More than a few times people ask, "Why don't you take before and after pictures at BT? The changes are so dramatic that it shows up on our faces." That's quite often the case but I am not sure how many people coming into that first Friday night would want to have a photo taken. It's not like there's no anxiety.
Scott Jones, who just completed BT 2 last weekend, has given us the next best thing to a before and after photo - maybe even one better than a picture. After attending BT 1 he posted "Off to the Mountain I Go" , a vulnerable reflection of where he was before attending BT 2 on his blog Reflecting the Light. He just posted his post-BT 2 reaction "Back From the Mountain I Am."
If you've attended BT, you can identify. If not, just imagine....
Off to the Mountain I Go:
It is way past time for me to get out of Dodge and meet God alone. I have been in a rut. It has probably been a rut that I caused, but a rut nonetheless. I am going away on a Breakthrough retreat with an organization called HeartConnexion Ministries. It is an intense time of letting go. I first met with this group 10 days ago. It was an unexpected encounter. I will blame it on God! Far too many coincidences to be anything less than God.
Bottom line: 10 days ago, when we all got together, it was all about leaving our crap at the door. We all have junk in our lives. For some of us the junk is an addiction. For some of us it is a broken relationship. For some of us it is a current relationship that is killing us inside. For some of us it is a crap load of messed up sexual stuff. For some of us it is a past that haunts us daily. For some of us it is simply us that we can seem to get beyond.
10 days ago, 19 of us decided to leave our crap outside the door. Part of the crap we left outside the door was the various masks that we wear in our normal lives. The masks of happiness. The mask of success. The mask of cool. The mask of tough guy. The masks of “you can’t hurt me.” I was uncomfortable without my masks. But I healed a little bit in the vulnerability of that group.
So Today I leave for a five day retreat. I leave my front door without my masks. I leave not on a pleasant retreat. but a retreat of inward honesty. Who am I? Why am I? how did I get to be who I am? I leave to meet the real me! A few months ago I left for Poland, partly to get away from me. Today I leave not to get away from me, but instead to get closer to me than I have ever been. I hope to meet God inside of me the way I met God in a country far, far from home! I think this is all part of the same long journey that started on a trip to Poland.
Off to the mountain i go…to find me, maskless, hurt, and real.
Back From the Mountain I Am:
I am back from my Breakthrough Retreat, Mountain Top Experience, with HeartConnexion Ministries! Wow, what a trip it has been!! I met God in some very new ways, and I found God waiting for me in a few dark corners of my soul that I forgot was there!
I found something over the past couple of weeks that I didn’t even know I lost. I found ME! I was reminded of who I am. I was reminded that I am more than my W-2 or my 1099-misc, or the lack thereof. I was reminded that as a child of God I was created to change the world. I was reminded that before life and bad decisions and a broken spirit piled debt & shame on me that I was just a little boy in the back yard who was convinced he was a hero with a BB gun killing bad guys and making the world a better place. I was reminded, on my mountain top journey, that I am still that hero, I was simply blinded and confused by my shame.
I am walking taller now. I am walking prouder now. I am walking again with a sense of passion! I actually look forward to the many fights that will surely come my way. I will cower no more.
So I am back. My finances are still a wreck. The fact is that my cleaning business has failed. The fact is that I do not have a job. The fact is that I do not get an unemployment check. The fact is that this is not the best time in the history of America to look for a job. The fact is that my wife still has one year of nursing school to go. The fact is that I have been away from paid, full-time ministry work for many years, BUT I am back! I have remembered who I am! I know what I do and I know how to do it well. I know my purpose and I will find a fit for me very soon. I have a wife and kids who love me, and we will make it through this even if we need to go backwards financially for a few years.
I am a Passionate, Driven, and Worthy man. I will change the world through the Love that God has shown me as I live out MY Life; a Grace Light in the dark world of shame.
scott
