together truth at the re:write conference.

I wrote a little post last week over on Together at the Table about the Re:Write Conference last weekend, tapping into just a few of the identity statements that were spoken over the audience during our time there.

I've been trying to write this debriefing post for a while now, but my thoughts still aren't melding together coherently - rather ironic for a post on a writing conference, I know. So, just as a warning, my thoughts will probably jump all over the place. And I guess it's strangely fitting for how the conference spoke to me - little bits and pieces of Truth and Life that hit me at different times and for different lengths. 

That's the thing about the conference - for as much as it was an all-out writer's conference, filled with speakers and information about the publishing industry, plotting one's novel, and building a platform as an author, it was almost equally an identity conference - one where the goals of publishing a bestseller took a backseat to writing just to WRITE. To write to tell the truth, to bleed on the page, to search desperately for meaning and life and light in the world.

I told my dad that I had never been so content with the possibility of not getting published after the conference - mostly as a joke to get him riled up.

But at the same time, it's so very true to my experience at the conference. I listened to author after author speak about the struggles of the writing journey, and how placing one's faith and security and identity in nabbing a book deal will always lead to disappointment and rejection. Because the writing journey is often times filled with rejection. Lots of it. (I learned that C.S. Lewis was rejected 799 times before being accepted on the 800th submission! Talk about crazy.)

I listened as author Mary DeMuth talked about writing as "soul work" to find out the Truth that each person is called Beloved by God.

I listened to author Ted Dekker as he explained his Superman analogy - the fact that most of us believe that we're Clark Kent, despite the fact that with our identity anchored securely in Christ, we are Superman! I chatted with him ever so briefly after he spoke, and he pointed straight at me, reminded me to never forget that Superman was right there. And then he was gone, off to converse with another writer. A few seconds, and yet it was enough to breathe fresh air into my self that often tends to fall back on lies of "not good enough" in times of insecurity.

I listened to bestselling authors speak candidly about how they still struggled with similar feelings of doubt and insecurity, that they still have their dark moments of seriously believing the lies.  You know those demons? The ones that curl up in the back of our minds with their demeaning whispers like

justshutupandgiveupalreadyyou'renotagoodwriterandyou'llnevermakeit.

But then we were all together, writers and poets and dreamers and artists, some well known and some just beginners, showing up together to sit through the lies and call them out as exactly that: lies. 

More than anything, this conference was about Truth, about writing as a form of searching for truth in the dark, in the cracks and crevices of our own hearts, hoping to catch glimpses of something Brighter along the way.

Clark Kent.   SUPERMAN.

Not good enough.   ENOUGH.

ACCEPTED.

BELOVED.

These truths are what the conference ultimately came down to for me. Yes, my brain was filled with different strategies and tips and exciting new ideas for my next steps with Yellowtree and my own journey as an author. I made connections with different writers, speakers, companies and publishing agencies. But none of that makes any difference if I don't believe the core truth that I. AM. SECURE. No buts about it. That truth will stay the same no matter where my writing future leads.

These aren't truths solely for writers, either. For we're all Truth Tellers, in a way, no matter our artistic ability. At our very core, image of God selves, we're really all the same.

Halfway through the conference, Ted Dekker was talking about this mysterious phenomenon of loving your neighbor not "like" yourself, or "similar to" yourself, but literally "as" yourself. He had us turn to the people around us and greet them with, "Hi me." And he challenged us with how different we would treat others if we saw them as ourselves. A revolutionary thought, indeed.

I left the Re:Write Conference feeling the most encouraged I've ever felt as a writer, but also as a human being. For although I am a writer, I am a child of God first.


You are a _________, but a child of God first.


We are ____________, but children of God first.

i don't always tell you.

The following was inspired by a post of the same title by Rachel Held Evans (read it here, please - it's breathtaking). This is the most raw, unfiltered, vulnerable piece I've ever written, and it's rather terrifying to post. But I've said over and over again that this is a place where you can be yourself - and that has to include me.

So here's a piece of my heart, in hopes that it can meet you where you're at in your journey.

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I don't always tell you that sometimes when I look in the mirror, it's like facing down a stranger with hints of familiarity, maybe a freckle in the same spot, or a similar twitch of the eye. All I really want to do is break the glass, but instead I just call myself names, like ugly or stupid or nobody likes you.

And sometimes I feel God's peace like a gust of fresh air, and it fills my lungs to the point where I can't do anything but smile and gulp in deep deep breaths because I know he is near.

