Ceilings, Floors, and Relay Batons

Great. There goes my blood again: boiling because someone said it. 

That dreaded phrase that ignites a defiant fire in me every time I hear it proclaimed with such annoying gusto...

"Our ceiling is their floor!"

There I sat, part of "The Forgotten 20-Somethings," listening to someone YET AGAIN praising the youth as the generation that's going to change the world, that it'll be OUR backs they stand on to reach the goal. As I crossed my arms and seethed angrily in my seat, I prayed that the retorts racing through my head would stay safely barricaded there and not burst forth in front of the entire congregation;

"...And what am I? Damaged goods? Too old? WHAT IF I DON'T WANT A DANG CEILING?!"

In 2007 when I met the Lord in earnest and immersed myself in supernatural culture, I had just exited the glorified teenage years and found myself as a member of the all-too-often overlooked "young adult" crowd. People always marvel over a kid who is experiencing the supernatural wonders of God, and revere the adults with families and children. But what about us college (or non-school-going) aged people in our 20's, just beginning to enter "the real world" that's a lot less glamorous than a Christian-raised homeschooler giving prophetic words (I'm not in the slightest bit against that, by the way!), or a well-established married couple with two kids and another on the way? I learned pretty quickly that mine was an age demographic usually treated like an afterthought, as if no one really knows what to do with us so we're left to carve a place out for ourselves in the shadow of the children's and youth ministries.

Fast forward a few years, and God was beginning to gingerly lead me away from young adult ministry (which, by the way, was much better than at my previous church), and down my next path. 

...And the irony was that I knew He was setting me up to work with the youth. 

From the very first moment I felt Him nudging me in that direction, the anger began to flare. I couldn't escape that demeaning phrase, imagery that further poked at my raw wounds from previous ministry experiences.

I would listen to different speakers raving about how massively anointed and special the kids in the church were, thinking to myself,

"Why are they seen as more powerful just because they're younger?

Why can't I change the world just as much?

And most importantly, WHY do I have to have a ceiling for them to walk on?!"

I didn't fully make peace with that awful phrase, but God did settle within me that mentoring the next generation didn't require me to somehow trade in living an exciting supernatural life so they could somehow get more than me. And since then, it's been just under 2 years that I've been happily working in youth ministry and loving every second...

However.

Recently, that bitterness and resentment snuck back up on me and pounced when I was most unaware, and that stupid phrase came back to haunt me, because...

DUN DUN DUN......

There's a new wave of teenagers and 20-somethings taking our place and experiencing the Presence of God and all the supernatural fun stuff that entails!

At first, I thought it was really beautiful and I was really excited about it; all of them congregating in mine and my friends' old spot on the left side of the stage like we did for years which caused the pastor to affectionately refer to the far left section of the church as the place where "The Crazies" sat; hungrily occupying the front rows just like we did, eagerly praying for the sick at the end of every service just like we always used to do, having weekly "bible studies" together, which are really just crazy Holy Spirit encounter nights.

But then it hit me: My life doesn't look like that, anymore. 

That initial joy in seeing the next wave of young people step into what I had walked in, began to transform into resentment and disappointment when I took a trip down memory lane and looked back in my journals from 6+ years ago; I read entry after entry chronicling the crazy supernatural adventures my friends and I would take, whether it was going up to strangers in the streets and seeing illnesses healed as we prayed, or finding our hands covered in gold dust during worship, and all manner of other crazy Holy Spirit encounters. Instead of being encouraged, I felt like I shrunk ten sizes...

...What happened to me?

Where was this girl who used to roll around laughing on the floor during worship? 

This girl whose idea of a fun Friday night was going out on a "treasure hunt" with friends to find some people to pray for?

Where in the world did she go?!

Feeling utterly deflated and terribly ordinary, that awful taunting phrase began to ring in my ears with a horrible new meaning attached:

"Our ceiling is their floor!"  

I knew I was bitter. I was well aware. And this time instead of stewing in it, I wanted to rip that sucker out once and for all.

"God, I HATE that phrase!" I complained loudly to Him, while driving one day. 

In His goodness, He replied immediately and I saw a very clear picture and suddenly, I had my answer to silent that phrase that irked me so much:

Christianity is not a multi-level building filled with people

on an infinite number of sealed-off floors...

It is a relay race! 

The thing about relay races is that no member is more vital than the other. It's a team effort and without everyone ready to run when it's their time, the game cannot be won and the entire team loses.

I'm not dumb; I knew it was a lie that somehow the younger generation was more important or more valuable than me, but it was hard to shake that when I'd already been hurt, and now a well-meaning, but poorly-worded mantra says that there's a cap on how high I can go, that eventually I'll hit a "ceiling" that only someone younger than me can surpass.  

