You Can’t Fake Authenticity

“You can’t fake authenticity.”
^that’s what has been on my heart lately.

So the question is, has somebody been fake with me? Or super real?

I think it’s me, though. I think I’ve been faking my authenticity all summer.

Convincing myself my walls weren’t walls. We all have walls, but some of us have more gates than others. I thought gates were enough; that I could have gates to not have walls. But the secret I’d been keeping from myself is that gates can close too.

I’d closed the gate on God for a while, but waved at him through the bars over my heart.

I thought talking over the fence was enough. But these fences and bars, these walls and these gates, these are the things that keep us awake. These are the things that give us that nasty feeling in our gut. These are the things that turn our castle into a hut.

So why do we do it?
I didn’t think I wanted to.

But being raw and authentic is scary. We’d rather try to fake our authenticity than try to carry the weight of ourselves when there’s no way to filter. When we’re real and expose our baggage, sometimes it just looks like more to carry. It’s scary.

But this isn’t the place we should live. Because if you’ve got bags, it looks like you’re going somewhere. So get there. Jump on the train; get off of the platform. Give your bags to the bus boy, and your ticket to the Master.

Your ticket is grace, paid in advance.
So hand in your ticket; this is your chance.
You’re off on adventure.
You’re safe. in. His. hands.

Open your gates up, unlock your old fences. Put down your shield, get out of the trenches. Stop fighting yourself; you’re not the enemy. Jesus is here: “Listen to me.”

{Selah}
[Breathe]

“I want you. I want your friendship. Not the way you fake it with others, and fake it with yourself. If you’re not real with me, who are you real with? It’s not like I don’t already know you. I still love you for all of it. Trust me with all of it. It’s not worth it to lock things inside, especially things that were meant to be shared. So share it with someone who cares. “Don’t be afraid to open up again. I promise not everyone will love you with a knife behind their back.” I promise you this, I promise this truth: If you’re not authentic with me, you’re not authentically you.”

Life is Discovery

We spend most of our life in the Unknown, I think.

That’s what life is, really.
It’s discovery.

It’s your first flight on your own. It’s window seats and salted peanuts, looking out at the clouds.
It’s a train station filled with strangers. Some of them are going the same direction as you and you’ll sit with them for a while. Some of them you just pass in the tunnel, or on the platform.

It’s climbing a mountain with a friend, just to say you did.
It’s that nervousness of your first time going downtown by yourself.

It’s moving away for the first time, starting over.
It’s coming home again, starting over.

It’s seeing how much you can learn overnight.
It’s learning that there’s much that you don’t know.

It’s falling in love for the first time. And the second. And the third.
It’s learning that love is a verb, and that you’re a noun.

It’s finding the limits of who you are.
And then pushing just a little bit farther.

It’s wanting to do everything, but choosing to do one thing.
Or wanting to do anything, but trying to do everything.

Life isn’t what you do.
Or what you know.
Or who you’re with.
Or how you’ve tried.

Life is the sum total of everything you’ve ever known multiplied by the amount of times you’ve failed, divided by the things you didn’t try because someone told you they were impossible.

Life isn’t something you can define.
It’s something you have to experience.

Clouds are weird.

Because they’re definitely not see through. But they still let light in. Think about it: even when it’s the stormiest day out, with the darkest clouds and the loudest thunder – it’s still light enough to see outside. It might not be bright, it might not be pleasant, but you can still see. No matter how dark the clouds – light still gets through and lights up the world. It lets us know that it’s daytime and that the sun is still there, even if we can’t actually see it.

I think that our problems are the same way. They might darken our skies, they might make our days less appealing – but no matter how bad our storm is, there’s still enough light in our world to know that the Son is still shining, even if we can’t actually see Him. Our darkest day is never truly dark. It might not be bright, it might not be pleasant, but we can still see enough to know where we’re going.

No matter how dark your clouds, the sun is still shining on the other side of them. Just like it always has. No matter how dark your clouds, the Son is still shining on the other side of them. Just like He always has.

Not every cloud has a silver lining, but every cloud has an edge. The sun is still shining, waiting for its chance to peak around the edge of your clouds.

“Have you grabbed a burger yet?”

“Have you grabbed a burger yet?” He asked me.
“Not yet,” I said. “Wanna jump in line?”
“Yeah, lets go.”

It’s Friday night, just after 10:30pm, and the parties were just getting started. There we were on Del Playa Drive – one of the most infamous party streets in the nation, known for its rampant substance (especially alcohol) abuse and promiscuity. Somehow we were at the best party on the block.

