When the Towers Fall: Rebuilding your Life from the Rubble, Part 5

I want to start this fifth message from Rubble Town with a brief expression of gratitude. I'm not going to overdo this. I just want to say a deep-down, heart-felt thanks to all those who have written messages of encouragement to me in response to these blogs.

You have truly reflected the kindness of the one who restores our broken walls (Isaiah 58:12).

And now to the fifth lesson I have learned in the seemingly well-populated territory of Rubble Town.

In the last blog I wrote about our identity. When the towers fall and catastrophe hits - whether self-inflicted or thrust upon us - our sense of self can implode too. In the rubble of our external circumstances we can experience a sometimes crushing sense of internal confusion as we ask one of the most fundamental questions of life: who am I? Now that my job has gone, my spouse has died,my mobility is removed, my health is shot, who really am I?

For a time, this can feel like a kind of soul death in which the fractured nature of our outer world becomes a stark reflection of our inner life.

But this is only for a season. It is not meant to last forever.

As I wrote in the last blog, our worst disasters can be the landscape for our greatest discoveries - including the discovery of who we really are.

So look for the real you in the rubble - not a fictional you (some people reinvent themselves more times than Madonna, after all). But the real you. The one with the divine imprint. The one that has 'kingdom' written all over it. The one, therefore, that cannot be shaken, even when everything else is.

All this is really just a lead-in to another revelatory journey and this has to do with discovering your true talent or talents.

So many of us, if we're honest, get diverted from the primary passion of our lives by the insistent demands of simply making a living. 

We get slowly lured away from what really exhilarates us by the expediencies of earning money, staying in work, keeping everyone happy, putting meals on the table, paying the rent or the mortgage and so on. 

In the process we make a sufficient living but we sometimes don't get to make a satisfying life. 

We survive but we don't thrive.

I believe there are many people like this, and not just those in Christian ministry in the church, or in jobs in Christian organizations.

They are everywhere.

I know I was like that for a long time - and for probably half my working life (if I live to over 70).

It is not comfortable.

In fact, it is deeply frustrating.

If you relate to this sense of frustration, this inner sense that your career and your creativity are out of sync, then I'd like to make a suggestion if you're currently in Rubble Town.

Start digging in the dirt for the talents that you forgot you had.

Look for shiny hints of destiny within the debris at Ground Zero.

I can guarantee there's revelation in the rubbish.

Do you remember the parable Jesus told about talents?

It's in Matthew's Gospel (chapter 25).

Jesus tells a story about a master who sets off on a long journey. He gives three of his employees bags of gold.

To one he gives five bags of gold.
To another two bags.
To the third, one bag.

The first and second immediately invest their money, doubling it in the process. The third man is so scared that he buries his bag in the ground. 

When the boss eventually comes back he is pleased with the first two but unhappy with the third.

'You could at least have put the money in the bank to earn interest,' he cries.

In the end the man is punished.

He loses even the one bag he had which is given to the man who had invested five (ending up with ten, or eleven as it now is).

This is a story familiar to pretty well all of us and there's a lot that I could say about it.

But let me confine myself to this one thought.

Many of us - like the third man in the story - live out of a centre of fear rather than a centre of love.

When we live from fear we seek to remain in control of our lives, choosing the safe option over risk every time.

What matters to us is not that we trustingly explore and utilize our unique creativity but that we keep the wolf from the door.

In the process we choose conventional paths and well-travelled roads and all the while we miss the adventure of investing the talent or talents the Father has given us.

We bury them in the ground.

On the other hand, when we live from a love centre - no longer bound by fear of poverty but trusting that God is a trustworthy and generous Dad - then we take hold of even the little talents and steward them faithfully.

As that happen we watch with marvelling eyes as what we have dared to invest begins to expand and multiply.

This then deepens our confidence as we take even bigger steps of faith in the investment of our talents the next time.

And so we learn to revel in convergence - the coming together of our true identity (who we are) and our true destiny (what God has called us to steward in faith).

So often it takes a trip to Rubble Town before we experience this alignment of what we do with what we have.

Maybe you're in Rubble Town now.

You've been living life one way, pursuing one particular path, but all that has come crashing down.

Now you find yourself asking who you are (identity), what you were doing with your life (history) and what your real purpose has been all along (destiny).

