Category Archives: Failure

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Letting Go Of Your Negative Storyline

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There are teachers, and then there are master teachers. Richard Rohr has been one of the most profound & enlightening voices in our journey of the last 2-3 years. His influence crosses denominations and we believe the impact of his life and writing will continue for generations to come. We have been so moved by a recent blog of his that we wanted to share it with you as well. He brings a feast for the soul. Dig in.

“Forgiveness is simply the religious word for letting go. To forgive reality is to let go of the negative story line, the painful story line that you’ve created for it.

To forgive reality is to let go of the negative story line, the painful story line that you’ve created for it. If that story line has become your identity, if you are choosing to live in a victim state, an abused consciousness, it gives you a false kind of power and makes you feel morally superior to others. But let me tell you, it will also destroy you.

It will make you smaller and smaller as you get older. You will find that you have fewer and fewer people you can trust, fewer and fewer people, if any, that you can love. Life itself becomes a threat. Your comfort zone becomes tinier and tinier.

Thankfully, God has given us a way to not let the disappointments, hurts, betrayals, and rejections of life destroy us. It is the art of letting go. If we can forgive and let go, if we don’t hold our hurts against history and against one another, we will indeed be following Jesus.

The wounds of the crucified Jesus symbolize sacred wounds, transformative wounds that do not turn him bitter. After the crucifixion, there’s no record of Jesus wanting to blame anybody or accuse anybody. In fact, his last words are breathing forgiveness: “Father, forgive them; they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34).

If we are to follow Jesus, he says we’re simply to forgive one another as God has forgiven us. He says we should forgive one another not seven times, but “seventy times seven times” (Matt 18:22).

What that implies, first of all, is that God is all mercy and all forgiving in God’s very nature. But it also implies that Jesus knows we are going to make mistakes. He assumes human beings are going to hurt one another and do it wrong—maybe even seventy times seven times. This should keep us all humble.”

* So which part of your negative, failed storyline do you need to let go?

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How To Die On A Cross- Pt. 2

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In my relentless pursuit of happiness, one of the things I missed along the way, was this counter intuitive principle from Jesus that, sometimes, to obtain the best of life we must go through the worst of it.  In last week’s guest blog, my friend, Mike Breen, wrote a phenomenal post I wanted to pass on because it 1) speaks so deeply & truly to where Caron and I have been  2) you, too will identify with Mike’s personal story and insight— or you will sometime soon.

I’m regularly asked about what my current journey as a recovering leader & follower of Jesus has been like.  Many ask about the lessons I’ve learned.  There have been a boat load and I want to share those with you in the months to come.  Mike’s post reflects one of those important lessons.

(Mike Breen, is the founder of 3DMovements. He knows a bit about personal crucifixion and the longing we all have for a resurrected life.)

“I am convinced that everyone who follows Jesus will have at least one experience of isolation and exposure in public (and probably more than one experience of it). That’s personal crucifixion.  Until you actually know what that’s like, you haven’t been crucified with Christ.  Crucifixion is coming to a point of exposure and death where the things you’ve done- or others have done to you (deservedly or not)- will cause you to feel shame, guilt, and fear… but never in private.  Crucifixion always occurs in public.

The immediate temptation all of us feel when confronted with this is to minimize it, hide from it, cover over it, manage it, avoid it somehow.  But the only way to deal with it is to fully embrace the process of being crucified.

 You can’t hide on the cross.

Jesus could not cover himself, because his hands were nailed to the crossbeam.

You will get to this point from time to time as a follower of Jesus.  Things will happen and you will feel betrayed, let down, unjustly treated. Life will make you feel alone and isolated and exposed.  Oftentimes you’ll experience these things in the harsh light of other people’s public observation.

 In those moments, the best thing to do is let the process crucify you.  Here’s what I mean by that: It causes you to let go of the things that you normally rely upon as your means of security.

For example, many people find their sense of meaning and security from the approval of others.  Others find security in support by others or material wealth.  Still others look to their moral uprightness for their security.

During personal crucifixion, none of these things are available to you.  You are stripped of every source of idolatrous security and significance.

 Being crucified forces you to rely on the most important thing: your relationship with God.  The most important thing is that, just like Jesus, you have a Father into whose hands you can commit your life.

 Until you get to the place where all you have is God,

it’s difficult to understand how significant he really is to you

You don’t know how strong the rope is until you let go of the cliff face and trust the rope.  This is the work crucifixion does in our life.  You’ll have at least one of these experiences; most of us have multiple crucifixions in our life.

