Easter Is NOT About Me

Bipolar Girl is NOT the poster child for Christianity.

My life has been very messy in parts, embarrassing in others, and down right ridiculous most of the time. At the bible study that I helped lead on Thursday night at work, I was fairly convinced that Good Friday wasn’t about me. That’s why it was so easy to just tell them the story of the crucifixion and not feel like we had to add all kinds of beeps and whistles. If somebody does not want to hear the truth of Jesus, all the beeps and whistles in the world will not open their ears.

I guess it was the text that I received on Friday that had me thinking that somehow God had changed his natural order of things so that everything was all about me… because the minute I read the text, I took my eyes firmly off of Jesus and put them squarely back on me.What was in the text that had so much power??

A former student was in crisis and needed my help.

I learned years ago that Bipolar Girl can stress out faster than a speeding bullet; has an overactive imagination more powerful than a locomotive; and can leap to conclusions in a single bound. When I read the text begging for my help, I panicked. I started trying to figure out how I, Bipolar Girl, was going to save her.

Well, that was Friday.
PRAISE GOD, Sunday was coming.

Saturday didn’t look that much better than Friday as I wrestled with how I was going to help her. My job has very clear and present rules about staff/student fraternization. Buying her a plane ticket back to her home country would be seriously frowned upon. If I didn’t play this right I could end up out of a job. But she was crying out to me for help. What was Jesus seriously expecting me to do??

In the past, I have wrestled with telling this girl that she needs Jesus. Her life is a train wreck of epic proportions… but who am I to use my life as an example of what Jesus can do for you? This is where I have always struggled with witnessing to people. My life is not an example of shinny happy joy-filled Christianity. I feel like a hypocrite telling people that Jesus will change their life when my life is still very much undone. If I did have one of those stories of radical transformation… of if a bear had eaten off my leg and I’d triumphed over the adversity… maybe then I could tell non-believers something that they might believe.

Me? I work better with struggling believers. Perseverance is the song that I sing and I sing it in B flat. I can tell a Christian who wants to give up that they need to persevere. I don’t even know how to lead somebody to Jesus because when I became a Christian, I did not have anybody “lead” me to Jesus. I went on an eight year journey looking for truth and ended up in a church. I heard truth there and I had to decide if I believed it or not. When I figured out that they (the Christians) were right, I went to a beach on New Year’s Day and introduced myself and all my sins to Jesus. I know why I needed Jesus… but I can’t figure out what I’d say to somebody else who needs him, but doesn’t yet know him.

I walked on stage at my church holding this sign.

Today in church they did the “Cardboard Testimonies” again. Check out youtube if you haven’t seen this before. They did it two years ago when I had my first surgery. I was happy to make my cardboard sign telling the before and after story of my life on a scraggly piece of cardboard. I even came here and blogged about it. This time when I was asked to do a cardboard sign, I couldn’t. My immediate and vehement response was, “NO!” I’m still very much struggling with my sexual addiction and my anger issues even if I’m not struggling with the bipolar. My ability to love the “unlovely” has yielded a big fat nothing. I have a hard time loving the lovely. Why does Jesus make being a Christian so hard?? As much as I’ve come out of my Bipolar Bubble… it just seems like it would be so much easier if I just went back into the bubble and put out a “Do Not Disturb” sign.

I talked to my pastor today. This is the first real talk I’ve had with him since I came back in January. For once I wasn’t sitting in his office bemoaning my own drama…. but second hand drama doesn’t feel so good either. That’s when he reminded me that it’s not about me. This girl does not need me to come to her rescue. She’s an adult and she has made a series of unfortunately bad choices. In the message today the pastor said that sometimes, pain is the best teacher. Some people will not recognize their need of Jesus until they have brought down a world of pain on themselves. That’s how I was when I was her age. I made a series of seriously bad choices that brought me to the end of myself.

There wasn’t a thing anybody could do to help me until I acknowledged my need of him and asked Jesus to save me. Did making that decision change my life immediately? In many ways it did. In many other ways it did not. I still struggled with the depression and suicidal thoughts. I still had very dysfunctional relationships and the list of things that didn’t change was long. But those things are changing now. My eternity was the one thing that changed and remained changed. My need of Jesus in my life on an ongoing basis also did not change. The truth of who Jesus is and what he did for me has also not changed.

