I just want You to know who I am

Sunday morning I was driving to the church early and a song came on. It was a cover of the pop tune “Iris” made by a new country artist I had put on my playlist to check out at some point. Honestly, I thought it was because of a girl, but I was wrong. 

I know the song well, and as I started to hum along, I froze as I really heard these lyrics… 

“And I don't want the world to see me

'Cause I don't think that they'd understand

When everything's made to be broken

I just want you to know who I am”

 ~ from Iris, by the Goo Goo Dolls

Tears started rolling down my face. I want to be known. It’s probably the deepest desire in my heart. It’s also the scariest one. It’s a fight inside to be known and not trusting I won’t be hurt in the process.

It’s not so much that I don’t want to be seen by the world, but it’s more that I don’t let the world see the deeper stuff. Those closest to me I do want to be vulnerable with, but before that I want to be transparent with God. Because that’s where it starts; that’s where life began for me - in 1972 and again in 2020.

So the truth is, I’m desperate for God to know me. And also scared at the same time. While I want him to have all of me, I still don’t know why he would want to. And that sometimes blocks being able to be truly transparent. Because I feel like I’m supposed to hide. I was taught that. Even in the religious halls that I grew up in I found that there’s many times we don’t want to ‘take off our shoes’ and truly be who we are.

We wear our fancy clothes, we talk and walk in the ways that are acceptable. But I’m not always acceptable. I’m a fucking nut at times! 

I love God. He is so real and true for me. And I’m not cutting on those who are more comfortable in their clothes than I am. I’m finally getting comfortable in my own skin and part of that is realizing that this whole journey is about relationship… and that starts with the relationship that is first and foremost. 

I often walk around feeling like I’m a pariah, an outcast, a misfit. And I’m learning that is perfectly ok. The man who wandered through Gallilee and Samaria and Israel and all of those old areas speaking truth… He was a misfit too. At least to those who wanted it to be a certain way. 

I crave the acceptance from those who are here around me, but what I want even more is the love and affection that comes from my father. I know God does know me - even when try to hide. 

When he touches my spirit like he did Sunday morning and the tears flow down; I realize the simple truth… 

“ I just want you to know who I am.”

~ Peace

The Burtle

Iris - Cover (click to listen)

Daddy Issues!

Reader warning:

This may be a sensitive topic to all three of you who actively read this blog! 

But that’s what I do. I take where I’m at and try to put my thoughts down as best I can. And sometimes that means it’s a topic I don’t really want to talk about or write about. And definitely not think about, but here we are.

How do you see your father? 

My father is a good man. I can’t say we’ve had the easiest relationship. I know I wasn’t easy and I can’t say that he was either. But I know that he loved me in his way and I’m thankful that I did have a father. My father gave me a taste of faith and also discipline. Took me to work with him at 14 and helped ingrain in me a realization that working is good. It’s something I’ve done my entire life. I don’t feel right unless I’m working. And I don’t mean every moment, but I do know that it’s important to get to the end of the day and know that I’ve done a good days work and rest in that.

I’m grateful I had a father who was there as I was growing up and also was there at one of the hardest points in my life and told me I needed to get help. Even if it was not pretty. 

What I’ve also had for my entire life and even today is a fear of my father. I’ve always felt that I was a disappointment. There’s some valid reasons for that. I’ve never lived up to be the man that maybe he and my mom thought I would be. But I will say this, I’m more grateful for the man I am today than any other man that I could’ve become. If you know me you realize that I took a pretty hard path to get here. Yet I’m here, and I’m breathing.

So I need to have a conversation with my father and it’s nothing incredibly serious, but even now so many years later, I still fear having those conversations. And that’s funny because if you really know me, you know that I don’t mind deep, I don’t mind hard. I don’t mind difficult. Hell you can tell me your shit and I’ll just go ‘yeah, I get it’. But there’s still a part of me that wonders how to talk to my father without having that little gulp of fear that comes in my throat and more so in my stomach.