And other times I try repeating his name out loud, just to remind myself he exists, and it only sounds like I'm taking his name in vein.

OH GOD Oh God Oh God Oh god oh god.

And then I hate myself even more, because what kind of Christian could ever feel this way and still hang onto Christ?

And praying just seems like some watered down way to make talking to myself seem sane, and the Bible is just full of words that get caught on my tongue as they try to escape. Read them, repeat them, scratch them off my heart and smear them onto my forehead. Something, anything to make me feel more alive.

And what do I do when the words that are supposed to be living and active, sharper than a double-edged sword, actually feel like they're cutting small little slits all over my faith, letting the doubt seep in like the smoke lingering after a fire?

I don't always tell you about these cringe-worthy moments, the ones not exactly suitable for a cleaned up and polished blogspot site.

Or a cleaned up and polished Christian, for that matter.

If those even exist.

And so I'll go for a drive, because I like taking long drives with God just to be with him, and we won't say much at all. I'll play a few songs and look up at the sky, usually sunset, and be reminded of how beautiful this life is all over again.

And this is faith, not always feeling and not always knowing, but continuing to show up in spite of it all.

For God is more than a good feeling in my stomach, a quiet voice in my ear, a cardboard pattern in my mind. He's more than the boxes and verses and how-to's of faith. He's more than my doubt, my questions, and my anger, jumbled up fear that wracks my brain and my soul.

He's here and he's present and he just keeps showing up.

So I guess I will, too.

intertwined building blocks of friendship and marriage.

If you couldn't tell from previous blog posts, I really like friendships. The concept to me is mind boggling and glorious and beautiful, but it's even better when it's lived out and felt, really really felt. I think part of the reason I find it so stunning is that there is no power struggle in true, authentic friendships. Both are equals, walking through life side-by-side, able to look at each other eye-to-eye because it's not about who's better or who's leader, but about how each person can better serve and love the other. I wrote in one of my previous blog posts,

"It's a beautiful parallel system that God created here - friendship isn't only about one person learning all about another. It's about two people coming to terms with their identities, together as friends, but also as individuals. We often learn the most about ourselves by learning about other people."

I see this all throughout the Bible, especially in one of my favorite passages, Ecclesiastes 4:9-12, where two people are better off than one, for they can help each other succeed. If one person falls, the other can reach out and help... A person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer. Back-to-back, side-by-side, helping the other stand up when they fall down, bare their soul, and their heart still feels a little shaky.

For I've lost track of the number of times I've heard people say that true romance and true marriages are built on friendship. I've heard that if friendship isn't the rock solid foundation of romance, the relationship is pretty much doomed to fail. If the concept of mutual, life-giving friendship isn't at the center of a romantic relationship, it seems rather forced and dull. Romance has to flow naturally from a place of authentic love (1 Corinthians 13), of the desire to honor the other as above yourself (Romans 12:10) and bear their burdens alongside of them (Galatians 6:2). That's something required of us as Christians in general, not just as romantic partners.

So I get confused when I hear people bring up terms like "male headship" and "authority," "leadership" and "roles," when discussing the elements of a biblical marriage. Like when Candace Cameron Bure states, "It is very difficult to have two heads of authority… When you’re competing with two heads, that can pose a lot of problems or issues" (Bure, Huffington Post). And Bure isn't the only one who holds this opinion. I've heard similar statements from various people in my life, convinced that a solid marriage needs a leader in order to avoid power struggles and chaos.

Yet no one preaching on friendship would ever claim that one friend has to be the servant leader, and the other has to submit. No one would claim that friendships digress into nothing more than chaotic power struggles if one person isn't put in charge. I'm guessing authors such as Candace Cameron Bure wouldn't post interviews on why she submits to her best friend.

Why? Because friendships aren't contractual. Christ-like friendships are about doing life together. They're about side-by-side community, about friends leading in their strengths and submitting out of love, not because the submission is demanded or forced upon them by Scripture, but because it is a natural outpouring of loving someone as you love yourself. That kind of love isn't just used to describe marriages - it's the same kind of love used to paint the picture of David and Jonathan's covenantal friendship, where Jonathan had David reaffirm his oath out of love for him, because he loved him as he loved himself (1 Samuel 20:17).

Here's what I'm saying: I don't think there's one right way to DO marriage. Something as holy and mysterious as the marital covenant can't be reduced to a set of rules or roles or several bible verses taken out of context. Just as I have seen many glorious marriages based on mutual submission, so have I seen marriages with the man as the head that are still radiantly beautiful.

