times, Jesus sits down with him and 3 times asks Peter, “Do you love me?” giving Peter a chance to reconcile with Jesus.

That got me thinking about my own views on Christian reconciliation.  I’ve kind of always viewed it as somewhat mandatory.  As if the things that Jesus preached about were the New Ten Commandments.  As if you could go through the New Testament and make a list of do’s and don’ts based solely off what Jesus said or the disciples wrote.

And then that got me thinking about the Old Ten Commandments and the fact that people seem to just want a list of do’s and don’ts to follow no matter what century you’re in or what you believe.  Even people you may deem as having no sense of right and wrong, they also have a list of do’s and don’ts in their head somewhere.  Do’s and Don’ts seem to be what humanity wants.  Look at any major world religion or any business or organization.  There is always a list.  Always a line.  The lists and lines vary from religion to religion and culture to culture but they are always there.

So that brings me back to Peter in the Garden.  If reconciliation is a “do”, why didn’t Jesus make him do it?  Why didn’t they hug it out?  Maybe later in life Peter and the guard crossed each other’s paths again and they talked it out and made things right but if that happened, it’s not recorded anywhere.

In John 3, Jesus said that those who follow the Spirit are like the wind, you don’t know where it comes from or where it goes.  Could it be that God never wanted to give us a list of do’s and don’ts but that way back in the Garden of Eden, when Eve and Adam saw that they could follow a clearly defined list of do’s and don’ts (albeit an internal one) and they would no longer have to rely on God’s constant guidance, that they jumped at the chance?  Could it be that God has always desired to be our guide in life, following the Spirit like the wind, and that he never intended a “one size fits all” remedy to life’s situations?  Isn’t this why He sent the Holy Spirit?

Maybe it’s time I stopped focusing so hard on trying to do what is right and avoid what is wrong and, instead, focused hard on following the Spirit of the Living God.  After all, if Jesus didn’t jump Peter’s case for not “reconciling” with the temple guard and let that one slide, maybe He’s not keeping a tally of everything I do and don’t do.  Maybe “judgment” looks a lot different than I’ve always been taught.

It’s the curse of the Garden that makes us crave a “list” so that we can be “right with God” without having to actually engage with Him.  I mean, if He just gives us a list then we can accomplish what He wants without His help, right?  That is the curse of the Garden, desiring to live and be “righteous” without God.  And it really doesn’t matter what culture you come from or whether or not you’re an atheist or a Catholic priest or a follower of Zorg.  Even devout Christians, pastors, priests, rabbis, etc., struggle with this desire.  The “just give me a list” desire or the desire to do it on our own, in our own strength, without help.  Religious people get their list from the tenets of their faith.  Atheists derive their list from their own internal voice and the culture they identify with.  But no matter what, we all have a list.

I think it’s actually harder to abandon our lists and try to follow the leading and guidance of God than to live by those lists.  But I see (at least I hope I see) that God’s intention for our lives is to abandon these lists and follow Him.  Do I mean throw out the Bible?  No!  I just mean, especially for myself, that I have to stop looking at the Bible as rules to obey, as a list of do’s and don’ts to follow.  I have to see that Jesus wants me to seek Him and not to try to live “a righteous life”  because if I’m following Him, and He’s a righteous God, then I WILL live a righteous life just not one of my own misguided making.

I have to sign off now because I have a lot to do.  And to be honest I’m not gonna proofread this before I post it because I don’t want to.  If you find any glaring spelling/grammar mistakes, feel free to comment and I’ll fix them later.

P.S.  The short story I started a few weeks ago is still being written, I have not abandoned it.

 

New Song and Such

Wrote a song the other day.  Used my high tech phone gadget to record it.  I actually have an awesome computer for recording now, I just have to figure out how to do it.  Anyway, here is the link to the song:

Teach Me Holy Spirit

I’m kinda thinking I need to record more of my songs and post them.  I have almost 50 songs now and only a sprinkling of them are on here.

Also, for those of you who commented your “word” to me for my short story, the short story is finished.  It’s called “Under The Eyepatch” and I liked it so much I submitted it to a sci-fi/fantasy magazine.  They do online submissions so I’ll hear back very quickly whether or not they will accept it.  If they DO accept it, I will find a way to let you read it somehow but I won’t be able to post it on my blog because they will have first publishing rights.  If they reject the story, I will immediately post it on my blog for you to enjoy.  So honestly, it’s a win/win.  Or maybe even a win/win/win. (That obscure reference was for you, Kayla Martin.)

I love you all.  I also love kittens.  Kittens are the best.  I’ll leave you with a picture of my kitty for your viewing pleasure.

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