So what is your view of your father? What if you don’t have a father? Who has been in your life that has helped guide and mold you? Maybe it was a mother? Maybe it was a family member, a foster parent, a pastor, Boys Club volunteer?

We all have different paths, but our views of those in authority over us, those who help guide us or sometimes kick us along, can define how we look at things throughout our life. 

I can say this pretty openly that my father and I are closer now than we ever were before, because I didn’t get him and I’m sure he didn’t get me. It took a pretty extraordinary act to get my ass in gear and realize that it’s OK that I’m not exactly who EVEN I thought I was going to be!

What do you do when you don’t have that guidance? Hopefully you found someone that walks along with you. Because those views of men or elders or women or mentors - they matter. They matter a whole lot. 

Those are the voices that guide us when we just don’t know what to do. And for me, hopefully they echo the voice of God. Because that’s my Father. Yes I have my earthly father, but I’ve ALSO got a Big Ole Daddy in the sky who loves me regardless of how crazy I am, when I fly off the handle, when I run around in circles, when I fall down and cry.

And sometimes there’s a fear of God because of a fear of man. If the only thing you’ve known is hurt, pain, is abuse, how can your view of God be anything but negative? I don’t know?!

My parents gave me a loving home to live in. They didn’t know the turmoil inside. They took me to church and exposed me to faith.  That faith is what guides me. And I thank both of them for that. 

My dad pushed having an education, getting a degree. And even though I don’t teach anymore, I think life teaches me and I can see how the lessons of completing something matters - even if it’s a bachelors degree in six years, though not a doctorate! (Maybe a PHD in life)

One of the greatest things that my father did was push me to follow through. And I didn’t always understand that and I still don’t always know I do it the best. But I try. 

As for that Father up in the sky, well that one loves me unconditionally. It’s one of the best things ever when you just know there’s this big huge loving being that just wants to love us. Who’s right there in all of the crap, in the joy, the hurts, the laughter and in the tears. 

Tell me about your father!

I’d really like to know :)

~ Peace

The Burtle

Like an 80’s John Cusack Movie

I watched the end of High Fidelity the other day. It’s one of the more modern of the John Cusack romantic comedies. It’s a good movie and in true form, outlines the path of one man who is honestly still searching for himself even though he’s pushing 40 in the movie. 

I grew up on these movies. And my life and how I look at things is often formed by thoughts of the hapless lovable loser. Who at some point finally figures it out and makes good. It’s silly. It’s not reality, but actually in some ways maybe there’s more reality there than I’ve thought in the past. You can live in this fantasy and that’s definitely not healthy, but if we look at our lives, I think all of us go through a time where we feel like we’re not good enough, or somebody’s gonna figure out that maybe we don’t have our shit together or maybe we’re just eating ourselves inside because that’s who we are and we have way too many thoughts in our heads.

Better Off Dead, One Crazy Summer, the Sure Thing, Say Anything - all classic JC movies!

I have played those characters over and over in my mind and also in my relationships, often fraught with my own emotional immaturity and desire to be seen, to be known. 

I still fight this. I know who I am. I know that I am a good man and I also know that I struggle with insecurities. I do daily try to push through them. But this vulnerable little heart inside me (and yes, it’s there - it’s tiny, probably infinitesimally smaller than anyone thinks), it’s there. And it just wants to love.

Thankfully, God rescued me from living fully in this fantasy by giving me hope. But does that make it always easy? Hell no! I struggle with the reality that I’m in my early 50s and I am alone. 

I have good people around, I have someone I’ve been talking and walking with, I have my kids. I have a church that drives me bonkers, but at the same time shows love in ways that I don’t know that I’ve ever seen. 

Some days I’m just a fucking mess! And believe it or not, even as I’m writing this, I would rather be a mess and know it than to not have any clue that I’m dealing with stuff. I’m learning still. I’m breathing, and I am still here. 