She’s supposed to call me back at 2:30 and I have no idea what I’m going to say to her. I am emotionally exhausted. Trying to save people is tiring. No wonder there was only enough room on the cross for one person. I cannot save her because only Jesus can. I can’t give her the money to go back to her home country. Through a series of unfortunately really bad choices, she burned that particular bridge. Bailing her out now would only be enabling her to make even more bad choices. It might also be standing in the way of God’s discipline. If I jump in there trying to play God, I might very well be messing up whatever God is trying to do in her life through all of this pain. My pastor pointed out that people who get in the way of God’s plans often bring down a lot of grief upon their own heads. He actually advised me to let her face the consequences of her own actions while being there to love her.

What?? No warm and fuzzy entreaties to give her “extra grace??” No insistence that I tell her that Jesus can change her life while using my own life as an example?? He pointed out that my life isn’t what she needs. She needs Jesus and that’s what I am to hold out to her. In an hour and a half she’s going to call me and I have no idea what to say. She needs a Saviour and I’m not it. What do you say to a non-believer who is in crisis and asking you for help?? I’m pretty certain God is telling me not to bail her out, but I can’t very well tell her that. I’m sure that by 2:30 Jesus is going to open my ears so that I can hear what I need to say (SWYNTS)…but right now? I’m tired and I got nuthin’.

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• Work: The ULTIMATE SWYNTS (theadventuresofbipolargirl.wordpress.com

Work: The ULTIMATE SWYNTS

I work in a secular institute of higher learning.

This is a BIG jump for me because for most of my 13 years of teaching I taught at small Christian schools where we had teach Bible memory verses, prayed whenever anybody felt like it, and had “chapel” on Fridays. My job was my ministry so there was none of that awkwardness that can come from trying to tell people about Jesus. It was the whole “captive audience” thing.

There were, however, times that I felt spiritually suffocated because the Bipolar pretty much assured that I would not be on the same page as most of the people I worked with… and the sexual addiction took care of all the others. I was rather happy when I quit teaching in Christian schools  because I felt like I was never going to measure up. There was always the faint whiff of hypocrisy lingering in the air around me. I could smell it even if nobody else did. I always felt like a hypocrite. I used to get mad at God because what kind of “good Christian” struggled with a mental illness, anger issues, and a sexual addiction?? Nobody ever called me a hypocrite… but I always felt like on none the less.  Ok, one person did ask me what kind of Christian was I? But since I thought she was a big old flaming hypocrite herself, her opinion of me didn’t really matter. It hurt, but it didn’t matter.

I figured that once I left elementary school teaching all the “Christianese” (that language that Christians seem to speak when they’re being religious) would be behind me. It would be separation of work and church all the way, baby. That was until God gave me a burden to start praying for the students. Once I started praying, he gave me a vision for a bible study. I figured I’d pray for somebody else to lead it because LORD KNOWS I didn’t feel qualified to do it. My testimony is messy and my life hasn’t been spotless. I didn’t particularly want to do it anyways… so I kept praying for someone who would. Then once that person stepped forward (one of the students) it became evident that he needed adult help. That’s how a friend from my church ended up helping me with the study. He leads it because I don’t want to. I provide the room. I chime in when I feel it’s necessary. I bring the snacks. I haven’t smelt that telltale odor of hypocrisy.

Yet I never quite say what I really need to say (SWYNTS). How can I?? It’s not like I can share my testimony of mental illness and sexual addiction with them. Try having that intel floating around campus. And since I don’t have some story of immediate deliverance from my depression or my addiction, I can’t really offer a testimony of dramatic deliverance to encourage them in their own struggles. My story minus all the salacious bits is rather… mundane. I don’t know Greek (and don’t care to); I cannot site the Four Spiritual Laws (and don’t want to); I don’t pass out tracks, get involved in religious debates about the superiority of Christianity compared to all other world religions…

I’m an educator. I put my pants on one leg at a time. I try not to yell at people when I drive my car. I get to work and I teach. I say what I’m supposed to say.

