The Power of Words

I’ve been doing some thinking lately on the power of words. I’m a writer, but even if you’re not, you still use words and have experienced the variety of ways they can make you feel. You’ve been told, “I love you” by close family and friends, maybe even a significant other. Someone may have said to you firmly (or possibly yelled), “I don’t want to talk about this right now!” You may have even heard, “I’m so, so sorry” that has come in the form of an apology. Words. Emotions. Together, they make us feel happy, sad, doubtful, angry, excited. All of these things I’m sure, you already know.

This morning though, I was reading in Matthew 22. If you’re unfamiliar with this passage of scripture, three groups of people, the Pharisees, Sadducees and scribes, all throw questions at Jesus trying to trap him in his answers. I was looking at Jesus’ responses to these rather annoying groups of people, and the way Jesus answers their questions—the way he uses words—astounds me. Jesus doesn’t get angry; he is calm and collected. He answers their questions and then makes them marvel at what he just said. Now that is power. Jesus was one talented wordsmith.

I’ve been learning lately that I have to be careful with the words that I use—whether it’s in my writing or in the way that I speak. Sometimes I forget the power that they hold. With one sarcastic comment, I can make someone feel incredibly self-conscious. With a carefully placed witty comment, I can have people laughing until they cry. With an honest admission of how I really feel about something, I can make someone reevaluate an entire situation. I have the power to make people marvel at what I say, just like Jesus did. But is that how I really use my words? Is that how you use yours?

I think sometimes we’re more like the Pharisees, Sadducees and scribes instead of Jesus with the way we talk or write. I know that I purposefully have tried to manipulate or control situations around me by the way that I use my words. I have said things to make me look better. I have written down all the things I would like to say to someone, but haven’t found the right time to say it in person. I have said things to keep myself protected. I’m not any better than the Pharisees. Are you?

No matter what situation we find ourselves in, we need to take responsibility for the things that we say and we need to mean it. Once something is said, or even written, we can’t take it back. It has already reached the other person’s heart. Now that’s power. How are we going to use it?

Lasting Fruit

When you think of something "bearing fruit," what do you think of? For me, I picture a huge, luscious tree; it's leaves a rich, dark green. It's full and healthy and the fruit hanging from it is just the same. Gravity pulls the tree's branches toward the ground due to the ripe fruit that has matured on its ends. I don't picture a single tree either--I picture a whole grove of trees, all growing together to produce more of what they were created to produce.

This concept of bearing fruit has been a central theme in the processing that I have done in regards to my future this summer. In several of my own quiet times these last few months, God has brought several verses about bearing fruit across my path. The first of which is found in the 15th chapter of the gospel of John: "You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit—fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name."

A good portion of John 15 deals with bearing fruit, but verse 16 (above) grabbed my attention. God appointed us to go and bear fruit that will last. The biggest difference between this idea and the picture I painted above is that the literal fruit on the literal trees don't last. They either will be picked or fall off and both fates don't lead to bearing more fruit. The verse in John, however, says that we have been chosen by God to do just the opposite--we have been called to bear fruit that will last.

Well, that's all well and good but what does that mean? What does it mean for us, in our present day, to bear fruit that will last? These were some of the questions that I tackled this summer as I took time to really seek God about what He may have for me in the future. What I found came in two parts as I spent some time in John 15. Earlier in the chapter, Jesus says that we need to remain in Him because apart from Him we can do nothing--no branch (us) can bear fruit apart from its vine (Jesus).

So if I try to do anything in the future apart from Jesus, it would only be in vain. I have to resist my human tendency to take my future into my own hands and pursue the option that is most comfortable. Instead, I have to continually be on my knees, asking God to reveal His will to me and to take my desire to control under His sovereign authority. I have to resist the urge to be swept up in the tides of what the world tells me is acceptable to do with my degree. Instead, I have to be willing to be moved and shaken in the direction that God wants me to go. This is what it means to remain in Jesus--and if I choose to be the branch that stays attached to the Vine, I will bear much fruit.

This leads me back to verse 16: "...but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit--fruit that will last." Alright, alright we get that we're supposed to bear fruit, but what is this fruit that will last? This took me back to the end of the book of Matthew to what is known as the Great Commission: "Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you." I think this is where bearing fruit that will last starts. Jesus commanded the disciples (and us!) to go and make disciples of all nations--talk about something that will last! With any person that you can share Jesus with, whether they decide to become a Christ-follower or not at that moment, you have planted a seed. And that will stay with them until it is time to be harvested.