That’s certainly been my experience in just this last year.  A little over one year ago I repented to the 3DM team here in Pawleys Island of something being exposed in me: the vanity of an unlimited capacity.  My personality drives me to seek omni-competence and complete capability in all situations. I don’t like feeling inadequate or weak.  Last year I got to the point of realizing that is a vanity. It easily leads me to be proud and judgmental.

So what I did last year is what I’ve done with every crucifixion (and there have been several others since that time last year): embrace it, and to live it out publicly.  You have to live it publicly!  That’s the only way that you can be a person who grows in your security in God.  So if you want to actually grow as a Christian, you have to go through crucifixion.  It’s the only way you’ll ever know that God is your only support, and he’s enough as your support.

Here’s the thing about this—the only way to fully experience resurrection is to fully experience crucifixion.  If you want to live the resurrected life, you have to live the crucified life.  The good news is that resurrection is what lies beyond the “bad news” of crucifixion.  Here’s how Paul puts in later in Galatians:

 May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. Neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything; what counts is the new creation.

You receive that new creation by dying to the old one.  So if you feel like crucifixion is what is happening right now in your walk with Jesus, embrace it- committing your life to your Father- and trust him for resurrection on the other side.”

* What kind of cliff are you having to let go of right now?  Is it easy or difficult to ‘trust the rope?’ 

Mike Breen can be contacted @ 3dmovements.com

(Painting by Pierre-Paul Prud’hon)

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How To Die On A Cross- Prt 1

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If you’re like me, you’d rather read a blog like “36 Ways to Be Happy in Jesus” than “How to Die on a Cross.”  But my friend, Mike Breen, has written a phenomenal post I want you to read because it 1) speaks so deeply & truly to where Caron and I have been  2) you, too will identify with Mike’s personal story and insight— or you will sometime soon.

 I’m regularly asked about what my current journey as a recovering leader & follower of Jesus has been like.  Many ask additional questions regarding lessons that I’ve learned.  There have been  multiple lessons & experiences-many I want to share with you here in the months to come.

Mike Breen, is the founder of 3DMovements knows a bit about personal crucifixion and the longing we all have for a resurrected life

Here is Part 1…

“If you’re going to be a follower of Jesus, you’re going to be crucified.  Following Jesus means taking the path he takes. Since his path led to the cross, ours will lead there as well.  Following Jesus will always mean being led into a personal crucifixion.

Galatians is a letter written by Paul to a group of churches who were taking a path away from a walk of faith and towards a walk of good works and law.  The path these churches were on caused Paul to be deeply distressed and discouraged; these are the first churches he planted on his first missionary journey.  It was like his firstborn deciding not to be a part of the family anymore.

Here’s what Paul wrote to them:

I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.  The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

For Paul, following Jesus meant being “crucified with Christ.”  As we look at the crucifixion of Jesus we see at least a couple similarities between Christ’s crucifixion and ours.

 * Personal crucifixion is public.  Soldiers cast lots for Jesus’ clothes, which means he was naked and exposed on the cross.  Personal crucifixion always exposes us.  It strips away whatever pretense we were hiding behind and humbles us.  Personal crucifixion isn’t you alone in your house working on stuff, it’s out in the open.  People can see it happening.

 * Personal crucifixion is isolating.  Leading up to the cross Jesus’ closest friends couldn’t stay awake and pray with him, and in the end most of them abandoned him.  Crucifixion is an isolating experience.  Although there is transparency in our death, it is isolating.  That’s the shocking paradox of crucifixion – it is isolating exposure, a public loneliness unlike any other death.

I am convinced that everyone who follows Jesus will have at least one experience of isolation and exposure in public (and probably more than one experience of it).  That’s personal crucifixion.  Until you actually know what that’s like, you haven’t been crucified with Christ.  Crucifixion is coming to a point of exposure and death where the things you’ve done- or others have done to you (deservedly or not)- will cause you to feel shame, guilt, and fear… but never in private.  Crucifixion always occurs in public.

Here’s the thing about this—the only way to fully experience resurrection is to fully experience crucifixion.  If you want to live the resurrected life, you have to live the crucified life.  The good news is that resurrection is what lies beyond the “bad news” of crucifixion.”

* What kind of “crucifixion” have you gone through or else are fearful of going through?  Where is there good news in what looks like nothing but bad news?

Next week- Part 2.

Mike Breen can be contacted @ 3dmovements.com

(Painting by Pierre-Paul Prud’hon)

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3 Gifts We Gain Through Losing

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Recently, my husband, David, and I saw the movie Noah.  And while it appears to many the writer took a few liberties with his biblical interpretation there was a moment when I grabbed my phone to capture this line from Russell Crowe:

“ The storm cannot be stopped, but it can be survived.”

