When I was a youth pastor, our pastor challenged us to write our “Life’s Mission statement.” Small task, right?! As a person who is particularly passionate about many things, this was a very challenging assignment for me. I came up with words and images and ultimately landed on a statement.
But after a few years, I realized how limited the statement I crafted was. It was very much a reflection of my stage in life and ministry and was not nearly big enough to last a lifetime.
You see, leaving ministry and moving to Georgia was the scariest and hardest thing I had ever done. I was leaving a place I loved during a time of a ton of pain and brokenness to move to a place where I felt like a total outsider without the amazing community of friends I had so intentionally built for the past 8 years. I had no idea how broken I was; how many bad habits I had assimilated for the purpose of self-preservation, and how much healing I required.
About four years ago, when I “left ministry” after 10 years to stay home with my kids I was really excited to see how my ministry and mission would unfold without a job description telling me who I was supposed to be and what I was supposed to do. Very early on God gave me this phrase that has stuck with me, become more colorful, and grown more robust every day since:
FREED TO SOAR
It was in the years of healing that followed that I realized just how much of my life I was living in bondage. I saw places of unforgiveness. I was able to identify endless lies I had been believing and see so many patterns in my life that were preventing me from having any kind of satisfying relationship with Jesus and any kind of meaningful impact on others. I realized I was in shackles.
And as I began to form new relationships in my new world, I realized I was not alone. There were lots of us out there, unknowingly walking around with chains on.
So, when I thought about what I desired most for myself and for those I had come to love around me, God gave me this phrase and this image. Freed to Soar! In John 8:31-32, Jesus said:
“…’If you hold to my teachings, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.’”
St. Irenaeus is often quoted as saying,
“The glory of God is man fully alive.”
Being set free; fully alive. Who doesn’t want this? Jesus wanted it—that’s why he gave us His Truth. God the Father wanted it—that’s why it is seen as His glory.
Freed to Soar—freed to live “fully alive” lives. This is what I wanted. I wanted it for me. I wanted it for my closest friend. I wanted it for everyone. I realized that the shackles I had been unknowingly wearing all those years were preventing me from living with joy. And they were preventing me from being the kind of witness that would attract people to Jesus, the most attractive person who ever walked this earth.
After my first year of college I spent a month volunteering at a Young Life Camp in Upstate New York. Every Sunday a new group of campers would arrive and everyone who worked there would basically put on a show of all the camp had to offer. My job was by far the best. I got to show them about parasailing. Every Sunday, they would send me up with a huge parachute and I would fly behind that boat all over the lake for hours. Sometimes I would sing, sometimes I would pray, sometimes I would just close my eyes and feel the wind in my lungs. In my thirty-nine years of life I cannot think of a time or place where I have felt so fully alive. I was soaring and I felt totally and completely free!
This is what I believe God desires for us to experience in this world—joy, freedom, being fully alive.
In that moment, the freedom came by means of a strong metal wire attaching me securely to earth, but giving me the ability to fly. In our lives I believe that same freedom is possible. But it doesn’t come from a metal wire, but from intentionally identifying the ways that we are held captive to fear, shame, despair, resentment and lies in order to find freedom through the truth God has for us in His Word.
When we are freed from those things, we will have the ability to soar, not only to enjoy this life ourselves, but to most effectively live into the unique purposes God has for each one of us.
So that is the heart of who I am and who I seek to be in this world. And that is the heart of this blog and this Freed to Soar ministry. My prayer is that as you join me on this journey, you would feel your metal wire inch out over the open waters, that you would begin to feel the wind in your hair, and that your joy would grow as you find yourself becoming more and more freed to soar!
Dana