This is the story of the house I stayed at last week. This is the story of the raddest party on the block. This is the story of Jesus Burgers.

—

Isla Vista, California, is the home of The University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) – a school known for it’s party culture.  About 15 minutes west of Santa Barbara, this town seems to have nothing but college kids and college culture.  You can’t drive a block down the street without passing at least a couple bicycles and several people on longboards. The “downtown” area is filled with restaurant after restaurant and bar after bar, with a couple coffee shops, smoothie stops, and froyo spots thrown in for good measure.

Mid-afternoon on a weekday the town has the strangest combination of being a super chill surf town, while also being rad enough to let you know that things are happening here.

Everything changes when nighttime falls and the weekend comes, as a several thousand teenagers and young adults hit the street looking for their next good time.

—

“Oh, by the way, I’m gonna have you play keys on Friday if that’s okay. Gonna use your talents while you’re here, bro!”

It’s Wednesday evening, and Mark and I are talking about our plans for the week ahead of us – he had just picked me up from the train station about a half hour earlier.
My best friend Mark moved to the Santa Barbara, California, area about a year and a half ago and we’ve been trying to find a time for me to be able to visit him ever since.  Between school during the year and work during the summer, it wasn’t until just after graduating from university this past May that I was able to. This was a week that we both had been looking forward to for months – and after a four hour flight, a 45 minute bus ride, and a nearly three hour train ride, I had arrived.

We caught up a little over dinner, and he told me a little about his house and his housemates as we babysat his niece, Hayley. (Who is the CUTEST, and super chill for a 2 year old. Also, she ate her dinner without spilling even ONE carrot onto the floor; way to go Hayley. Also, way to go Andrew and Kimmy – you’re winning at this parenting thing.)

Mark lives at a house in Isla Vista (about 15 minutes west of Santa Barbara) that has become known in the community as the “Jesus Burgers House.” This reputation has been built over the past 15 years, during which they have served hundreds of burgers every Friday night to college kids roaming the street looking for a party. The name started when someone, years ago, asked their buddy if they wanted to go get burgers from the Jesus People, which then invoked the name the “Jesus People Burgers” – and then just “Jesus Burgers.”

—

The festivities at the JB house get started at about 8pm.  There’s a garage up the driveway and behind the house that has been turned into the “prayer shed” (now the home of the Isla Vista House of Prayer) – complete with carpeting and couches. At 8pm we started praying as people were showing up – praying for the city, the church (IVC), the global Church, and for the presence of God to move powerfully that night in our midst. By the time we said amen, nearly 40 minutes later, there were probably 50 people gathered in the shed and just outside the doors on the driveway.

Then we stood up and started singing.

We led a worship set that lasted over an hour — Mark on guitar and vocals, Tess on vocals, Caleb on drums, and myself on keys/synth.  It was an awesome time as the group sang, danced, jumped, shouted, laughed, cried, and sang some more – all out of delight in our Saviour, Christ.

After the set, Bryce – the house “dad” – gave a few minutes of encouragement and inspiration to us. Then it was time to hit the street. Mark and I started cleaning up the instruments. A group started making hamburger patties. Another group went to start the bonfire. And another group got out the Free Blessings sign. Pretty much everyone had something to do – and if they didn’t know how to help, someone was able to point them in the right direction.

—

By the time we got out to the front, the first burgers had hit the grill, come off the grill, and been consumed. We stood in the front yard for a bit and chatted with people as they walked through. We sat on the wall in front of the house and encouraged passerbys to grab a burger – the line was short just then!

For a little while we stood out by the Free Blessings sign that was propped up across the street. At this sign, people could come up and get blessed – in a variety of ways! Sometimes what they needed was encouragement, sometimes prayer, sometimes healing of some sort, and sometimes just someone to listen.

While Mark and I were at the sign, a guy named Oscar came up to us. We introduced ourselves and asked what we could do. He responded that he didn’t really need anything – that life was pretty good for him right now. School was going well, he had a job, he had friends, he didn’t feel like there was anything wrong in his life. To say it in words he wouldn’t have: he felt that he was blessed. What he said to us was, “I guess I’m just thankful, yaknow? I just don’t know how to express it.” How awesome to be thankful but not know how to express it! So many of us know very well how to express our thanks to the One who has blessed us, but so many of us forget how blessed we are.

