Simplifying the Soul by Paula Huston

For Lent, I will be reading the book Simplifying the Soul by Paula Huston.  You can read a great interview about the book here on Sara Zarr’s blog. I particularly enjoyed reading Sara’s thoughts on the way Paula can challenge us without making us feel “like a big fat loser/sinner.”  Loser SLASH sinner.  Not a good combo.

However, I completely agree with Sara’s thoughts because the last several months Paula has been working with me to help me with my writing, and while I have a lot of loser/sinner thoughts swirling around me as I write, none of them come from Paula.  What I love about working with her is that she gently tells me there is a lot more to the story I’m trying to tell, but she also makes it clear that the story will come out if I give it time. This idea that I have to “get it” right away never comes out in Paula’s comments, though I feel challenged to dig deeper when she asks, “Where’s the conflict?” or tells me, “There’s more to this character/plot/etc.”

The way I practice my spiritual life, my faith, is by writing. I don’t set out to write about “Christian things,” but I can see that the more I write, the more I understand my faith. I don’t believe I have been called to write, but I believe that when I hear or tell a story, I am changed. And while I might not always understand an event, when I sit with it for awhile, and try to describe it as I push a pen across paper, I see glimpses of God in the ink.

There was a Good Friday, years ago when I was in college, that I remember quite vividly.  Classes were shortened so we could attend Chapel if we wanted to.  The weather that day was warm for Grand Rapids in late March/early April.  I think I was wearing shorts, or at least flip flops, as I sat in the Tenebrae Service.

What I remember most about the service was the loud cymbal, representing God’s anger, His loss, perhaps His overwhelming pain of the death of Jesus.  I remember covering my ears, and sort of crouching in an attempt to hide from the noise.  It didn’t help.  The noise was so loud it felt like it was coming from inside of my body.  I felt awful, and scared, and really, really guilty.

But then we walked outside into the spring afternoon.  With no classes to go to, and it being the beginning of the weekend, my friends and I decided to drive to Holland to see Lake Michigan.  We heard the lake’s waves were frozen and couldn’t imagine something that could smash us onto shore being unmovable, still.

We laughed a lot, my friends and I, as we sat on the pier and looked at the frozen waves.  I remember I could hear the water underneath the ice, sometimes lapping up against the small hills that would soon collapse and run towards the shore.

I think about that Good Friday afternoon and I remember my laughter, and those waves, and that terrible loud cymbal and it all seems to swirl around me: the happiness, and the fear, the guilt and the thankfulness, and the idea that Something underneath it all will crack it open and drive us to shore, wherever we are. I look forward to sitting on that frozen wave during Lent, and practicing renewing my spirit as I head toward Easter.

I’m interested in what others read or practice during these next 40 days. I vowed to give up ice-cream once and it lasted about five hours. What sorts of things do you do?  I’m planning on writing posts on Simplifying the Soul and if you’re reading the book too, I’d love to hear from you. Also, if you head over to Sara Zarr’s blog, and leave a comment, you have a chance at winning a copy of Paula’s book.