The Singing Cheerleader

Let this be a teaser for what will hopefully be some upcoming commentary on some of the referenced resources God's been using to feed me as well as personal self reflection and new ventures ahead...

Well I was trying to work on my “GoFundMe,” aka the second scariest thing I’ve ever done, with #1 being going to China… well okay, the GoFundMe and moving to NYC or to Boston might be about the same amount of scariness, I’m not sure… anyway, I’m digressing ALREADY!!! So much for learning to be concise. Happy 50^th Elements of Style)! BUT the website isn’t loading. So I’m going to try not to get too charismatic and take it as a sign from God that I shouldn’t do this whole thing at all. HA! I AM, however, going to take it as a sign that for the moment, I should just do something else.

Letting go of control. Perhaps that could be a title for the theme of my life the last few years. It’s not a glamorous title, albeit. I could probably come up with a variety of titles to characterize the last few years, or 10, or 14, or 20…. Yes, that’s how long it has been since I moved away from home, 20 YEARS! I was telling someone the other day that I had lived just as many years in my family of origin as I had lived outside of it… and actually, I now understand why this person just looked at me puzzled…. I STILL CAN’T DO MATH. I WAS OFF BY TWO YEARS DANGIT. Almost 39, (in 6, 7, 8!!!!!!!!!!! DAYS!!!!!!!!!!!!!) But yeah, 20 Years FOR NOW. I started Mercer University way back in the day, at a mere 18 years old. And that good ole’ therapist I saw back in 1998 was right on track when he said it would take about 20 years to work out the crap I’d been through.  My current counselor shirked at the nerve of someone to say that to a mere 16-year-old girl, but I assured her of this man’s sincerity because what he was doing back then was, in reality, trying to help a young girl understand that everything which she believed was normal was actually very much a broken..down..system.

And perhaps in THAT lies the theme of my last few years, or even of my life… the blowing up of the system, and I suppose I don’t mind that theme (My faithful followers might remember now the story of me writing the judge a letter when my parents were in the middle of their divorce and I felt neither of them were being particularly honest. Ha. The nerve! I can chuckle now, as I watch that nerve…in my little Eden girl, and I say “oh no. I am in for it).

It has its pitfalls, mainly the amount of people who think you are crazy and make fun of you or dislike you, as well as the amount of time it freaking takes to learn to forgive oneself and those nearest to oneself for the gravest of ills which one and all of those around have overtly and covertly committed. It’s tough… learning to love myself AFTER I actually SEE myself stripped down before God… insanity, that He would love first… just insanity. Counter-cultural in every sense.

In this post are some of the resources that have been guiding me as of recent. If you’d like more information or to hear more of my thoughts, I have copious notes…be glad you are not my brother-in-law. He received a 25 page thesis about one topic.

Also, this post will eventually link to the GoFundMe I hope to start…because that’s just it guys, I can’t exist like this anymore. I can’t be a kog in a system that serves only to support itself. My purpose must be more. I will explain more about the GoFundMe, how it will be utilized, and the accountability for it’s utilization WHEN I get it started. I guess this is the introduction…dun, dun, dun… scarinessssss.

Sigh. I mean, call me idealistic if you like, (because I certainly do on a daily basis, as well as narcissistic, and selfish, and inadequate, and then analyze my motives like the craziest conspiracy theorist there is! I mean I have honestly asked doctors to diagnose me with something just so I can have an answer to the issue of REALITY)! So I live to be a sacrifice, a living sacrifice, as Jesus has called us to be (Romans 12). I am a captive who has been set free, and all I want to do with my life is serve the One who set me free… so here I will tell of my story and let it neutralize the experience of LIFE that we all have but which we are so terrified to speak. I will speak…

Recently my friend pointed to the A necklace I wear around my neck. “What does that stand for?” she asked.

“This A is my strength. This A stands for a lot, for the losses in life, for the mistakes and the griefs, for some incredibly specific souls and circumstances, altars, that have FORMED my very existence and relationship with Jesus.” I answered, or well… I tried to tell her some version of that, in a non dramatic way.

“Oh,” she responds. “Kinda looks like a mega-phone since it hangs sideways; figured it was, since you’re a cheerleader and all,”

and her words….they stopped me dead in my tracks.

I am a cheerleader. THAT’S RIGHT. I always have been, ever since I was a kid, for Martinez-Evans, with Ms. Patti as my coach! And ever since I made the signs and hung them around my house one Christmas to encourage my parents to remember the reason for the season and worship Jesus… and ever since I heard the lover of my soul call me out, to follow Him, and to leave my people, and to be willing to suffer and be treated how Jesus was treated, Jesus….who John chapter 1 tells us was rejected not only by the people that He created, but by His very CREATION- Can you  imagine that? Jesus submitted to this BROKEN WORLD even though HE HAD CREATED IT TO BE PERFECT. God submitted in Jesus Christ to the broken, devastating, losses in this world. (John 11 as well as every Crucifixion account for a start).

