Burs

It’s been a challenging season. In addition to some things that feel heavy lately, my little sister was diagnosed with breast cancer. My emotions are big and my margins small.

Saturday morning, my heart was aching, so I went for a walk to process with Jesus. I took my Labradoodle, Dahlia. We walked, and I talked with Jesus. But when we got back home, I noticed something.  

Dahlias, muzzle and ears were covered in burs.

And I found my flesh and the enemy, whispering, “Everyone who walks with you, gets covered in burs.”

And immediately the voice of the Spirit said, “That’s what walking together looks like sometimes. You look at Dahlia, and she would tell you it was worth the burs to get to walk with you.  And you would say the walk was worth the work that it’s going to take to pick those burs out.”

Doing life together, walking in relationship together, following God, together isn’t always easy. Sometimes, when we walk together, one of us, or both of us, might end up with a few burs. 

That’s the cost of relationship. That’s the way of Jesus. 

If you ask Jesus if the cross was worth it, he would say 1 million times over and over again that it was. That it is. And that it always will be. 

God is good, but life is messy. Sometimes we walk through the sunshiny meadows together, but sometimes we walk in the dark valleys together. 

Real community, real life on life, real relationship, is the willingness to do both. 

It’s the willingness to ask someone to walk with you, knowing that they may get a bur or two. And it’s the willingness to go on the walk, knowing that you may end up with a few burs. 

It was good for Dalia and I to walk together. But I could tell she was tired and hot and worn out. So I took her home so that she could get a drink and rest, and I decided to keep on walking with Jesus. 

It was super quiet at first. But I began talking with him, and I then began just listening. And in the quiet, when I was walking by myself, I heard Jesus’s voice the loudest reminding me of the truth that I wrote here.

I think community is the both and. It’s the willingness to walk with others, burs and all. 

And it’s the wisdom and discernment to know when we need to journey by ourselves with Jesus and spend some time getting quiet and listening. 

What a gift and what a good God to invite us into the both and. To invite us to walk with others, and to invite us to walk with only him. To invite us to find community that’s willing to enter in with us, no matter the challenges. And to find our true hope, and healing in community with the father son and spirit. 

I have often heard it said that you can’t be in Community with Jesus without being in Community with Others. Jesus greatest command was to love the Lord your God with your whole self and to love your neighbor as yourself.  Burs and all.  Both. And. 

I’m wondering what it looks like to know when and how to do both. To be present in community with others- burs and all, and to carve out time alone to talk with God. And to do both simultaneously. 

Loving God, with all that we are, and loving others as ourselves. And receiving the love of God for our whole selves, and receiving the love of others for our whole selves. Both. And. Burs and all. 

Ps. When I got home it only took a second to relive Dahlia of every single bur.  And my heart felt lighter and more peaceful. 

But that’s a whole other metaphor to dig into.