Last night I said what needed to be said. It was our weekly bible study. My co-host was out with some gnarly illness, but a friend who’d attended last week came and brought his wife. We’d talked beforehand about what we’d cover. Since it’s Good Friday/Easter,  I felt like we had to talk about it and address any questions the kids might have. Attendance is sporadic at the study and I never know who’s going to show up. Last night, two young men showed up. Both are in their early 20′s and both have seen a lot of life. Both have a heart for Jesus, but not a lot of knowledge about him. One of them showed up by chance. He saw my friend bringing in his guitar and was drawn in by that. The other is a regular with a lot of zeal, but not a lot of real understanding of who Jesus is. We started with two worship songs. When I found out that the big guy played guitar I told him he’d have to play at the end.

Rather than go around the circle having people read sections, my friends and I told HIStory. Each of us took a section starting at Judas’ decision to betray Jesus.  We paraphrased some parts and quoted scripture in others. We clarified what certain portions meant or anything the guys didn’t understand. One of them had no idea what Good Friday was or that Jesus had actually been crucified on Friday and not Sunday. Hearing his story told by three different people who each brought their own unique perspectives and insights really made the word come alive for them.

We told the story of Jesus as it was meant to be told: simply and relationally.

What really amazed me?? I didn’t have to feel like a hypocrite because I still have emotional baggage. It wasn’t my testimony we were sharing. We were bearing witness to what we know to be true about Jesus. We weren’t even asking them to take our word for it — we encouraged them to read it in the Bible for themselves later. All the things I have wanted to say to people about Jesus just came rolling off my tongue like I’d rehearsed it. At the end, we prayed and it was then that I noticed that the big guy was in tears. Clearly, God had prompted us to say what really  needed to be said to this “accidental” attendee. After we prayed, my friend handed him his guitar and the guy blew us away.

He started playing worship songs and it was just lovely. What moved me most was when he started playing the same song that God had prompted me to sing last Sunday! I asked him if he could play it in B flat (my new-found key)… but he couldn’t. That’s when I realized that it still wasn’t about me. In my key I could have belted it out and blown them away. And I would have taken the spotlight firmly off of Jesus and put it squarely back on me. When I make it about me and what I’ve done… that odious odor starts wafting around. I stopped trying to impress and just thanked Jesus for what he was doing in that moment.

Eventually the study ended and my friends and I headed home. We fairly floated home on that cloud that usually accompanies moments like these. The cloud followed me all the way into my house only to completely evaporate in my bathroom. I looked up and there in all it’s furry legged glory was a very large fast-moving cane spider. For a moment I completely lost my cool. The cloud was gone and it was just me and the spider. Gone are the days, however, where this could evaporate my cloud for long. I grabbed the broom and a can of RAID and made short work of it. As is circled the drain and disappeared into a watery grave, I could feel my cloud re-materializing

or re-inflating… or whatever it is these clouds do. The point is… I’m still stoked about work and being free to be bold for Jesus. When I worked at the Christian school I had to talk about Jesus because it was my job.  Here I don’t have to say a word about Jesus unless I choose to. I don’t try to witness to my coworkers because I don’t think God is even calling me to do that. I’m there for the students…but I don’t go all bible-banger on them either. I’ve made it known that I am a Christian; that I’m offering a bible study and bibles to anybody who’s interested; and I let God do the rest. He is bringing whomever he wants to bring and all I have to do is say what needs to be said. Pride, fear, and hypocrisy had no place there last night. That’s why I’m still floating on the cloud and haven’t caught a single whiff of hypocrisy.

Drink Me. Eat Me.

Having Bipolar Disorder has been a bit like falling down the rabbit hole. There I was a relatively normal girl in high school — not popular by any standard, but not a bubble dweller either. I was rising in the ranks of competitive oratory and was making a name for myself as a public speaker. I was at the top of most of my classes. All my teachers liked me. One year I even earned a merit based, all expense paid trip to Norway. To say that all seemed right with my world was an understatement. At 17, I believed that I was going to own the world.

I fell into the rabbit hole when I left home to got to college at UC Berkeley. Looking back over my life I can see evidence of the Asperger’s Syndrome in me from early childhood and there were glimpses of the bipolar… but it didn’t fully manifest until I went away to school and ran into my first trigger. After that my world began to spiral out of control and I became the Mad Hatter, the Cheshire Cat, and the anger Queen of Hearts all once. My moods swung severely in college and it wasn’t due to drugs and alcohol. To this day, I am thankful that, given my addictive personality, I never even had the temptation to do drugs because I would have od’d before ever crawling out of the rabbit hole. I did turn to alcohol to self-medicate, but being a drunk never sat well with me and it was easy to quit. I realized early on that those bottles labeled “drink me” weren’t going to be able to help stop the crazy pain in my life.