BUT the most amazing part about ME being a cheerleader is …. I can’t tumble. Nope. Not at all, minus a heck-of-a-good cartwheel and/or round-off, even for almost 39-years-old. And, most of the kids told me that whenever I ‘’cheered,’’ it sounded like I was singing. OOoops. I mean, I tried my BEST just to SCREAM. Trust me. I LIKE to scream. Ask my husband. But somehow, my cheering came out melodically. AND I WAS TERRIFIED of falling on my face and dying, which also meant, I wouldn’t “fly” for the stunts. And I was really small (like a good flier), so I couldn’t be a base, so I had to literally just SUPPORT- be the spot…and CHEER/apparently sing very loudly while some people laughed at me.

So even though my parents forked out plenty in lessons, I never mastered the back handspring that most of my other girlfriends were BRAVE ENOUGH TO TEACH THEMSELVES! And I never soared through the air like some of the other brave ladies I know who let us throw them all over the place. Those sweet girls. They have to be my friend still. I saved their freaking lives by breaking their falls.

BUT how did I make it??? How did I make the squad?? I even skipped cheer camp each year (except for one time) because I had unhealthy attachment and struggled being away from home! YET I made the team most years because the ‘’coaches’’ liked me. Because I was the good girl. I didn’t get in trouble… I followed the rules, and I was kind to them. BUT I DON’T SAY THAT TO BRAG. Because the only reason I was like that was because I COULDN’T BE COOL. I mean, I TRIED to get into trouble. I tried to be cool. I tried to break the rules and have the guys like me and be the most popular and most talented, etc… I did my best, but it never worked out guys. Newflash. I couldn’t cut it. Identity wasn’t going to be found. God wasn’t going to let me peak then…or ever.

So the teachers could count on Megin to be honest. (I literally confessed to having my pager at school one time JUST because SOME OTHER KID’S PAGER WENT OFF IN CLASS….IT WASN’T EVEN MY PAGER, BUT I FELT SO GUILTY AND ASHAMED!!!!! And I had to suffer through detention thinking, “why the crap didn’t I just keep my dang mouth shut?!!” But confession- I couldn’t live a lie. I had to be right with God, come what may, no matter what the world thought).

(And now I have revealed my age….because I had a pager…. In the 90s….and I didn’t deal drugs. 123-623-911).

So what’s the point of all this??? The A- THE MEGAPHONE- the Losses- the CHEERLEADING!!! How do any of THOSE things relate? (because we’re nearing ten minutes of reading here Meginlea…)

God made me a cheerleader, but I cheered out of the cultivated ground of the losses of my heart, because of what I couldn’t be. I cheered despite the ways I wasn’t adept to be a cheerleader. BUT MY LOSSES forged a character that made me attractive to the coaches. Similarly, I’d like to be of use to God in life, but in order to be of any use, I have to be forged. I have to be willing to be in the fire if I want to testify about God’s salvation from it. I can’t serve two Gods. I have to pick one. Myself…or Jesus. The losses in my life will forge the ministry. The comfort God gives me is what will BE the love of Jesus to others. I will be blessed SO THAT I may bless. It is literally the only thing I have ever found that DOES make sense of reality… diagnosis complete.

I remember visiting LHS right before I moved to NYC, in 2007. I talked to my old cheerleading coach. She remembered me. I couldn’t believe it. I hadn’t talked to her since probably… 1999? Yeah, that’s it, when my parent’s divorced, and I stopped trying out for cheerleading. (That’s how you know cheering is a sport. You try out for it. You don’t audition. Duh).

I updated her on my life and where I was headed, and she told me she always knew I would do something important with my life. And then I went to go see my chorus teacher, and we bonded over how much we loved our nieces and nephews. She was proud of me too. And so I was proud of me, because they were. And so I moved on… terrified… but confident, toward the next adventure in a foreign land where some nights I would most certainly cry myself to sleep.

The singing cheerleader. So proud of herself back then… even though she probably appeared humble. I mean, okay, I’ll be gentle. She didn’t REALIZE she was proud of herself. She was going through some crap then too… I mean, actually, a lot of crap… which is why she was so broken and ended up breaking in even more ways than she ever imagined she would… that broken, now humbled, singing cheerleader, well, let’s transition back to calling her ME now. And for me…I realize that I am broken not only in my desires but also in my ability to BE a good person even, or BEEEEE a Christian, to BEEEEE in ministry, TO BEEEEE married, to BEEEEE a mom, to BEEEE a friend, TO BEEEEE anything at all, and then I am humbled and AMAZED at how LARGE God becomes, once I stop looking at myself in admiration OR disgust. Once I TURN MY EYES UPON JESUS, I am amazed, in the presence.  

We were just talking about this last night, Jesse and I with Pastor Ben and his wife. Our understanding of the depth of our sin and sin patterns increases… and subsequently our view of God increases, and it’s all extremely biblical. John the Baptist said it in John 2. “He must increase, and I must decrease.” God, decrease me in my own heart, and increase yourself. Decrease me in the heart of my husband and those around me, and increase Yourself. Be seen so much so that all any of us feel or live or move or do or desire IS YOU. In YOU we live and move and have our being. IN YOU. Amen. So be it. My Lord, and My God.