But how does this tie into my processing about my future? Well, if I have been appointed and chosen by God to bear this fruit that will last, whatever I choose to do with my life must allow me to do that. Now, this doesn't mean that the only way to bear this lasting fruit is to go into ministry--it could mean that, however, it also could mean that God wants you to use your specific gifts and talents in an industry where He has plans for you to bear lasting fruit there. I think the question ultimately is this: What is the best way that I can I bear fruit that will last, using all of the gifts and talents that God has blessed me with? When we can answer this question honestly friends, I think we will begin to live in the freedom of knowing where God is calling us.

I spent time this summer trying to answer that question honestly and it was hard. What made it so difficult was that I began to hear God speaking to me that where I can best bear lasting fruit cannot be found in the journalism world. It is true that God has given me many talents that make me cut out for the printed media, but as I began to think about all of my other gifts and passions, it became rather clear. When I'm honest with myself friends, I'm not really passionate about journalism. I love how the profession can use good reporting and writing to right wrongs and bring justice to unjust situations, but that is only where a small corner of my heart lies. I have discovered this summer that the majority of my heart beats with passion at the thought of working with students and empowering them to accomplish big things for the kingdom of God. I'm going to be honest with you, this is the last place I thought I would ever find myself. It has been a little over a year that I was asked to consider going on staff with InterVarsity, and one year ago I had laughed at the possibility. But alas, here I am.

I'm scared. I'm ecstatic. I'm carefully choosing my words for when I talk to the members of my family about this abrupt change in careers. But it is in this crazy chasm where I must trust God, that I am confident I have been appointed and called to this line of work where I can bear fruit--fruit that will last.

Summer Truth

“So how has your summer been going, Brittany?”

It’s the typical question that relatives and friends you haven’t seen for awhile ask you during this three-month break away from school. I’m sure you know it well and have had to answer it on more than one occasion these past few months. Some of my past answers have included:

“It’s been going well. I’ve been working a lot and spending time catching up with friends—it’s been really good, but I am looking forward to going back to school soon.”

“This has been one of the best summer’s ever! I spent a month at Cedar Campus in Michigan at SLT—an InterVarsity summer leadership training program and I met God in such a powerful way. I was challenged and stretched and made so many close friends while I was there—it was hard to go home after such an incredible experience.”

As I have been asked time and time again how my summer has been going these past three months, I am having trouble coming up with an appropriate response. None of those two to five lined responses above can really capture this summer’s experience. I mean, where do you want me to start?

Do you want me to start at the beginning where I had an awesome week retreating up in Michigan with my InterVarsity chapter, then had a whirlwind three weeks spending time with my boyfriend before he left for Africa which was directly followed by a week-long missions trip in New Orleans serving alongside high school students from around the U.S.?

Or how about the middle where I have enjoyed working at Family Friendly WBGL and the National Soybean Research Laboratory 9am-4pm five days a week, but then felt sick starting June 30th and had to miss work, gatherings with friends, among a host of other things. Oh, and I forgot to mention, having my car die on me the same night I drove three hours back to Urbana.

Or how about now? I find out that I’m allergic to unseen mold in my apartment, and have had to move in with my adoptive family from church for the past week. Meanwhile, I continue to be sick and returned from another doctor’s visit yesterday with the same response as the first: “drink plenty of fluids and get plenty of rest.” Then I returned to the doctor's two days later because I continued to feel worse and was diagnosed with mono several hours later. Planning to go home, I visit my apartment to pack up a few things and my car dies AGAIN in a spot where I can get a $50 ticket. Oh yeah, I miss Greg and am counting down the days until his arrival back in the U.S.

Are you sure you still want to ask how my summer has been going? By the above synopsis, it doesn’t look like it’s been that great, eh? Well friend, to be brutally honest, this summer has been the worst. Never in my life have I ever felt so awful for such a long period of time. Never in my life have I gone 6 weeks without seeing or being able to converse other than a weekly email with my significant other. Never in my life have I had to stay with a family for more than week because I’m too sick to do anything else.

There have been moments in the past few weeks where I have reached my wit’s end. I have broken down and sobbed. I have called and complained to my mother. I have written down my frustrations in my journal. I have, at times, let my attitude be consumed with every “bad” thing that has happened to me this summer. Right now, I am only holding myself together by choice.