If you're in that situation now, here are some questions you can ask that will help you to find your buried talents.

These questions are ones that I have felt led to ask in my own rubble as I have had to look for clues about my real talents and my true destiny.

1. Is there a clue in your family history?

Is there something about your parents, your grandparents and even your great grandparents that could be a revelatory hint?

I know that may sound a little off the wall but we are radically shaped by both nature and nurture.

I know that's been true for me.

My birth mother's name was Storey (sounds like story, and I'm now focused very much on that in my new working life).

My adoptive father was a friend of C.S.Lewis, a lover of poetry, a writer and an absolutely fantastic reader of stories...

All these things are part of God's pre-ordained moulding of my personality and gifts.

They are clues concerning buried talents.

2. Is there a clue in your childhood?

Was there something you felt passionate about as a child or a teen - a hobby, a cause, a nation, an activity?

Is this something that you forgot when the responsibilities and pressures of adult life kicked in?

Did you forget that thing that made you sing when you were young and free?

Did your profession line up with your passion or did it bury it?

I know there were clues in my upbringing.

My childhood was profoundly shaped by storytelling.

I started writing stories at a very young age - the first one about my teddy bear. It was twelve pages long and my poor twin sister had to put up with me reading all of it to her!

How about you?

Chances are there's a forgotten hobby, passion or dream buried somewhere in the rubble.

3. Is there a clue in your voluntary input?

Is there something you have done outside your paid job, your career, your ministry and purely in a voluntary capacity?

Was there something you did for free and without expectation of reward because you loved the activity, the people the cause?

Whatever we voluntarily give time, energy and passion to is a massive clue about our true talents and our deeper destiny.

Looking back, can you see moments where you gave your all to something or someone in a purely voluntary capacity, because it resonated with your core passion?

4. Is there a clue in your moments of convergence?

Sometimes we have moments in our careers or ministries when we are energised by a feeling of alignment.

When I had the honour of being the Vicar of St Andrews Chorleywood I came up with the crazy idea of doing a Narnian Christmas!

For the whole of December the church building was transformed into a Narnian winterland as I shared about Lewis' faith and writings, enlisting my literary background in the process.

That month we saw extraordinary fruit in the number of people whose lives were touched and changed.

And speaking personally, I felt more alive in ordained ministry than I'd ever done or would ever do again. 

I felt a sense of alignment between my true self, my true gifts and what I was actually doing in my professional life.

That was a hint about buried talents if ever there was one!

These, then, are just some of the questions the Father has been encouraging me to ask. 

They are not taken from any book.

They are from my own personal treasure hunt.

They may be helpful for you as well.

So if you're in Rubble Town, why not start digging for buried talents and treasure?

And as you do, remember what God promises in the Book of Isaiah:

'I will give you hidden treasures, riches stored in secret places.'

(Isaiah 45:3).

When the Towers Fall: Rebuilding your Life in the Rubble: Part 4

One of the great challenges in life is to discover who you really are - not the you that has been moulded by your upbringing, your job or your community, but the 'you' that God created you to be.

What I'm talking about here is identity and that's something that doesn't just vex teenagers and people going through mid-life crises.

It affects all of us.

Deep down, we all from time to time ask the question, 'who am I?'

Indeed, this is one of the three most important questions that human beings ask.

Where am I from? 
Who am I?
What is my purpose?

I call this H.I.D: for History, Identity, and Destiny.

These things are hid from many of us.

They need to be discovered.

TV programmes such as 'Who Do you Think You Are?' seek to help well-known people to find facts about their past (history), to answer questions about their present (identity) and to discover clues concerning their future (destiny).

They are watched by millions because millions have exactly the same issues.

In fact, all of us do.

Deep down we want to find out who we really are.

We don't want to settle for a socially constructed version of our selves - a version shaped by others. 

We long to build our lives upon a spiritually discovered understanding of our selves - who we really are as God sees us.

That takes revelation.

And revelation so often comes in the rubble.

This brings me to my fourth message of hope from Rubble Town.

When the towers fall - in other words, when catastrophe hits - many people experience a loss of identity.

If their sense of self was defined by their relationship with a loved one who has now gone, or with a valued job that has now been lost, then there can be a sense of inner uncertainty.

People in the rubble are left asking, 'who am I?'

