God-sized Dreams

Where Dreams Set Sail

Wild In The Hollow: Chapters 4-6

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Today we will discuss chapters 4-6. There is so much good material here. Let’s get started!

Chapter 4: Harness on the Wind

She (Mamaw) didn’t mean to teach me that Jesus was one who worked in scraps or one who took on strays, but she did. She taught me what the church is supposed to look like. She took care of what she had. She gave part of it away…It wasn’t her job to make the world beautiful. All she did was feed us and give us a place to rest.”

In this chapter we see Amber as not only a new believer on fire for the Lord, but also a newlywed about to attend her first mega-church where her husband served as youth pastor. I had a feeling things were about to get very interesting :).

As a new believer how did you reconcile who God made you to be, the Holy Spirit’s leadings, and the church’s doctrines? Was this a struggle? Do you feel they can all be in unity?

My favorite lines from this chapter that resonated the most with me are right here:

I made a mistake when I came into the church. I walked in newly transformed, with a diamond on my finger, and asked them, “Will you love me now?” If I change the way I dress, calm down some, use your language, and learn to defend the faith well, if I accept the parades of the church and all the fancy fireworks, will you love me then?”(pg.50)

We so desperately want people to love and accept us. We want others to see we are changed after we become christians. But sometimes I think instead of trying to please God we twist it into trying to please His people instead.

We can’t look to the church to be our Holy Spirit.

Only the Holy Spirit can be the Holy Spirit.

What do you think?

Chapter 5: Hungry

So, in my new faith, rather than give in to desire, fall into sin, and die, I decided to kill off desire instead. This is what I thought church was for. I lay down before her-the church-like I had on the dorm room floor. I waited for passions to die. I waited to feel alive.”

Wow.

In her beautiful spin of words that leave you dizzy and amazed someone actually writes like this, we are reminded we are responsible for our own spiritual journeys. The church is a wonderful place to be, but she is wholly imperfect.

We can’t put our hope in her, because we will only be left disappointed.

We can try-hard holy and will end up putting ourselves in spiritual starvation mode for something real…more. OR we can give into the easy grace and yoke of God. He doesn’t ask us to burden ourselves in trying to be good enough for anyone or anything. He didn’t intend for His church to become a burden, He meant it to be a blessing.

I think for me the question I am asking myself is,”How can I be a blessing in the church and not burden others with religion?”

Chapter 6: A Wolf Revision

I began to revise my future, as if the rewriting would make it better… I saw myself in the past, in love, and I told her, “Revisions of love are perversions. You cannot revise the future for improvements. It is already beautiful-a garden planted, watered, pruned, and bearing fruit.”

This chapter hit me hard and left me looking deep within. Does she not know how to spin a tale of words?!

At some point those of us who are married will go through a spell where we are left wondering, Did we make a mistake? Why aren’t we happy anymore?

Amber had an affair to make her feel alive, loved. She took her eyes off not only her first love, God, but Seth and the life they had created together…for better or worse. New life is forming inside her, and with it I think we are going to see a rebirthing of Amber too.

Conclusion & Questions

What are your thoughts?

Have you ever felt that the church complicates the gospel?

Have you ever found yourself in a cycle of pleasing men rather than God?

Shared by: Alecia Simersky

Comments

  2. Love love LOVE this book.

    “What I sensed from church was that perfect love adopts fear. So much hammered doctrine was an effort to control, as if it were our own job to uphold the morality standards of Jesus for the world, rather than to be embodied by the actual Spirit of the living God… We used doctrine to feel better about ourselves… Doctrine became God…. I see now that using any doctrine like a harness to keep a moral upperhand on the world is corrupt. Jesus didn’t come to modify the behavior of the church. He came to set her free.”

    “There is nothing as exhausting as acting like we can control God.”

    Amen! In a world filled with Christians telling others how they are supposed to live, we forget the Spirit and Jesus’ call for us to love and offer grace to one another. Aren’t we all broken sinners in many different ways? A friend says all the time– If I had known churches were just hospitals for sinners, I would have become a church lady years ago!

    Reply

    • Yes! *Hands raised!* Broken sinner in need of Jesus’ love and saving grace EVERYDAY. I love what you’re friend said about the church being a hospital for sinners, that is exactly what it is. It should be a place we can come and be real and leave feeling refreshed.

