Which is Yes…

Posted on August 13, 2012 by Melissa Otterbein

“I thank you God for this most amazing day, for the leaping greenly spirits of trees,
and for the blue dream of sky and for everything
which is natural, which is infinite, which is yes.” -E. E. Cummings

Aug 12: Sunlight all around, making the green fields glisten like the first coat of untrampled upon snow. The wind is lightly blowing in my face, a warm late summer breeze that feels more like spring. My legs move up, down, up, down, up, down, faster now, exhilarated by the velocity of a good bike ride, breathing heavier now. There’s sunflowers waving in the grass, some wildflowers hugging the edge of the road. There’s so much beauty to see. Orioles fly gracefully through a field, orange belly lighting up the sky. I have no roadmap, no predetermined route. I am an explorer now. And oh, by bike, there’s so much to see. So much to see…

I take a turn down a hill off to my right and cycle around a CSA farm. I can see spinach and lettuce and other greens growing off in the distance as a woman approaches the garden, presumably to help share in the farming responsibilities. It’s the aura, the ethos of Community Supported Agriculture that gets me. People coming together to grow and harvest food that will nourish brothers and sisters, neighbors, families gathered ‘round the table, and those who pine with a deep hunger to have just one meal with a family like that, ready to say grace before the passing of baskets, dishes, and salt. There’s something about this that’s heavenly and holy, divine, like that’s the way food is supposed to be- you’re supposed to get your hands dirty and know the faces of the hands that plucked your berries from the vine or the tomatoes now garnishing your salad. It’s as if you’re supposed to celebrate that the produce you’re eating was once just some tiny seed that made its way through heatwaves and deluges of rain, sunny days, cloudy days, and days in between, just growing, growing, growing…

I head back to the main road, going down streets I’ve never been on, neighborhoods and schools and hills I never knew existed. A father goes on a walk with his two daughters, one in the back of a wagon, the other blithely by his side. We smile and wave.

I take in a deep breath, filling my lungs until they say “no more,” and prepare for a steep hill, fantasizing about the view from the top. Changing gears, slowly but persistently, inching but persevering, legs getting stronger and leaner with every turn of the pedal, I make it up to the top and discover a new place that I will watch sunsets from.

It’s beautiful now, this moment, this evening sunset just doing the same thing it does night after night, only I don’t stop often enough to give it the glory it deserves.

It’s stunning, really, the sun ablaze, hovering over tree tops, trying to avoid sinking down beneath the nighttime covers of the horizon, a firery ruby orange, a sapphire in the sky.

Oh it’s so beautiful.

The whole wide world.

It’s fricken beautiful, and I have everything I need.

It’s beautiful and God, it feels good to be alive.

It’s beautiful and this Sabbath bike ride pulls me in deeper, deeper into you God. I’m pedaling downhill, I’m flying fast now; exhilarated, like a child on their first rollercoaster getting brave enough to wave her hands in the air.

Oh yes I’m pedaling harder now, making my way around the bends in the road, biking past a tall damn with geese at the top, looking over the edge. I bet they’re daring each other to jump or fly off the edge- “you go,” “no, you go…”

I bike over the bridge where I went bridge jumping with friends, wearing my cap and gown one jubilant night in May 2009 with friends. This spot always causes a smile to traverse my face, usually from the right to the left as I ruminate the rush of that plunge over and over again.

I peer over my shoulder one more time and there’s that sunset again, this time emanating from water.

It’s beautiful.

My eyes can capture each hue, every tint, every highlight of sky refracting off the water.

It’s beautiful, God, and I get to see it… get to see it, taste it, feel it, experience it.

And it was one of those amazing days composed of everything which is natural, which is infinite, which is yes…

Here, now.

Posted on January 19, 2012 by Melissa Otterbein

6.12.11

I was about to start a run yesterday, when I noticed the most beautiful, free-fluttering, yellow butterfly. I peered closer, lifting my leg towards my back to stretch, and pause long enough to notice the black and fellow fur, completely covering what used to be caterpillar, but now has blossomed into this spotted-winged creature.