When I did a little research on how relay races work, I learned that often the slowest member of the team will go first. Before I was tempted to be offended that perhaps God was eluding to the fact that I was the slowest team member, He reminded me of icebreaker ships: they are massive vessels with steel hulls that cut through thick layers of ocean ice, moving at a slow and steady pace.

...Are they somehow less important because they're slower? NO! If not for the icebreakers moving slowly but with force and clearing away the ice, the smaller ships wouldn't be able to move freely and quickly through the water. They aren't slow because they're weak ships, they're slow because they're big and strong!

And I realized... I was that icebreaker. That place in the left corner of the church where the new wave of young people who are getting blasted with the presence of God congregate, is the same patch of carpet stained with years of my tears and snot from my own encounters with Him. It's the same place I laid on the floor with friends, enraptured in holy laughter that kept us from standing upright. It's the same place I sat with my journal opened as I got download after download of revelation. The same spot my friends and I prayed for people and saw their legs grow, and sickness leave, and metal pins leave their bones. 

They can experience this now at a younger age and with more ease because of the icebreakers who went before them and cleared a way!

Now please, don't hear what I'm NOT saying: I am in NO WAY insinuating it's all because of me, or all because of my particular community of friends, or that these kids didn't have their own struggles to persevere through. I FULLY honor and acknowledge those who went before me, those who pressed in for breakthrough so that I could walk in and experience breakthrough, myself. And I acknowledge that every young person has their own story. But what I am saying is that we are all icebreakers for SOMETHING and SOMEONE. We are ALL in this relay race, and we all have a moment of running with the baton, and a moment of passing it off to the next runner. 

So where does that leave me to answer my earlier question of "Where did that girl go?"

Well, that's simple: I'm resting while someone else runs with the baton. I won't belabor this topic because it's been spoken on so many times and we all understand the reference, but this is about the time God began to remind me about SEASONS:

That girl who loved to dance around in church like a fool didn't leave; she's in a different season. She no longer lives with her parents, where her only responsibility was cleaning her room and paying her phone bill. She no longer has the time to stay up til 4am with friends on weeknights, praying and getting wasted in the Presence of God. She now has a husband and a house, a mortgage to pay and responsibilities to tend to. This is not bad, and it doesn't mean I've "peaked." I haven't hit a ceiling. I've simply stepped into a new place that looks different, but lacks nothing good because with God, it's IMPOSSIBLE to go backwards in His glory!

(( I believe this all ties in with comparison, that nasty thief of joy, but that's a whole other topic for another time --in fact, my good friend Ayse wrote an awesome blog post about it, which you can read right here. It's written for a mother's perspective, but you don't need to be a mom to relate! ))

The best part of this revelation is the fact that as I was realizing this, some of those very youth expressed their enormous honor and gratitude for the road my peers and I walked before them to make their way with God possible. WOW!! Talk about humbling!!

So what, now? What do I do with that silly little phrase? Not going to lie, it still irritates me, but I have a different understanding.

I might not be in a season where everyone can see God making a spectacle of my encounters with Him, but that hardly means I'm no longer moving upward! Right now, I'm grateful to be cheering on the runners as they grip the batons and dash faster than I did during my turn. I can do this gladly with no fear that I'll bump my head on this metaphorical ceiling, because guess what? I've decided that I don't have one. The only person who can put a cap on me is myself, and you couldn't pay me to do it. 


Seasons come and go, but they can only bring you forward, not back. I no longer have to be disappointed when they look different. I no longer have to be resentful or bitter when someone enters into one that I've left. I can embrace the season I'm in without fear of losing a piece of myself, because they build one upon another. Nothing is lost, and nothing is wasted. 

So if you've got that baton, run! If you're passing it off and assuming a different function for the team, embrace it! 

No matter your role, no matter your season, don't forget that it matters and you're vital to a team victory.



Peace out, ceiling!  

Expectations: Not for the Faint of Heart

I've heard it said, "If you don't have expectations, you won't be disappointed when they're not met." As an optimist and an idealist, I never liked this way of thinking. And honestly, not subscribing to it has always done me good.

But let's get real for a second; it's simply impossible to go through life without experiencing the disappointment of having our hopes dashed at some point, even when we put our hope in the proper place.  So how do we reconcile unmet expectations with a God that says He'll never let us down?