When I became a Christian I had a lot of expectations about Jesus. I thought that he was the ultimate “drink me/eat me.” I thought that if I just had enough Jesus in my life I’d be fine. I thought there’d be immediate changes in my life. I’d heard those testimonies of people who’d been radically delivered of all kinds of stuff… and I wanted to be one of those people. When that didn’t happen for me I doubted. When year after year that still didn’t happen for me, I got bitter and angry. And I stayed that way for a whole lot of years — especially the last few years. Jesus was not doing what I thought he should be doing in my life. When I started blogging, I met other people with bipolar disorder who were a lot worse off than I was. Some of them loved Jesus, and yet he didn’t seem to be doing much delivering in their lives either. So not only was I angry, but I was confused too. If there was to be deliverance where was it? And when would it come?

Tonight was Good Friday. Although, at 1:04am, Good Friday is behind me now. I’m not sure how to say this next part without sounding vain, so I’m just going to say it and you can take it as you wish. My church put on a Good Friday service and I was the creative mastermind behind it. I think I mentioned that in a recent blog because I was freaking out under the weight of so much responsibility. I have been in a bipolar bubble of isolation for so long that the idea of any kind of church leadership was stressful. I don’t know what I was expecting for tonight, but I wasn’t expecting God to show up the way that he did. People were moved. One woman told me that she cried through the entire program. Another woman said that it helped put her in the frame of mind to fully appreciate the meaning and spirit of Easter.

When we took communion tonight we took part in the oldest Christian ritual. And unlike Christmas, which I don’t believe Jesus himself ever celebrated, the Lord took part in communion. The Last Supper before he died for us. That’s when the deliverance happened. He took some bread and said, “Eat me.” Ok, maybe not a direct quote… but he was saying that we needed to participate in the breaking of his body for the forgiveness of sins. There would be breaking and immediate forgiveness because of his death on the cross, but our healing and deliverance would happen over time. Then he took a cup and said, “Drink me.” And while the whole concept of drinking his blood rings a bit too “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” for my liking… Jesus was saying that only his blood could pay the price for our sin.

Bipolar Disorder is not a sin. But because of my bipolar disorder I’ve made a lot of sinful choices that continue to affect me today. And it’s for those sins that Jesus died. As my pastor pointed out tonight, it wasn’t just the sins of the world that nailed Jesus to that cross. There was a hammer in my hand too. And that’s something I felt we all needed to do tonight, so as a part of the dramatic readings that I’d written I included a time when people could write their sins on slips of paper and actually nail them to the cross at the front of our sanctuary. You should have seen how quick people where to come forward. Seems like I’m not the only person with baggage. And after leaving their sin at the cross, I included a time where people could get the bread and the wine for communion. It was intense. I was crying and I planned it all.

I stepped outside of my bubble long enough to let God use my gifts and abilities. I let him stretch me beyond what I thought I could do. Earlier today I prayed that tonight he’d use my production to reach people and he answered me. I woke up a while ago with thoughts of the evening on my mind. Standing at my bedroom window enjoying the cool breeze and the sound of rain, I thought about tonight and how great it felt to feel normal. When I nailed my paper to the cross I wasn’t an emotional basket case like I was the first time I’d done the nailing to the cross exercise years ago at a different church. Back then I was mentally unstable and in need of ministry. Tonight, I was ministering to other people. I have never felt as mentally stable, strong, and free as I felt tonight. Sure, I’m  reverting back to the time when I would wake up in the night needing to blog, but I’m not blogging because I’m broken and bound up. Jesus was delivering me all along. When I first ate of his body and drank his blood he began a work of deliverance in me that will continue until the day I die.

I am not sure how “Alice in Wonderland” ends. I know she somehow gets out of Wonderland. I also know that being in it was not the end of her world. Having bipolar disorder has not been the end of my world. Being a sinner hasn’t been the end of my world either. That’s what’s so good about Good Friday. My sin might have helped nail Jesus to that cross, but neither Jesus nor my sin stayed there. I’m not sure how the whole Friday to Sunday transformation happened, but at this point in my life I don’t need to understand it. I’m just glad it happened. Friday has past. Saturday is here. And as everybody loves to say, “Sunday is coming.”