Being still, like I was in that moment, is hard for me. I don’t know very often how to be present. It’s something that I talk about- being passionate, being fully alive, not missing your life. Maybe I should stick to following my own advice. Nevertheless, it’s something I’m working on and something God is trying to teach me, through many experiences and people.

One of them is my youth pastor, whom I met with last week, and I bought a copy of her beautiful new book, “Unhaling.” The last chapter is titled, “be here now.”

Be here now. Be here now.

The words mull over and over and swirl around my brain, as my feet take to the pebbled trail. “BUT I DON’T KNOW HOW TO BE HERE NOW!!!” I shout out to God, tears mingling with sweat. “My grant position ends in April; I have no idea where my career is going; I don’t know exactly which grad program I should go into… everything feels like it’s changing…… And why, God, WHY, for the life of me can’t I stop thinking about Africa, I trip I’ve been on nearly FOUR years ago?! And why can’t a day go by without me thinking of HIV, and images of orphans, and girls being trafficked and sold into sex slavery, and unbearable poverty. WHY ARE YOU BOTHERING ME WITH THIS STUFF, GOD!!!?” I shout indignantly as my feet hit the pavement harder.

Be here now.
Be here now.

I pick up my pace. Bikers, runners, joggers, and walkers smile at me. But I can’t smile back. My 19-year-old self would have gladly smiled at a fly, but I didn’t feel like smiling at anyone in that moment. And I feared depression has awakened from its nap and once again reared its ugly head, like a hissing snake, slithering in the darkness through a crack in an unlocked door. I quickly slam the door shut, but fear its hissing, mocking voice will come out again.

Be here now.
Be here now.

A red, red cardinal stretches its wings, moving from the path into the shaded branches of the trees.

Be here now.
Be here now.

Squirrels hang upside-down above me, tip-toeing along tree branches, exposing their white bellies.

Be here now.
Be here now.

Bono whispers, then SHOUTS through my headphones, of a journey of running, crawling, scaling these city walls… when, “DAMN IT!!” I mutter out loud. My iPod died, battery gone. Embarrassed, I pray no one has heard me, as I notice little kids with training wheels biking around me. I fear their parents are secretly glaring at me, wondering what my problem is, and successfully avoid eye contact with anyone.

Be here now.
Be here now.

Now that silence has officially overtaken my headphones, I can hear birds chattering to each other in trees along the path, like neighbors across the street catching up over gardening and trash day.

I can now hear cyclers’ dinging bike bells, warning me that they’re about to pass and I envision myself on my next triathlon. This one will be a half ironman and I visualize myself swimming, biking, and running my way through those 70.3 miles.

Be here now.
Be here now.

I watch as a young girl feels the peddling sensation of her knees going up, down, up, down, her dad smiling behind her, as she tries to bike without training wheels for the first time. They’re smiling and laughing and he is not letting go.

Be here now.
Be here now.

My feet hit the pavement harder. I look ahead. About 20 feet in front of me to my left is a deer trotting merrily along the path. “Bambi?” I think out loud, as it leaps over the grass down to the water for a cool drink.

Be here now.
Be here now.

My feet are moving faster now and my tears have stopped and sweat is pouring down my face.

Be here now.
Be here now.

My finish line is getting closer. My chest is pounding. My toenail, bruised and falling off, screams at me.

Be here now.
Be here now.

I lengthen my stride, pumping my arms as swiftly as I can and cross my finish line. Overcome with a mix of sheer exhaustion and endorphins, I pause to catch my breath. I look up to the sky and feel sunlight touch my face, knowing, deep in my heart, that I have just spent the past seven miles with my wonderful Father in Heaven. My spirit, enmeshed with His, in an intimate holy embrace.

Be here now.
Be here now.

I stretch my hands out to my Maker, and, for the first time, I smile.

“You are here now,” says God. “You are my child.

And,

LOVE

YOU.”

And I walk to the car, heart rate now steady, smiling, here now.