And it is a choice that I am faced with when I wake up every day: “Are you going to let your circumstances get to you, Brittany? Or are going to choose to be joyful?” Some days I have chosen the first option. But I am working hard to make sure my response mirrors the latter—and it has been hard. It has been hard to see what God could possibly be doing with these series of unfortunate events. But as I continue to reflect on my worst summer ever, this is what I have discovered:

God has affirmed the abilities He has given me and how I can best use them to serve Him in my daily life and in my future career.

I have learned to accept help from others and have been humbled time and time again by the loving people God has placed in my life this summer.

I cannot control the things that happen in my life or in the lives of others. What I can do however, is listen and then make my requests be known to God—my prayer life has grown considerably these past few months.

In a sermon brought by pastor Shannon at TCBC two weeks ago, the focus of his message was out of Colossians 2:9-10, “For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled in him, who is the head of all rule and authority.” Pastor Shannon went on to ask, “Why do we live like we’re lacking something?” That hit me. This whole summer I have spent time looking at all the things that I lack: I lack good health. I lack an apartment. I lack close proximity to my boyfriend. To my eye, and the eyes of the world, I lack a lot of important things. But pastor Shannon’s words reminded me that Jesus lives within me, so how can I lack anything?

This summer has been awful and I’m not going to end this post by saying the things that I have learned have made it an incredible summer because I’d be lying to you if I did. It is true that I have learned a lot about myself and who I am in Christ this summer and it is through all of these circumstances that God chose to show me those things. Sure, I would have picked different scenarios, but I’m not God.

So I write to you from the guest room at my adoptive family’s house, coughing and feeling like I am swallowing shards of glass but with the knowledge that God is fully divine and with Him, I lack nothing.

A Familiar Fountain

I took a bike ride tonight. Let me tell you, it wasn’t because I was feeling up to it. I needed out of my apartment, away from my horizontal position on my bed—I needed clean air. I’ve been sick for the last two weeks with headaches, sleeplessness, back pain, night sweats and coughing, symptoms of the flu my doctor assured me. Well, I’ve rested and I’ve drank enough water to cleanse my bladder 100 times over and I still feel—blah. Thanks, doc.

The purpose of this entry is not for me to gripe about my current ailment, but to share with you about a fountain that I visited toward the end of my bike ride tonight. I didn’t plan to stop. I was riding past a familiar place on campus—the “Allen Hall pond” as it is known to most students. A lot of things have happened to me along the “banks” of that pond: my first RA meeting; Retreat of Silences; conversations with friends, old and new; my first kiss. It is a place of good memories and I visit there often.

Tonight was no different. Usually though, I sit up on the “banks” with my eyes closed listening to the sound the fountain makes on its surrounding pool of water. Tonight, something compelled me to walk through the damp grass down to the water’s edge. Of all the times I have visited, never had I gotten so close to the water. Now, I wish I could say the water is as clear as crystal and that it sparkles like sapphire. Or that you can see thousands of pennies littering the bottom of the pond from the hands of many love-struck, well-wishers.

The truth though is that the water in this “pond” is disgusting. It’s dark; it almost looks thick like motor oil. Pennies aren’t littered on the bottom—real litter is floating at the top. It looks like a health-code violation, and I can’t help but wonder if one of these days I’ll see a smaller version of the Lock-Ness monster rise up out of the water to take an unsuspecting visitor. I don’t want to paint you an inaccurate picture of this place. It’s a nice “pond”, it really is—the water is just gross.

So tonight, I sat at the edge of this “pond”, careful to keep my feet and arms a safe distance away from the water’s surface. As I sat there, my knees to my chest and my arms clasped around them, I looked at the fountain in the middle. I’ve seen it plenty of times before, but as I looked at it tonight, I felt like someone was asking me: “Brittany, what part of the fountain are you?”

Huh? What part of the fountain am I? “Do fountains even have parts?” I felt myself asking. I continued to look at the familiar sight. I noticed the base, where the water magically shoots upward with enough force to make it fan out in the air. The streams of water turn to droplets as they make their downward descent toward the pool below. The droplets become another part of the “pond”, rippling out toward the edge where I sat. This is what I saw, nothing groundbreaking by any means.

I continued to ponder, looking at the fountain. Then, like one of those droplets hitting the water’s surface, I was hit with this question: “Brittany, do you want to be the part of the fountain that makes the water look beautiful? Or do you want to be the water, rippling out toward the edge of the pool?” Both parts are important—one is more visible than the other.