So much of our sense of identity is shaped by the people that we love and by the work we do that when these things are removed we can lose our bearings and experience an earthquake of the self.

In such situations I would like to suggest a fourth tool for rebuilding:

Treat your disaster as the opportunity for discovery.

I have come to the place in my life where I can say with conviction that disasters can be the contexts for some of our greatest discoveries.

In times of trial, we can make discoveries in the following realms:

SPIRITUALLY: knowledge that we had about God before our disaster - which often existed in the realm of theory - now becomes embedded in the world of raw reality. We now know things about God's kindness, presence, goodness and so on and that knowledge is personal not propositional. Forged on the anvil of suffering, it is now theology on fire.

INTELLECTUALLY: the wisdom that we discover on the trash heap or the ash heap is deeper than any that you can acquire in the place of abundance. When we live life superficially we tend to think superficially. But when we wake up in Rubble Town, deep calls unto deep. Cosmetic tweets won't do. As Job discovered, something more than platitudes is needed.

RELATIONALLY: in Rubble Town you discover who your real friends are. They are not the people who loved you for what you did or who you knew. They are the people who love you simply for who you are. C.S. Lewis wrote in A Grief Observed that friends crossed the street to avoid him after his wife Joy died. In times of trial, your real friends walk with you.

These are just some of the areas where we can receive momentous insights.

Perhaps one of the most important areas is PERSONALLY and has to do with our sense of identity.

When we experience the searing agony of loss - whether this is the loss of a loved one, our health, a job, our finances - we are confronted with one of the greatest opportunities of our lives.

It may not feel like it at the time because the sense of disorientation which comes with loss can result in a loss of clarity.

We feel lost at sea.

But when the mist from our eyes starts to clear, one of the issues we start to address is the issue of identity.

Circumstances now make this urgent.

No longer is this merely the quest of middle-classed people with the luxury of a lot of time on their hands.

It is everyone's quest.

At least in Rubble Town it is.

Whether we are rich or poor, single or married, in work or out of work, academic or self-taught, every inhabitant of Rubble Town has to discover who they really are.

This is both frightening and exciting all at the same time.

It is frightening because it can be painful to discover the degree to which our sense of identity has been socially constructed.

It is not easy to let this self go, because this requires kenosis - self-emptying - and kenosis feels like crucifixion.

For Christians it is particularly distressing when we realise the degree to which 'ministry' has defined our sense of self.

It is scary confronting the false self created out of our job or our role within church settings.

When ministry goes, identity can often go with it.

But this process can also be exciting because it can be the seedbed in which your true self in Christ grows and flourishes.

It can be the context in which the false self is buried and the true self - your God-ordained YOU-NIQUENESS - can grow.

What is absolutely essential for that growth to happen is accountability.

You have to involve trusted others in the discovery of your true self in Christ.

For me, this means fortnightly visits to an insightful and non-judgemental Christian counsellor and psychotherapist.

With their help I have come to see that I've lived much of my life out of my shadow - a mythical version of myself.

It was close enough to the substance - my real self - to make me invest in it with great commitment.

But it was not the real me.

The real me is what I'm discovering in Rubble Town and I'm learning it through accountability.

One of the things that I'm asked in my sessions is this: 'Is this slick, religious Mark? Or is this real Mark?'

I need that.

If the version of my self which I believed before was a fiction, it is imperative that I don't exchange that fiction for a new one.

In other words, I cannot simply re-mythologise who I am.

If the version of my self which I believed before was a fiction, it is imperative that I don't exchange that fiction for a new one.

In other words, I cannot simply re-mythologise who I am.

In Rubble Town I have to commit to transparency, humility and reality.

But the process is working.

It is gradual, yes, but there have been stunning moments of revelation which have led to profound discoveries about myself.

This has released hope, as prophetic revelation always does.

If living out of the false self leads to frustration, living out of the true self leads to fulfilment. 

That's hopeful!

If you're going through the process, you're not alone.

Keep persevering.

Brokenness has always been the context for brilliance.

As the Apostle Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 4:

'If you only look at us, you might well miss this brilliance. We carry this precious Message around in the unadorned clay pots of our ordinary lives. That's to prevent anyone from confusing God's incomparably great power with us. As it is, there's not much chance of that. You know for yourselves that we're not much to look at. We've been surrounded and battered by troubles but we are not demoralized.'