Learning to Love the Questions Themselves

Posted on January 19, 2012 by Melissa Otterbein

3.21.11

It’s my most favorite time of the year, where just walking by a flower causes me to smile. My favorite tree is in bloom and each day, I stop my running mind to observe new budding and flowering of each magnolia blossom. And it’s a reminder to me that God is not finished; that He is on the move, and what I once saw in January was not the final picture nor final fate for these beloved trees, beloved blades of grass, beloved chirping birds… And so it is with people; so it is with me… That I am ever-growing, ever being molded and shaped, ever-taught. And yet still my soul thirsts and hungers deeply, a seeking and asking that never seems to stop. When I think I’ve figured out one thing, there’s always something new to ponder, some new question to ask…

And in this season of life, I am asking more questions than ever before with some kind of shameless audacity and curiousity about the world around me; not a demanding, indignant, deserving sense of question-asking, but rather one of an explorer, a participator. What does it mean to be fully alive each day? What does it mean to be a human, bound to Earth by gravity, seeing all this messiness around me, but receiving my guidance, direction, purpose, and hope from above, beyond this world? What good does it do to be critical of other people; afterall, we’re all brothers and sisters anyway? If Jesus prayed for ‘Your will be done on Earth as in Heaven’, shouldn’t we be actively trying to shape the world around us into something more beautiful, more complete, more whole?

And so I’m learning to not be afraid of questions as they come, but rather, I’m learning to love the questions themselves. That they point to something bigger than me, something beyond me. That my little brain cannot fathom, nor know, nor fully comprehend the majesty of life and Creation… That yes, there are absolute truths in life. But that God is not limited… that his/her Kingdom is more diverse, more whole, more all-encompassing that I can ever, ever imagine. And I feel convicted that my arms want to refuse to unembrace anyone.

So may we s e e k . And may these questions that cross our minds draw us into holy wonder and awe, straight into the arms of our Creator.

Like Birds On Trees

Posted on January 19, 2012 by Melissa Otterbein

4/5/10
At my favorite park, reflecting:

I look out there into that creek, water gracefully sliding its way down stream around rocks, and I look up into that g i a n t blue sky, the sweet fragrance of magnolia captured in the warm breeze brushing up against my face. All I can think about is how what I see in the world doesn’t seem to equate to what I feel like Jesus offers us. I think about what my faith community taught me during college about my gender and feel hurt, small, and my heart aches because I don’t think this is what Jesus meant when he said that he came to give us life to the full. I think about what they and so many others have said about homosexuality and how most of them have never bothered to sit beside still waters with someone of a differing sexual orientation.

I skip some rocks and ponder the sacrificial love of Jesus who touched those who were rejected by society (Matt. 8) and never condemned anyone (John 8).

And I think about all the beauty in the world and how much peace we could share if we could stop and slow down more and marvel and learn from the beauty around us. Trees offering birds a place to rest and make a home. Ducks in the pond just coasting along the small water ripples, no hurry, no worry, just your best duck friends and you cruising along the cool early spring water. Birds exhaling beautiful harmonious songs of gratitude and joy, as if to delight the tree, to bring out the green on its leaves or to encourage the growth of blooming buds daring to come out and experience the world, knowing there would be winds that might shake off its petals and that winter is inevitable and one day in the future it will die, signaling the finality of life and death, but d a r i n g u s t o LIVE BRIGHTLY AND BEAUTIFULLY WHILE WE ARE STILL YET ALIVE.

And look at the flowers. You don’t see them arguing over who’s pink and who’s purple and why it’s wrong to be a perennial instead of an annual. Just harmony and brightness and joy. Maybe the flowers know more than we humans do when it comes to Jesus’ goals of being of “one heart and one mind, so that we’ll be unified and together” (John 17).

So I’m sitting here, stretching at the entrance of my favorite park, post-run sweat slowly drying to my forehead and cheekbones. And God is bringing me back to s i m p l i c i t y . That really, S/He doesn’t want our arguing. That S/He is so simple, yet its the simplicity of God that makes Him/Her/the Spirit seem mysterious. That one day, we will all hold hands and D A N C E in heaven, like birds on trees, being moved by the warm magnolia breeze, like purple annuals and pink perennials growing in the same garden of love.