Like any normal female with a dream in her heart would do, I've spent much of my 9 years of knowing my now-husband, fantasizing about my life with him as a married couple. One of my deepest desires was to take him to the place that I grew up, my most favorite place in the entire world. Summer after Summer that he could not go there with me and my family, I would dream of the day when it would happen, conjuring up beautiful mental images of us walking hand-in-hand down the beach, star-gazing at night, sailing on the bay. My heart would literally hurt while I dreamt of the day it would finally become a reality.

After so many years of waiting, I was finally able to bring him with me this year in our first Summer as husband and wife! Could the timing have been any more perfect? I was simply beside myself. Finally my dreams were coming true!

In the week before our trip, God kept bringing to mind the lyrics of the Andrew Ehrenzeller song that I picked to be sung during our wedding ceremony: 

"So I set my love upon you, no expectation, only revelation..."

(Looking back at my 5 months of marriage, the irony and humor of my song choice is not lost on me, but that's another dozen blogs for another time...)

Going into this trip, I had extremely high expectations. After all, I have had years to dream and fantasize, to plan out my perfect scenario for every situation while on this vacation. However, from the moment we woke up to go to the airport, nothing was going the way I had "planned." Dumb little things that went wrong were like fatal blows to my dream. By the time we landed at our destination, I was extremely irate, disappointed, and quite honestly, hurt with God. Ian picked up on it right away and wasted no time reprimanding me in love: 

"Don't let the fact that things aren't going exactly as you thought, steal your joy."

Of course as any heart-sick individual would do at the loss of a perfect plan, I didn't heed his words right away and let a couple of precious days go by feeling upset, let down, and disillusioned as each hour yielded different results than I expected of this long-awaited dream.

"God, don't you tell us to expect great things? Don't you tell us that you're a good Daddy who wants to give us the desires of our heart? What happened, here?!" 

And there it was again, the words sang over my marriage:

"...no expectation, only revelation..."

And then I realized my fault: I put expectation in my own ideas of perfection, rather than putting expectation first and foremost in the character of God to fulfill dreams in His perfection! It's so vital that we don't jump ahead of God, assume that we know how He is going to do something, and then build our hope upon it. That is a sure-fire way to construct a rickety foundation that will crumble under the weight of the slightest disappointment! 

I've heard so many times to "come to God expecting": expect Him to move in a mighty way, expect Him to answer you, expect Him to be there in a time of need, expect Him to show up.

Are these bad things to hope in? Of course, not! But what I've found that I do (and I'm sure I'm not the only one guilty of this) is I will go that teensy little step further and--sometimes unconsciously--put my hope in what I think His methods will be and expect everything to happen just as I imagine. Then when things don't go the way I expected I am left feeling let down, like God didn't come through on what He promised.

"...only revelation." 

What we need is not expectation, but revelation, a.k.a perspective. Perspective to see things as God sees them and not as we see them, perspective to remember that His ways are not our ways and His thoughts are not our thoughts (Isaiah 55:8), that we must not lean on our own understanding, but trust that He knows what He's doing (Proverbs 3:5-6). It's easy to think that everything has gone wrong when they didn't go the way we wanted them to, but that hardly means God didn't make good on His promise; it means He did it HIS way, not ours, and we should ask for revelation to see beyond what things appear to be on the surface.

Bottom line: We will always risk being disappointed if we are more hopeful in His methods than in His character; His methods are often a mystery and beyond our understanding, but His character is clear and it never changes.

"Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but desire fulfilled is a tree of life." (Proverbs 13:12) The Hebrew word for "deferred" means "delayed" and the Hebrew word for "fulfilled" is "come, arrive." I finally see this verse in light of Jesus: while we may have to wait while the fulfillment of our dreams is delayed, we will never have to wait for access to Jesus and the fulfillment we can find in Him...it has already arrived! Because of this, our hearts will never be sick and our desire always fulfilled when our hope is exclusively in Him: Not what He can do, will do, or has done in lieu of our heart's desires, but simply in who He is!



In hind sight, the fact that my dream didn't pan out exactly as I had always imagined was a good thing--more than a good thing, it was a great thing. I would not have experienced what I had and realized what I did had things gone any differently. Once I gained revelatory perspective and looked past my expectations, I was able to take joy in my dream, again. I ditched the disappointment and embraced the moment, and while it didn't outwardly appear to be my version of perfect, I chose to enjoy it and it was amazing.



God has known the deepest desires of my heart longer than I have. He was aware of them developing for 9 years and He knew how I longed for their culmination. I am no special case; God sees your heart, as well. Have you been disappointed lately by circumstances taking an unexpected and unwanted turn? Have you had great expectations only to find yourself disillusioned with their outcome? Release your expectations and receive His revelation! Putting hope in Him will not disappoint.



"And this hope will not lead to disappointment..." - Romans 5:5



<3 Hali