We are not demoralized.

We are not disheartened.

We are not dismayed.

We are on the path to discovery.

When the Towers Fall: Rebuilding your Life in the Rubble, Part 3

My third post in this series has really quite a simple message. It was born from a memory of the TV news coverage of the aftermath of the fall of the Twin Towers in 2001.

I remember it distinctly. A TV camera was panning round the rubble and dust of ground zero, through the jagged edges of girders and the last vestiges of walls and doors.

All of a sudden, the commentator stopped talking.

There, on a mantle shelf fixed to a wall that was somehow still standing was a painting of Jesus, a searing look of compassion on his face.

The commentator was speechless.

The camera lingered.

Everyone watching must have been like me - open mouthed with surprise.

After several seconds, all the commentator could say was, 'well that speaks for itself.'

And then the camera moved on.

I share this because my third suggestion for rebuilding your life in the rubble is simply this:

Look for hints of His Presence in the Rubble.

I didn't expect to see Christ in the chaos, but he was there.

He is always there.

There are always hints of his Presence.

Why? Because the Redeemer is drawn to our rubble.

About five years ago I discovered Antony Beevor's magnificent book about Stalingrad.

At the worst moment in the battle, 300,000 troops of the German 6th army were trapped in the destroyed city, with no chance of escape from the Russians, who were eager for revenge.

It was Christmas 1942.

At the darkest hour, hardened soldiers of the German Army walked into a small underground chamber to pay homage to a picture drawn by Kurt Reuber, a German soldier also trapped in the kessel.

The image was of the Madonna and child.

Reuber - Protestant pastor, artist and Panzer division commander - had created the picture which was three feet by four feet in dimensions. 

It had a stunning effect on the soldiers.

One of the only 6000 6th army soldiers who survived, later wrote this:

'For me that Christmas was heavenly. I felt there was a bridge that stretched over the entire earth, the starry sky and the moon, the same moon that my family could see in Germany.'

The picture was removed in the last plane out of Stalingrad, just before it's fall in January 1943. It now hangs on the walls of the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church in Berlin.

There is a copy below. It has the words, life and love on the right hand side.

I share this not just because it's Christmas but because there are many of you reading these blogs who feel like you are surrounded by rubble at the moment.

I know because you have been writing to me.

My advice is this:

Look for hints of His Presence in the rubble.

Be alert to this surprising, sudden intimations of God's Presence even in the chaos.

Don't believe the lie that says this is too messy, dirty, murky and dark for Jesus.

How clean and bright do you think his manger was when he was born?

The God who created the universe touched down in filth and shadows not in a sanitized shrine.

He is Immanuel - God with us in the mess.

I had one of the worst days of my life in the run up to last Christmas.

Through my own failings, I had lost just about everything and now I was about to lose my beloved Black Labrador called Molly.

For reasons I cannot go into, I now had to find a new home for her and fast.

To say that I prayed with tears of desperation would be an understatement.

I longed for Molly to have a good home.

Within a few days a lovely woman contacted me. She said that she had heard that I had a Black Lab that needed a new home.

'I lost my six year old Black Labrador in the summer,' she said. 'She was killed by an adder. I was devastated. Her name was Molly.'

She shared that she had two other dogs and acres of land and also that she now felt it was time to have a new Molly.

When I handed Molly over on a drab and rainy day, I knew that she was in the best possible hands, that she would be happier with her new Mum and her new home than she had ever been, and this was God's kindness.

For me it was a stunning moment of reassurance.

Even in my mess, God was being kind.

Even in my rubble, he was present.

As even an atheist said to me, 'it seemed meant.'

            (Molly in the grounds of her new home)

If you're at ground zero, and the dust is yet to settle, look for signs of His presence.

He is there.

He is not scared by disaster or allergic to chaos.

He is the God who was born in the mess of the manger and who is present in our mess too.

Don't lose heart.

May his presence surprise you and his peace delight you.

WHEN THE TOWERS FALL: Rebuilding Your Life in the Rubble, Part 2

In this series of blogs I'm looking at how we can recover from disaster - whether that disaster is self-inflicted or thrust upon us.

I believe we can move from helpless passivity to creative activity, however dire our circumstances may seem. 

We can make choices in the chaos that will determine whether we live life again or simply exist - whether we thrive or survive.