We asked if we could pray over him – he agreed. After we prayed over him, thanking and praising God for the blessings in Oscar’s life and asking for continuance of that blessing, Mark asked if he was in any pain or discomfort. As soon as Mark asked, I knew that we were about to pray for his ankle. “Well, my ankle has been hurting a bit…” Oscar said, as I grinned.  With permission, we laid hands on his ankle and prayed for healing, in the name of Jesus. We asked if he noticed a difference, and he said that it didn’t hurt. “Sometimes it doesn’t really hurt when I’m just standing though, I’ll check it out tomorrow though, yaknow.” He said, reluctantly. After thanking us again, he walked away – and I’ll likely never see him again. I still think of Oscar every couple of days, and I often wonder how his ankle feels.

Mark wandered away for a while and I stood a few feet away from the Blessings sign and talked to Brad. We exchanged a couple stories of Mark (Brad was Mark’s roommate last year, but recently moved to Austin, TX) and shared a little bit of each of our own stories and where we were in life.  After a few minutes, he asked, “Have you grabbed a burger yet?”
“Not yet,” I said. “Wanna jump in line?”
“Yeah, lets go.”

—

Later that night, as the parties were dying down – after the last burger had been grilled – there was a weird sense of peace. It wasn’t that there was a lack of peace earlier – I think I had been at peace the whole night, but just hadn’t noticed it. I think that’s something I’ve read in story after story about people visiting Jesus Burgers: that there is peace there. Even in the midst of external chaos – people roaming the streets, jumping, shouting, and dancing – there is internal peace. Our God is a God of peace.

There are times when God’s love shines brightly, bright as the spotlight from the balcony on a dark night. There are times when His presence is overwhelming, as overwhelming as the music blaring from the neighbour’s house. But His peace? I think His peace is more like the embers in the campfire. It doesn’t burn brightly and grab your attention, but when you get close to it and pay attention – it warms you, and lightens up the darkness of wherever you are.

—

“Hey, are there any more burgers?”
“No, man, sorry! We stopped grilling about a half hour ago. You can come back next week though!! Or hey, do you want a s’more?!”
“Nah, I’m good. You guys are awesome though!”

He wandered away, but a group of girls heard the word “s’mores” as they were walking past and walked up. We invited them to join us by the fire.
“Here, there’s room on this bench!”
“Hey, let me grab another chair for you.”

As we chatted, they kept expressing thankfulness, over and over again. For the s’mores, for the warm spot by the fire, and for just being there. These girls – like so many others that night, and every every Friday night during the school year – experienced a peace that they weren’t used to. Its a peace that will always be a piece of the party town near the beach. This peace lasts longer than any party, tastes better than any burger, and feels warmer than any fire. Even though they were too late for a burger, they got something far better.

S’mores are basically just dessert burgers, anyway.

Words

Here’s a few thoughts on why I appreciate words, as I wrote one night while procrastinating on writing an essay.

—

Words

Writing papers is literally my least favourite thing to do, in all the history of ever. I would be tempted to say I hate doing it, not just dislike it.

{literally hate.}

That’s probably a good way to put it.  Yes I dislike it, but there’s more than that. Dread it? Despise it? Detest it? Loathe it? Certainly not love it.

It’s not even that I hate writing, because I don’t. I actually quite enjoy writing sometimes. I love a cleverly worded sentence that articulates the thought in a playful or thought-provoking way. There’s nothing better than the feeling when you arrange words in just the right way, when it finally clicks and you can put the period at the end of the phrase and feel proud of what you wrote. There’s nothing better than the feeling when you’re able to craft words in a way that helps someone understand something new, or maybe even something about themselves.

I think my enjoyment of writing stems from my enjoyment of reading. Whether it’s a book or a blog, I’m a sucker for a good story. A good, well-written story can capture my attention and take me to lands far away. It can take me to staggering heights, soaring with eagles or climbing snowy mountain peaks. It can take me to traverse a rocky trail overlooking a cliff, climb down into a dark valley, or explore a dark and misty forest. Even more than just taking me to these places, a good, well-written story can take me to and through their matching metaphorical emotions.  I can rejoice, I can mourn, and I can pensively explore parts of my soul that I’ve sometimes neglected for far too long.

I’m not sure whether all of this contributes to the reason why my primary love language is words, or if it all stems from that fact. Words are a powerful tool that can trigger an emotional response — positive or negative. Words are the first thing we all learn, but something that not many people take time to master. Words are what allows me to be me, and you to be you, us to be us, and them to be them. Without words we would have nearly no chance of relating to each other in a meaningful way; there just isn’t another way to share your soul with someone in the same way that you can through words.

So how, then, can I have such a profound, loving sentiment for words yet such a palliative, loathing sentiment for writing an essay?