Because I wasn’t always here. For a lot of my life I was absent. Even if I stood right beside you, I was able to walk through life without being truly enmeshed with what was going on. 

The funny thing about High Fidelity, at the end he figures out a lot of things, but he gets hit immediately with the same thing that he has struggled with, seeking out attention and wanting to be seen by others. It resolves, as movies like this tend to do, and Jack Black sings one of the most amazing renditions of Marvin Gaye‘s classic ‘Let’s get it on’ and it is powerful. Then, Stevie Wonder comes on with a song that I do hope is part of my future.

As I’m driving this morning to take care of some things, to be present with my life group at the church, serve this afternoon, to walk a lot I hope, I just needed to get this off my chest. 

God gave us such a capacity to love. He gave us hope through him. And, you don’t have to believe what I believe, that’s never what this blog is about. I do hope you believe in something though. Because I had a friend this week who lost a daughter because she couldn’t believe in anything bigger. It’s hurting me still that this person decided to leave. In fact, I wrote a blog about it, but that’s one is just for me.

I’m very grateful. Even on a melancholy morning, where I feel like part of me is still in Alabama. I’m grateful that I’m here and sad at the same time. And I think that’s what life does. We have to hold onto both. We have to take the times where we’re joyful and align them with the times when we’re suffering and find peace in them. 

Love on ourselves, then we can love on others. Just my thoughts. 

~ Peace

The Burtle

Love and Kindness, part 2

About a year and a half ago I wrote how I hoped to live my life by showing Love and Kindness to others to the best of my ability.  Others meaning ‘everyone’.  Still a very rough journey at times - navigating this call, this path that I truly believe God set me on.  Not a ministry appointment, not a place of serving in a church (though I do that when I can), but the desire to look at life through the lens of that ‘crazy to the world’ Savior who did just that - showed love and kindness while walking among the people - chastising the religious leaders, welcoming the dirty and sullied, teaching and setting a new commandment for us all.

And this morning the message was on that - Love and Kindness.

So I’m going to steal straight from the message I just heard and add my take on this ‘new commandment’.

Showing love and kindness is a CHOICE. A daily decision to NOT be mean, surly; evil.  Yup, I just said evil.  In our hearts we are evil unless we fill it with the Light.

“He did evil because he had not set his heart on seeking the Lord.”

2 Chronicles‬ ‭12‬:‭14‬ ‭NIV‬‬

I chose to take action.  Simple action of being available, willing, committed (as best this man can) to this cause.  

Then there’s my recent look at 1 Corinthians through the “is” scriptures. My take on how to truly show the L word!

“…is…

Patient

Kind

No envy

Not proud

Honors

Not selfish/self seeking;

Slow to anger

Doesn’t keep score

Does not do evil

Seeks truth 

Protects 

Trusts

Hopes

Perseveres - 

Never Fails.

The Greatest…

…is.”

1 Corinthians 13: 4-8

Take away the frilly, feel-good, emotion based version of this and get down to the Choice to Act, Commit and Be… Love.

Showing this to those close to us seems obvious, but what about to our enemy, to a stranger, to those sick - whether physical diseased, mentally ill, addicted, angered souls?

I’m still working on this.  And I fail at it daily.  The course isn’t about a specific outcome - though there are some areas where I pray constantly for the path I’m walking to unfold…

But if we just try a little more to Be Kind.  Show Love. Breathe life/light into darkness. And not my own light, but His…

Holy Shit! What a change that could make!!

Ponder that.  

What if we spent more time being those “is”s from above?

What if I just took a little more time to see others and to show them a little of what saved my ass?!  A bunch of people praying (Thank you BHBC Life Group!), a God that loves, a light that I hope will continue to shine.

Last note:

AND sometimes Love is about letting go.  Holding up an outstretched hand and saying “please take this from me”.  It’s Yours.

~ Peace

The Burtle