In my last blog I suggested that our first choice should be, 'don't - whatever you do - lose hope.'

Today I want to offer a second choice.

Before I tell you what that is I'm going to describe a dream I had in February of this year, when life in many ways couldn't have looked bleaker.

Here's what I saw.

I was standing on a beach looking out to sea. There was a strong wind blowing, almost gale force. The sky was shifting from light to dark grey. Birds were flying at speed inland, faster than the scudding clouds.

As I peered into the distance I saw to my horror that a huge wave - a massive tsunami - was rolling towards the coast where I was standing. It felt like it was over one hundred feet high. It was pitch black in colour and filled the entire horizon.

As I strained my eyes I saw that there was a word written in gargantuan letters on the wave. The word - cast in a serrated, elongated and sharpened font (like those used by serial killers) - was 'inertia.'

As I read that, I didn't fully understand what it meant (I'm not a physicist) but I did understand what it signified.

It signified a choice. 

A choice to yield to the wave and let it wash me up on the beach.

Or a choice to confront the wave and try to conquer it.

Somehow, even in my unnerved state, I knew there was only one choice. 

I looked around and saw to my surprise a small wooden boat, no longer than ten feet, lying on the gravelly sand. It had a furled, burgundy canvas sail around its mast.

I ran to the boat and pushed it through the surf into the breakers. I jumped in and loosened the sail, tying and tightening it to the boat. I steered my flimsy coracle towards the inky tsunami which had now built to a prodigious height in front of me.

I remember climbing the wave with an unnatural, supernatural speed until I was almost vertical.

My little sail was puffed out like a proud chest.

Then, in the twinkling of an eye, I was over the dark summit and descending on the far side of the wave.

The colour of the sky changed, like the sea, from black to grey and then from grey to blue.

I could see the rays of the sun on the distant horizon, bursting through the clouds.

And then the dream, like the wave, was behind me.

When I woke up the next day I had a new resolve in my spirit.

I was not going to give in to helpless passivity.

I was going to choose creative activity.

That morning I was due to keep an appointment with the Job Seekers Plus office. I phoned to cancel. They asked my name. When I told them, they said they had no record of an appointment with me that day.

Clearly God had different plans.

I was not meant to go on the dole and watch daytime TV.

He wanted me to do something.

Many of you reading this will know what it is to be confronted by the overwhelming temptation of inertia. 

Inertia in physics is the tendency of an object to maintain its state of rest unless acted upon by external forces.

When we lose everything - whether that's our mobility, our health, our marriage, our jobs, our money, whatever - a terrible dark wave can often start building up in front of us. That wave is - a profound disinclination to act or move.

But the Father has better things for his children.

He wants us to make a defining decision - to choose creative activity over helpless passivity. He wants us to act. He wants us to decide to do something. He doesn't want us to wait for some great act of philanthropy from someone else. Nor does he want us to manipulate or orchestrate for it.

That's the entitlement mentality of the orphan. 

God wants us to launch our little boats and conquer the wave like heroic sons and daughters.

I have a close friend who is doing just that right now.

She has just lost her husband. She and he were deeply in love - deeply united spiritually and wonderfully affectionate physically. They were everything a Christian married couple should be. They were a radiant example.

Then death barged into her life like a thief and stole him from her.

She could have given in to inertia.

She could have allowed herself to be washed up on the beach.

But quickly she sensed the promptings of the Holy Spirit. She decided it was time to DO something creative, compassionate, community oriented.

What a daughter of God!

She decided to conquer the wave rather than let the wave conquer her.

You may be in precisely this situation today.

You're not one of those Christians who lives in the shallow waters, pretending everything is fine and dandy, proclaiming that you're living in constant triumph.

You're a real Christian, someone who knows brokenness as well as blessing, tragedy as well as triumph.

You know that the word of the Lord to you is to push the boat into deep waters (Luke 5.4).

So ignite the pilot light of heroism in your soul.

Steer your boat towards the wave.

Set your sail.

If you set your sail, He will fill it.

And you will discover the glorious truth of Psalm 18.16-19 (in the Message):

But me he caught - reached all the way from sky to sea; he pulled me out of that ocean of hate, that enemy chaos, that void in which I was drowning. They hit me when I was down, but God stood by me. He stood me up on a wide-open field; I stood there saved, surprised to be loved.