At the same time, I think the 'headship' and the 'leadership' language starts to sound more and more like an employer-employee relationship, a business leader and an administrative assistant, rather than a husband and wife one-flesh bond of love and unity. Since when did Christ become not enough as the head of a relationship?

Authentic friendships don't leave room for hierarchies, for static leaders and helpers, for legalistic rankings of authority. And from what I've come to learn so far, neither do marriages. With Christ as the head, brothers and sisters, husbands and wives, become one in Him, taking turns leading and helping, showing weakness and showing strength, because in Christ there is no fear. There is no shame. One is not pigeon-holed into a specific role, but allowed the space and fluidity to grow into who he or she is in Christ. 

God is constantly creating us into beautiful things; beautiful things that are organic, not forced or hurried, beaten down with never enoughs and just not theres.

And for most of my life, I've heard sermons preached on marriage that only left me feeling restricted, like it was nothing more than a cardboard check list of dos and don'ts, impossible standards with no room to be afraid and vulnerable and simply HUMAN. But I've also heard those same pastors talk about friendship, about David and Jonathan and Ruth and Naomi, about carrying each other's burdens, and it was like breathing in fresh air that felt FREE.

Now before you go off saying I'm scared of commitment, let me tell you that I only felt this way because I continued to box off marriage and friendship as two completely different concepts. Because that's how they're often talked about, right?

"Oh, they're just friends."

I still catch myself saying this now. Just friends, like the friendship is either ten times less than a romantic relationship, or a simple stepping stone leading to eventual marriage.* It's easy to paint marriage as the mountain top experience of all relationships, often times diminishing friendship in the process.

But that's the thing - marriage and friendship aren't in competition. They aren't two separate concepts on opposite sides of space, racing against each other to cross the finish line.

They're often interconnected and intertwined, constantly intersecting to reveal a breathtaking paradigm of mutuality. It's a paradigm where both are equal and Christ is the head - one that most are quick to allow into friendships.

And if friendship makes up the building blocks of healthy romantic relationships, wouldn't that same paradigm carry over into marriage?

*For more of my thoughts on platonic, male-female friendships, read my post here.

behind the cardboard camera: walk forward (anthony bankes).

Before we get started, let me just throw it out there that if you have a passion for writing and you're at all interested in writing a guest post for my blog, definitely contact me and I'll be in touch. I love hearing different voices and different stories, and it's good for me to take a step back from the driver's seat sometimes. Also, I would greatly appreciate it if you would take five seconds (seriously, five seconds) to follow my blog (if you enjoy reading it, that is). I know it seems small, but it's just a way of staying in touch and cultivating a consistency that is rather helpful when it comes to keeping up a blog.

But onto the real news. I've decided to switch things up for the month of March. Rather than writing my normal occasional posts, I've decided to take a shot at vlogging (aka video blogging), an idea that was inspired after watching the rich art that is The Work of the People (please check it out, the videos truly are stunning). The first video down below is myself, talking about some of the main messages and purposes of my work-in-progress novel, Yellowtree! For the next few weeks, at least, and probably on and off throughout the year even after March, I will be posting videos of different people, all speaking about different things, but speaking from the heart about real life and real hearts and real journeys.

While I'm not making any strict parameters or guidelines for the other video participants, I am sticking with the running theme of "Identity." I realize this is a very broad word, so it's going to play out differently in each vlog episode, but I'm also excited to trace the similarities and to see glimpses of ourselves in the variety of voices we're going to hear.

Some of you may have seen the first cut of this vlog episode, which I ended up taking down several days ago. It took a few of my closest friends to inform me that I was trying too hard - that it wasn't really me, like I was hiding behind a mask or something. And that's just not acceptable, not for a series with its main focus on identity. So, this video down below is the final cut - the raw, unfiltered me that was very much missing from the first take. I want you to be able to be honest here, I want you to be yourself.

Because that's beautiful.

So, with no further ado, I present to you, Behind the Cardboard Camera.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tl_Hih2OK7k&feature=youtu.be

Special thanks to Ally Bankes for the camerawork.

Music:
Easy Lemon Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

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Interested in reading Chapter 2 of Yellowtree? For a limited time, I'll have a Google Document open for whoever wants to take a look. It's only accessible by clicking the link down below, but if you're at all interested, I'll have it up for about a month or so. I'd love to hear your thoughts!

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1V_joGoulaHtyzjM9Wu7n9qkGPehXSrkvd878F0DlQUM/edit?usp=sharing