Emily, way over in the East, and I, way out here in the West, would like to share encouragement and some thoughts on faith - with each other and with you, our family. Especially our siblings and cousins .... and parents ... and aunts and uncles ... and friends, and for me, my spouse and son - so basically everyone. Everyone who has the courage to read what actually comes out of our fool heads. Look out world! (I hear Dolly singing 9 to 5 in my head.) But, to state the obvious, we have a very dear and special place in our hearts for family.
It occurred to me some time ago that co-authoring a blog might be just the thing. It's not going to be all perfectly written or out-of-this-world excellent - well my posts won't - Emily's might! She can be downright poetic, as you all know. But we don't really know, it's a bit of a trip and we're just starting out.
It very well might turn out mediocre, BUT, here's what it WILL be: it will always be honest - painstakingly honest (which will probably also involve eating a fair amount of crow on my part), and it will always lead to Jesus, and mine will hopefully sometimes be irreverently funny, and it will always be loving.
We all read our Bibles sometimes, a devotional here and there, books on faith and walking with God. But I am so interested in hearing and sharing with the people in my family, the people I miss and love so much. When Mother calls me and says, I just read this in such and such book and it just filled up my soul, it's so much more potent than digging around for meaningful soul food by myself. Really, this blog will be like seeking God together, sharing our lives across the miles.
The truth is that (honesty spoiler alert!) I am completely, terrifyingly paralyzed by a fear of failure. It's taken me a long long time to do anything about this blog idea. And truly, I'm sick to ever-loving death of quotes like these: Defeat is not the worst of failures. Not to have tried is the true failure. I really am so sick of them I could spit. I'm sick of scratching the surface with wit and presumed intelligence. I'm sick of mantras. I'm sick of social media updates and cheap wisdom. I need something so much more.
That's the thing of it ... I can't boil down my life and daily struggles to those kinds of quips. They're great, sure, and sometimes one can get a little boost from them. I am, however, a complex creature with four thousand conflicting things running through my brain at any given moment. So I'm looking for transformation - the kind where I won't hope and scrape for a little boost just to keep my head above what is damned rough water (that would be life, gentle reader). I am at a point in my life where I don't think I can live without real transformation daily.
I want to have actual joy, and find peace for my troubled, troubled soul. I want freedom for my heavy heart. I only know of ONE person in this whole great Universe who talks about giving us, the human race, those very things and means it. And that's Jesus.
Emily said some things to me the other day in an email that struck all the way down into my toes - it was about our family, the clan McLeod - the Woody McLeods specifically, and the kind of anchor we all are to each others' souls. Here's what she said (in bold):
"I was thinking about identity... about how we naturally seek to find our identity in our jobs, in our credentials, in our hometowns, in our talents, in our friends, and in our FAMILY. Our Scottish "clan" mentality is all about that - claiming the tartan and finding identity in who our "people" are. :) It's not just Scotch, it's Southern. It's Mississippian. And it's us. It's why we always end up in the old graveyard at the end of a day in Green County. It's why we love to hear the same stories again and again about Roderick and Sarah and everyone who came before us. It's why conversations about the homeplace bring us to tears.
We stake our identity on another - a people and a place.
The
reality, of course, when we trust in Christ, is that our identity is in
Him. That's how we can "let goods and kindred go" - even when our
kindred means so much to us. It's why we can let our very "mortal life
also" go - knowing that "the body they may kill, God's truth abidith
still."
God's truth - that abidith still when all else is gone - is that I
am designed by my creator to stake my identity not on myself - but on
another. My whole eternal identity is based not on who I am, but on who
Jesus is and on the hope I have in where He has gone to prepare a place
for me.
It turns out that the clannishness that comes so naturally to all of us is a gentle yet powerful way that the Father nudges us to see and understand the way that he has designed us. He actually intends for us to seek our identity in another - in His Son. The peace that we feel from our fleeting identity in Clan McLeod and the old homeplace is just a shadow of the deeper, better peace we can feel from our eternal identity in Jesus and in heaven, our real homeplace.
It turns out that the clannishness that comes so naturally to all of us is a gentle yet powerful way that the Father nudges us to see and understand the way that he has designed us. He actually intends for us to seek our identity in another - in His Son. The peace that we feel from our fleeting identity in Clan McLeod and the old homeplace is just a shadow of the deeper, better peace we can feel from our eternal identity in Jesus and in heaven, our real homeplace.
This old Scottish hymn puts it much better than I can:
Upon a Life I have not lived, Upon a Death I did not die, Another’s Life; Another’s Death: I stake my whole eternity. |
| Not on the tears which I have shed; Not on the sorrows I have known: Another’s tears; Another’s griefs: On them I rest, on them alone. |
| Jesus, O Son of God, I build On what Thy cross has done for me; There both my death and life I read; My guilt, my pardon there I see. |
As one who has Thy Word believed!
I take the gift, Lord, look on me
As one who has Thy gift received."
So ... that's what you can sink your teeth into, put all your eggs in that basket. (And isn't Emily a lovely writer?!!) I do hope that you are encouraged by these words, these thoughts and honest confessions by one of your own, by one of the McLeods who loves you deeply.
This is meant to be a bit of a forum as well, where we can make comments, and enter into some discussion about our true thoughts and fears and hopes and encouragement. Emily and I invite you to enter in and we so hope you do! Jokes also heartily welcomed. Obviously.
Take heart, and Hold Fast my beloved ones!
love,
Annie
PS - My Joshua loves old hymns and is constantly refreshing them for our church. He searched this one out and couldn't find the melody - so he wrote his own, and also added some lyrics for a chorus - I'll find a recording of it and link it here soon! Loves.
