When Girl Meets What God Actually Calls Her To Do
It seems almost contradictory to me to write beautifully about a city that spoke sadness to my heart.
But I suppose there’s a beauty in something inhuman still able to affect. No matter what the effect is.
Will I be a pioneer in my writing about the trappings of New York, New York?
A city that symbolizes diversity, success, and absolute opportunity seemed to me a cage for the heart.
Even when passing theatre after theatre—the pinnacles of human expression—art and expression suddenly became a mere businesses.
Unforgiving, small, ferociously directed, and as lifeless as the tired neon lights.
The lights have no other job than to brighten. The New Yorkers no other job than to deliver.
Where has the humanity gone?
I look up and see jagged pieces of sky not only scrapped but torn by sky scrappers. I do not see homes for the world changers and sustainers.
The confines and directions necessary for success, impact, and real freedom seem to constrict and choke the humans that practice ingenuity and creativity. Don’t the best creators, writers, and performers need epic stories to tell? I know it would be dirty work for me to find an epic hidden in concrete.
The very air told me to look at myself.
Challenge myself only.
Further myself only.
Walk quickly for myself only.
But I remind myself, “If I am confined to myself, what is the point of expression? Creativity? Ingenuity?”
“If I must be silent to those I pass by, is anyone really interested in the messages being sent across the world?”
The competition smothered me.
Of course, I cannot define that city. I walked it with some who could confidently say there was no where else they would rather be. They would define New York, New York as home.
NYC frightened me however.
Maybe if I had explored the nooks and crannies; if I had had the chance to climb a fire escape to look down and feel outside of it all for a moment; if I had met someone who knew how to sail a boat; if I had seen someone going for a walk simply because humans can walk and see and hear and that person wanted to use his senses for awhile…then the place might have seemed more human.
This trip to the city is almost too perfect an analogy to what my own heart has been experiencing for a long time.
There was a time when I hated being alone.
Why would I watch a movie alone? I can’t laugh about it with anyone.
Why would I go to the store alone? It takes two to make conversation.
Why would I shut out the world for homework? The world and the present people in it bring more wisdom than these pages…
Even now I’m alone at a library and cannot help but feeling selfish that I’ve stolen away. As if I’m communicating that people are in the way of my life when they are actually my entire life.
If you know me, you’ll read these lines and see my extroversion dripping and pooling over every word.
But I see my outward focus as more than a personality definer.
It’s how I’m meant to serve the Lord. To always surrender to the way He has designed me to broadcast, to express, to learn then to turn around and teach someone else.
What good is it if I’m edified and keep it to myself? God is not glorified when I do not speak of His hand.
I’m too small to hold what God’s doing, to hold His entire glory, to bring enough praise to His name.
I crave my purpose to be apart of eternity so strongly that whats going on inside me seems trivial.
I know it is not though. I know I need to understand myself and how God works in me and through me to truly be an eternal stamp of blessing. But I wish I wasn’t given that task. I know treasuring precious moments in my heart given specifically to me by Him creates intimacy. But the glory seems too great to stay silent about.
Then there was a time when being alone became more comfortable.
I walked to classes alone.
I ate alone.
I read alone.
I watched movies alone.
I sung alone.
I became comfortable with being inside my small self.
And it has grieved me immensely.
Because when I am ok with just me, myself, and I, all I live for is me.
I tell people about me instead of Jesus. I tell people about my favorite memories instead of praising God for who I’m conversing with at the moment. I tell people to notice my talents instead of just using them for His glory.
New York, New York. The expression of my sad soul. Confined with a mere memory of eternal impact.
I’m reading C.S. Lewis’s The Great Divorce and have found sharp conviction about my writing through it. One of the Solid People speaks these wise words to a Ghost who in another life was a renowned painter: “Every poet and musician and artist, but for Grace, is drawn away from love of the thing he tells, to love of the telling till, down in Deep Hell, they cannot be interested in God at all but only in what they say about Him.”
I would rather broadcast The Word instead of how I can present it. I would rather broadcast God’s character instead of who He is shaping me to be. I would rather keep conversations about me small and conversations that point out how God is working and present continuous.
Humans are canvases. We can choose to stay focused on the beauty of our unmarked potential, or, look up and open ourselves for the Master Artist as He begins to paint His message upon us. If we choose the later, we walk towards people—towards the world—with outstretched arms, searching eyes, and beauty absolutely pouring out of us as God’s Heavenly colors spread through the world by the obedient canvas.
I guess what I’m trying to say here is that God calls us to love Him and to spread His love across the world. Introversion and extroversion aside, no one can love God and accomplish His mission through a prideful focus on themselves.
I’m finding out what it looks like for me to love God in how He has made me.
I’m finding that it is in no way related to be comfortable in my tiny life.