I’ve had the privilege of taking part in a lot of things throughout my life. In high school, I directed or was on stage in almost every school play. I was senior class president, National Honor Society president, a Leadership Retreat leader. In college, I’ve been a desk clerk, an intern, a Small Group Leader, an Area Coordinator. I’ve been in roles where I have led large amounts of people and roles where I have taken the back seat.

I remember being so excited to attend college to become the visible one—the star. Everyone told me that I would succeed at everything I chose to pursue and to me, that equated to fame—my name in lights, perhaps my face on a billboard. Now, I realize how silly this sounds but in many ways, it’s the truth. I finally would join the ranks of thousands of other students, but I would rise above them all because I had the talent. I had the potential to become the best.

I looked at that fountain tonight though and I realized that I don’t really want to be those visible droplets anymore. I want to be the part of the fountain that makes the droplets look so beautiful. Of all of the times in my life that I have held positions that have required me to empower others, I am just starting to realize that those were the times that I enjoyed what I did the most. I loved working behind the scenes and making the cast of “Morning’s at Seven” look great on opening night. I loved helping to plan a retreat where students could come and have fun away from school. I loved being the Crew Encourager on our missions trip to New Orleans this summer. In all of these roles, I was the one helping make others succeed.

That is what I want to do with my life. I want to do things that empower others. I have no desire to be the lead role in the play anymore. I desire to be the director. I want to be the base of the fountain that sends the droplets of water up and outward to make a difference in the world. This is what I feel God is calling me to. It’s not as glamorous as I had envisioned—my face won’t end up on a billboard—but I know it will be the most fulfilling.

Shells

This first post was inspired by a short film that I watched with my coworkers at Family Friendly WBGL during last week’s Wednesday morning staff meeting. Entitled “Shells,” the narrator of the film shared a story about his youngest son. One afternoon, while their family was at the beach collecting shells, the young boy saw a starfish floating just off shore. Realizing that such a prized specimen was within his reach, he asked permission to go and grab it. Giving his son the okay, the father watches his son run into the water after the starfish. After a few minutes, the boy runs back to shore without the starfish. His dad yells words of encouragement, thinking that the boy had become a little intimidated at the prospect of such a find. The boy runs back toward the water, and again comes back without the starfish. This happens time and time again, and finally the dad asks his son when he comes back, “Son, why aren’t you able to catch the starfish?” The young boy holds out his hands and responds, “Because my hands are full of shells.”

For those of you who have seen “The Wedding Planner” starring Matthew McConaughey and Jennifer Lopez, there’s a part in the movie when Eddie (played by McConaughey) is trying to determine if Mary (played by Lopez) is a better match for him than his current fiancé. Talking with his golf partner out on the green one afternoon, he asks, “What if what I thought is great, really is great; but not as great as something greater?” You may need to read that through again. Go ahead.

This summer I have had a lot of time to myself. My family is three hours away. My boyfriend is in Africa. My friends are working odd hours. With all of this “me time” I have been able to reflect a lot about my past three years in college and how much I have changed since my parents drove away from my dorm that one muggy August day in 2006. They left behind their not-so-little girl, her head full of dreams. I identify well with that little boy in the beginning who worked so hard collecting his shells. I feel that with every year that I’ve been in college, I have collected my own version of shells. Call them pieces of wisdom, knowledge, plans—the names aren’t important. Every internship, every compliment from a professor in the journalism department, every A on a major assignment—they have all contributed to my “shell” collection. And with each new addition, my hands have become filled with these “shells.”

These are my prized possessions. It is these things that will ultimately help determine my future. The more “shells” I am able to gather, the bigger collection I am able to showcase to those who may be interested. But what about the starfish in the story? Or the ‘not as great as something greater’ line? As I move into my final year of college, I feel like now I have become that little boy who has discovered the starfish floating off shore.

Recently, I have been reexamining the “shells” in my hands as this starfish has come into view. I am starting to ask myself what Eddie asked his golf partner. What if what I thought is great, really is great; but not as great as something greater? I’ve picked up all of these beautiful “shells” these past few years; my collection by most people’s standards would be considered complete. But I find myself not satisfied with what I’m carrying in my hands. I want the starfish. But the only way I can get it, is by letting go of the pieces I have worked so hard to find. It has taken me three years friends, to finally be willing to let go of my “shells.” I have decided that the starfish floating off shore is worth more than my whole collection. Yes, it comes at a cost, and venturing out into the water is scary, but how much better would it be to show off my starfish rather than my small “shells?”

I think too often we settle—I know I have. Don’t let your shells keep you from your starfish, friend.