I’ve experienced both literal and emotional tempests, more than a few with life-altering consequences.  And, apparently, they’ve had their impact on me because for the last ten or fifteen years a reoccurring dream of mine is one where a giant funnel cloud threatens on the horizon and I’m frantic to find to my family.   Of course, as it goes with dreams, I either can’t find my family or I’m stuck, running in place in slow motion and can’t get away.   I always wake up just as the twister hits.  Except, recently, when another storm blew through my dreams. This time, something different happened. I survived.   

Even our worst storms don’t last forever.

As I’m writing this ( I kid you not) one of our famous Florida thunderstorms has just come through.   It lasted about 30 minutes and now all that’s left is the faint rumble of thunder in the distance as the last raindrops splat the ground off the roof.   On the lawn, there’s only a downed twig or two.  No big deal.

But, sometimes, the relational, physical or financial storm we’re in feels like a Category Five

and we find ourselves ” coming-to” in shock, with strange people digging us out from what feels like mounds of splinters and shards of glass.  Our life as we’ve known it looks leveled. Gasping we say, ” What in the world can possibly come from all this destruction?  ( That was one of the tamer questions I put to God after the most devastating day of my life.  ) At that fragile, post -storm, trauma stage

the last thing I wanted to hear was “ the sun will come out tomorrow.”

 While this IS true, from the look of shrapnel, as far as the eye could see, it felt to me at the time that the biggest nightmare storm of my life must have caught God snoozing on the job.   If you’ve ever felt like that, I get you.

Yet, I also saw this to be true: Once I got up from the ground and checked my limbs for gashes, it wasn’t just a cliché,  behind those dark clouds I could start to see a silver lining.my

My 3 top gifts from the storm: 

1) Perspective    

This dreadful thing could have killed us.  Yes, we’re bruised and bloody, scared and shaken.  Yes, it feels like something really important has died, and sadly, maybe it has.  But, wait.  Some thing, someone important is still left.  Our life, just moments before, so predictable and probably pretty much taken for granted, now feels vulnerable  and precious.  All the stuff we gave time to before this can almost look silly now. We say,  “ I just saw my life, our marriage, our family, etc. flash before my eyes.  But I / we are still standing . Ok, so we’re barely breathing- but it sure beats the alternative.” All that is left is all that matters now. Miraculously, we’ve been granted another day. And in tears we cling to our fellow survivors.

“It takes a real storm in the average person’s life

to make him realize how much worrying

he has done over the squalls. ”            Bruce Barton 

2) Clarity.

 Even in immense loss there can be a strange lightness of burden as the minutiae of what once was gets stripped away.  You bet, there is a shocking nakedness, a hyper disorientation to our new normal. But

there is also less now to cloud our inner vision, especially when it comes to our own souls. 

After the initial fog disappears, options we never needed before or allowed ourselves to ponder begin to present themselves.  We get privy to blind spots.  We gain access, awareness of previously hidden, debilitating sin.  If there were contributions we made that helped to feed the storm we just came through, we can better see those contributions now and begin to take responsibility for them. What can be shaken will be shaken, the bible says.  And what remains in the aftermath? Nothing says it better than that line from the old Johnny Nash song: I can see clearly now the rain has gone.

3) Tenderness

 The other night we watched a documentary on deserts.  They showed all these rock formations that had worn smooth through centuries of wind and floods.  Now think of the way a piece of meat gets tenderized by rough, aggressive pounding.  After some pretty tough hits our hearts can get softer, too ( or harder and bitter depending on our response. ) I believe God intends for us to soften, become more sensitive to the pain of others after we ourselves have gone through intense hurt, to the point we want to be there for them if they’re going through a hard time. One of my favorite scriptures is 2 Corinthians 1: 3-4, “ …the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God.”

Not long ago, after the biggest storm of my life, women started calling, emailing and sending me Facebook messages.  They had heard of my trauma and came wanting to know how they could make it through their own.  I felt a strange privilege.

 I was a survivor. And out of my pain I had increased capacity to hold the deep needs of others facing loss.

* If you’re in a storm, trying to dig yourself out from the aftermath or know someone who is, David and I are here @ Kairos Collective to sit with you and to remind you though it may feel like it right now, all is not lost.  There is a path toward redemption and restoration.

* Let us help you see clearer and encourage you to disown the bitterness and embrace the tender-hearted grace of God.  Contact us.

(Credit: Above painting by artist John Brosio)