      I recently read a different book by Rachel Held Evans, Searching for Sunday, and in it she wrote about how the church should run like an AA group. In AA they come, admit who they are, what they’ve done, and then receive and give support and encouragement to leave and live stronger healthier lives.

      With so many people feeling this way I’m wondering if a revival in the church is about to take place…or already taking place? 🙂

      Thanks for joining in, Carrie!

      Reply

  3. I love how Amber alluded to Seth’s indiscretion on the internet. Or at least that’s how I perceived part of chapter 5?
    I’ve just finished chapter 6 so here’s hoping these two get it together…by the books end.
    Sounds like two pretty dysfunctional folks here trying to do their best. I understand dysfunction.
    What gets me though is here you have people who had OPPORTUNITY. Continued education,
    seemingly stable family life? All these things that I’ve always believed if I’d had would have kept me from my past, but it
    didn’t help them at all. So…what hope did I have?
    I wish I could have been her friend when she got pregnant the first time. It’s sad that she felt that alone even knowing who God is. I may not have been able to stop her…but oh I would have tried!

    I like how she summarizes her church experience. The whole fitting in thing.
    I totally relate to the, look at me now, I’m all cleaned up, people pleasing, fitting in game.
    I’ve been there and done that…for years! It’s awful. I’ve rolled around on a bathroom floor too.
    I wish everyone would let the skeletons in their closet out now and again. It’s so refreshing to have
    conversation with those who don’t pretend to be untainted.

    Reconciliation…I love that word. I loved when I first read that word used in describing what Christ did for us on the Cross. He makes us right. It has taken me years to understand that I have to be nothing more than what God made me to be. If I’m meant to do something grand He’ll provide the means. If I’m meant to do nothing more than what I’m doing now then it’s all I’m meant to do. I can rest in that.

    Having a relationship with God, a personal relationship is what being a Christian is. Talking with Him and living in Him as you can no other on this earth.
    It’s not where you attend worship services. Yes church and religion can totally complicate the Gospel!! In my opinion there should just be Church. God’s people. All under one roof. The only reason there should be more than one building is because we can’t all fit in the same space.

    And yes, the whole waiting to feel alive passage…wow. Seems we all wait for tongues of fire to come down and strike us when we’re first saved…waiting for this indwelling that is way more subtle than we think. Why is this? And no, the church is definitely not the Holy Spirit! There is a saying that goes something like, in most churches if you want to feel the Holy Spirit you best bring it with you.
    And there it is…in a nutshell. The Spirit resides in US. No five bell alarms no thunder and lightening. Just the indwelling of the Most High right inside of us. WE ARE CHURCH.

    Marriage is HARD.

    I’m going to hush now. I could go on and on……….

    Reply

    • I love reading your responses!! Thank you!

      You made a very good point in your first paragraph. One I didn’t think about. I’m always hard on myself for not doing better when I was younger. I could feel God calling me, but I pushed him away. I wasn’t ready for what He was offering…or so I thought. Now when I look back I think IF ONLY. If only I would have listened, how different would my life look? (My life isn’t bad now, but I would have saved myself a lot of hurt) But you take Amber and Seth. They knew God. Were involved in church, worked for the church, studied and knew His word and yet they still succumbed to the flesh.

      I guess now I realize it doesn’t matter what I know, how much I attend church. If my heart is wandering from Him then I am easy prey for the enemy. It all comes back to the heart and believing we are loved, free, wanted, accepted. Reminding ourselves each day.

      Isn’t there so much FREEDOM in knowing we don’t have to live by a list of rules, or appearances to ensure we look approved. We are free to love and live for God by His leading!

      And yes, marriage is HARD! 🙂

      Reply

  4. My yellow highlighter was in overdrive in these chapters! It was especially on these pages that I kept wondering how she kept describing me. I kept thinking, “That’s a thing? You experienced that too?” So much amen. As a Catholic, I have a deep appreciation for doctrine and traditions, but I’ve come to see that the personal relationship comes first as the focus and bedrock of faith, and all the “rules” flow from that as ways we want to live because it expresses our love for Jesus. They are actually tools to help us live in freedom and not sin. I found the issue to be people’s interpretation in how those doctrines are applied to our lives or treating non-essential teachings and practices as though they are essential, condemning people who didn’t agree or live that way. In other words, putting the doctrine before Jesus and leaving the loving of others out. It was healing to read Amber describe this being played out, and so poetically.

    Reply

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