bridges

I will begin this post with a spoiler, a spoiler in the form of a quote from the last pages of the Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S. Lewis. (I call it a spoiler because though The Chronicles of Narnia have been around for a LONG time I am just now reading them, and I haven’t quite finished the series yet so I’m sensitive to others who may be in the same boat.)

but anyways, here it is…the last moments Lucy and Edmund spend in Narnia.

“There is a way into my country from all the worlds,” said the Lamb; but as he spoke, his snowy white flushed into tawny gold and his size changed and he was Aslan himself, towering above them and scattering light from his mane.”

“Oh, Aslan,” said Lucy. “Will you tell us how to get into your country from our world?”

“I shall be telling you all the time,” said Aslan. “But I will not tell you how long or short the way will be; only that it lies across a river. But do not fear that, for I am the great Bridge Builder. And now come; I will open the door in the sky and send you to your own land.”

“Please, Aslan,” said Lucy. “Before we go, will you tell us when we can come back to Narnia again? Please. And oh, do, do, do make it soon.”

“Dearest,” said Aslan very gently, “you and your brother will never come back to Narnia.”

“Oh, Aslan!” said Edmund and Lucy both together in despairing voices.

“You are too old, children,” said Aslan, “and you must begin to come close to your own world now.”

“It isn’t Narnia, you know,” sobbed Lucy. “It’s you. We shan’t meet you there. And how can we live, never meeting you?”

“But you shall meet me, dear one,” said Aslan.

“Are – are you there too, Sir?” said Edmund.

“I am,” said Aslan. “But there I have another name. You must learn to know me by that name. This was the very reason why you were brought to Narnia, that by knowing me here for a little, you may know me better there.”

My time at Truett seminary came to a close last May. I grieved leaving its halls in Waco, Texas. I knew that when I returned it wouldn’t be the same. I wouldn’t belong like I once did. My time there is done. I can't really go back. That season is over. I cried when I read this exchange between Aslan and the Pevensie children because I can relate so deeply to their fear that they won’t see Aslan again. They think their journey with Aslan is over because they are leaving the land where they met him and where they understood themselves as truly loved and full of purpose for the first time. 

The Saturday after I graduated, after everyone who came to celebrate with me left town, I sobbed. Like Lucy I felt my story snap shut and I couldn’t see where there might be more pages.

It isn’t that I didn’t know that God would be present with me after seminary, it’s just that I didn’t understand how; I didn’t know where we would go next. In many ways I still don’t.

I never really knew for sure why I enrolled at Truett. I had some ambitions to be a missionary…and then a social worker…and then an Executive Director/founder of a non-profit…and then a lawyer…and then a pastor…and then…a writer? Each time my toes were on the edge of something new and I was ready to jump full force toward one of these professions I felt God gently (and sometimes rather abruptly) tug me back and say, “Just be present here. Here at Truett. Here at UBC. Here with these people. Here with me. Worry about the end goal later. Just trust, be present, wait, and see.”

It turns out that the only thing I know for sure about why I was at seminary in Waco is because God whispered to me something like what Aslan told Lucy and Edmund… “that by knowing me here for a little, you may know me better there.”

And now I am “there”…sort of. I feel a little stuck in an in-between place. A space back in my parent’s house where most of my days are spent flying solo and trying to keep busy when I don’t really have much to do. A space of preparation for marriage and a move across country. A space where I am dreaming about digging deep into my community that I know is waiting in Charlottesville, Virginia but that I am afraid will take a long time to find and belong to.

I understood the rhythm of life with God and people in Waco, Texas. I don’t know that rhythm yet in Austin, and I certainly don’t know it in Charlottesville. It feels like there are many rivers to cross…not just one. A lot of practice and failure. A lot of humility. A lot of loneliness. A lot of purposelessness. A lot of searching for meaning and identity in my own efforts and coming up short. A lot of anxiety and taking out frustration on people I love. A lot of grace.

So many rivers and what they leave in their wake…and that feels daunting. But I don’t build the bridges. I can simply seek to walk with the Bridge Builder. And as I walk and move across rivers on these bridges my hope is that the ways that God met me during my time at seminary will spill out and help inform the rhythm of our life together today and all the tomorrows. My hope is that this will lead me to live in ways that are genuine and raw and are an offering of love for the world around me…

“You are too old, children,” said Aslan, “and you must begin to come close to your own world now.”

I have aged out of my last season, and in many ways it was a world apart from anything I’ve ever known and anything I will know again. And here I am in my “own world” and I’ll be honest I don’t really know what to do. I’m looking around and seeing the devastation of life in so many ways.  Through racism. Through sexism. Through fear. Through distrust. Through an inability to hold respect for those who believe differently. I see this devastation within myself as well. I am not innocent of this brokenness. I don’t exactly know what is mine to do. But there is a Bridge Builder. As I get to know my world, with the good and the broken and the blurry lines between, my hope is that the bridges and their Builder become increasingly known to me. May I learn to cross these bridges with a discernment and courage that can only come from their, and my, Builder.

I haven’t blogged in a long time. But the latest thing I have felt led to pursue is writing, so I’m going to practice that here. This post just sort of flowed out and I think it gives a good foundation for unpacking the season that I am in now. I’m excited to see what else spills out on the page. Join me if you’d like.