I hope you're happy

Have you seen those “I met my younger self for coffee” reels? They’re based off a poem by Jennae Cecilia, from her book Deep In My Feels, but they kind of took on a life of their own a few weeks ago, as viral trends do. I didn’t make one, but I saw them from nearly every influencer, brand, or business owner in my feed. In all the ones I saw, the predictable pattern was an older, wiser, less anxious “self” showing up to comfort a scattered and scared younger one, who was eminently grateful for the hug, tears, and pep talk.

The question that kept popping into mind for me was, “Doesn’t anyone have a younger self who is disappointed in what their future self has become?” (Or am I the only one whose younger self was a jerk?)

If I met my 21-year-old self for coffee today, she’d be so uncomfortable I think she’d clam up and refuse to speak to me, or—more likely—nod along with me agreeably while inwardly screaming “ARE YOU TELLING ME WE TURNED INTO A HERETIC?!”

I know her so well, but she doesn’t know me at all. She can’t fathom the changes wrought by heartbreak, sleep deprivation, or depression—the chipping away and continual molding of marriage, motherhood, and parenting. In her worldview there is no circumstance in which exiting her evangelical world and returning to liturgy makes sense; there is no universe in which questioning complementarian theology (let alone rejecting it) is anything short of a moral failure. There is certainly no space in her imagination for a day when she would contemplate the legitimacy of baptizing infants, chuckle a bit at the timeline of the end-times she drew in the back of her study Bible, or—God forbid!—sit in pews with people whose beliefs are varied and unknown to her, and haven’t been screened out by a lengthy “statement of faith” on the church website.

If she found out she would one day be the topic of concerned whispers by the elder board or disappointed remarks by mentors and friends, I think she’d have crawled into a hole and died (maybe after shaking me violently and screaming “HOW DARE YOU TURN INTO THIS?! HOW DARE YOU RUIN MY LIFE?!”).

But I hope she would be able to find, somewhere inside, the piece of her that was always there—compassionate and thoughtful and not-quite-a-clean-fit to the world she was trying so hard to fit into. I hope, like Glinda at the end of Wicked, she’d find some capacity to say, “I hope you’re happy”—even if she couldn’t imagine following me off the ledge.

Because that’s what I’d say to her. I don’t want to scold her, or rush her, or talk down to her about her narrow thinking and fear of the opinions of others. There’s so much life in between, so much of God’s slow and patient cultivation. If I spook her now I could interrupt it all.

So—I do. I hope she’s happy. I know she was, in many ways. But I know now there’s a certain depth of flavor missing from happiness when it hasn’t yet been seasoned with sorrow.

I wish I could tell her not to be afraid when things change, life hurts, and people hurt most of all. I wish I could tell her not to flinch when she hears the voices saying, “Look at her! She’s wicked! Get her!” But I can’t, she’s not ready. I’m not even ready—I still flinch at the thought of the labels they’d give me now.

All I can do is reassure her that the road she’s on still leads to Jesus, even if it’s lonelier sometimes. Her delight in the Scriptures and desire to share their wisdom with others won’t change, and in fact will only expand and deepen as she follows the guidance of the Spirit. The God she has known since childhood will prove Himself changeless and trustworthy, and He will provide gifts of reassurance that He is not simply waiting on high for her to screw something up—that His character is always to have mercy.

And I’d try to tell her that she’ll find God only gets bigger and more beautiful the more she explores Him and gazes upon Him—even when the path that leads “further up and further in” makes some turns she won’t see coming, some risks she doesn’t quite want to take but also can’t resist. She will taste freedom and never want to go back.

So, to my 21-year-old self, the one who would be deeply disappointed in me: I hope you’re happy, my friend.

I know I am.

Drem, and her dreamer

Last night I watched a current of wispy pinkish clouds float across a lapis lazuli sky and wondered if that’s what it would look like to see the train of the Lord’s robe fill the temple. It was one of those precious, fleeting moments when the veil between heaven and earth feels nearly transparent—I could see the flame of the Holy Spirit flickering over neighbors’ houses, while the happy wild daisies bobbed together along the roadside to remind me of the Great Cloud of Witnesses that cheer me on from the next realm.

It was a gift that I didn’t know I would need to carry me into this hard day.

My horse, Drem, passed away overnight, at home on my parents’ farm. My mom called to tell me this morning. Dad buried her on the hill that rises beyond the creekbed that runs beside her corral, in view of Mt. Adams.

I call her mine, but she was really shared between me and my sister, Hannah. I think of her as my lifelong confidant and friend, but she didn’t enter my life until I was 12 and I only saw her sporadically after I got married at 20. Mom, Dad, Hannah, and Amy all spent more time with her in the last ten years than I did. Even so, the bond between a horse and her girl is real, and without her sweet spirit on this side of it anymore, the veil between heaven and earth seems a lot thicker today.

It’s a literary cliche at this point, but with good reason: A love for horses has been tattooed on my inner being since before I had the words to express it. I distinctly remember the ache in my chest every time I saw someone else riding a horse, every time I watched Black Beauty, every time we passed horses grazing in a field on the way to church on Sunday mornings—starting at three or four years old, if I had to guess. I remember the hours Hannah and I would spend poring over horse books, magazines, and Breyer model horse catalogs. We eventually outlet our obsession by writing and illustrating our own horse stories (shout out to my beloved fictional racehorse, Robin Hood).

Drem was my dream come true. She came to us as a seven-year-old greenbroke quarter horse mare named “Lady,” and we renamed her “Dreamer” because she had the same coloring as Soñador from the movie, Dreamer. But the name evolved over the years to fit the horse she really was: quick, endearing, a little bit unexpected, and highly independent.

The hardest part of anticipating this parting, besides surviving the crashing waves of grief, has been wondering who I will be without her. In so many ways, she formed me: I learned how to lend her my calm when she was nervous instead of adding my own anxiety into the mix; I learned to lead with confidence even when my follower is ten times my size; I learned what it feels like to be free and independent on those long, solitary rides in the fields or around the Winterstein loop.

To her, I was strong and trustworthy, a safe place—even when I felt scared, small, and weak. Sometimes all it takes to become something is for someone to believe that’s what you already are.

I had no idea back then that the horse I was trying to train was actually training me in all the skills I now use daily to be a wife, a mom, a disciple.

It’s hard to release her, the link between Hallie the child and Hallie the adult, especially knowing that she might be the only horse I’ll ever have that is really “mine.” But the tattoo on my inner being is still there. I’m still the same dreamer, meeting God beneath cloud-trails and on horseback, in the shadow of mountains and the sunshine of daisies.

And I know who I’ll be riding in the ranks of the armies of heaven. ☺

curiosity and color

The funny thing about calling into question the accepted understanding of a tertiary issue (as I have done over the last year or so, regarding the status of women in Christian spaces) is that you find out how many people actually hold it as a secondary doctrine—or even almost primary. Not because they really believe that what I think about the “role” of women in churches and marriages has any bearing on my standing before God (I don’t think?), but because our whole culture currently runs on extremes, and we generally don’t know how to handle the idea that gray area or other interpretations exist. Especially as it regards things of God and the Bible.

Of all things, surely these, at least, must be black-and-white.

Right?

I certainly used to think so. But the more time I’ve spent poring over the pages of the Bible and listening to the Spirit that brings them to life, the less I’ve been able to retain that monochrome worldview. Do we really think that the nature of God and His glorious design for Creation and humanity and the kingdom of heaven can be described without a full scope of color and light? Ezekiel tried to tell us what it was like to witness just one brief vision of God’s glory, and the passage is bursting with color:

Something like a throne with the appearance of lapis lazuli was above the expanse over their heads. On the throne, high above, was someone who looked like a human. From what seemed to be his waist up, I saw a gleam like amber, with what looked like fire enclosing it all around. From what seemed to be his waist down, I also saw what looked like fire. There was a brilliant light all around him. The appearance of the brilliant light all around was like that of a rainbow in a cloud on a rainy day. This was the appearance of the likeness of the Lord’s glory. When I saw it, I fell facedown and heard a voice speaking.

Ezekiel 1:26-28

It gives me pause to recall how much of my life I’ve spent limiting how God is “allowed” to act in my life, in the church, or in the world. We build our tidy sets of theological walls, made from little rows of black words on a white page, to contain our gods—proof-texting and cherry-picking and forgetting altogether that the true God operates in another dimension, where our comfortable boundaries are meaningless.

In that realm, color and creativity and living water flood out from every crevice. Curiosity is rewarded with wonder. Ask, and receive—seek, and find. The Father God reveals His heart. The Savior Jesus wins our access. The Holy Spirit beckons us in.

It’s a new and better Eden, lush with the Creator’s life-giving presence and heart-changing glory. He is abundant, and abundantly generous, giving us Himself.

God forbid we wait around to die instead of taking hold of the victory and living like citizens of that kingdom now! Abiding in the nurture of God’s heart is for today. Abiding in the triumph of Christ’s defeat of sin and death is for today. Abiding in the tranquility of the Spirit’s voice is for today.

We’ve met the true God. Can we stop trying to shrink Him down into the form of a golden calf?

We’ve been set free, made new by grace. Can we actually shake off our chains and stop fearing what it means to live without the tutelage of the law?

We’ve been adopted as daughters and sons into the Royal Family! Can we please stop acting like we’re still banished and cursed?

I know that we haven’t entered the full reality of Christ’s victory yet. But that seems like a poor excuse to actively choose a life characterized by defeat or narrow-mindedness. The Spirit of God—who raised Jesus from the dead!—lives in us. Hallelujah!

Let’s wonder at these truths, and fear not our wondering, because if God is good and holy, He will reveal His goodness and holiness in response to our honest curiosity. And then, even here on earth, we might get to see hints of heaven’s glorious color.