It is upon my life daily.
Some of you ask me, some of you are concerned for me and some of you out and out think I have fallen away from a faith I hold precious and have served for decades. Through this journey with you, whichever group you fall into, I have come to a place of peace. In entering into conversations and a dialogue I have found my voice.
This isn't the conversation I would be wanting to have. I wouldn't want to have to have my yogi friends see your posts, see your questions, see your fear. I don't think it represents the Christ we follow. But I've heard your heart. Now I'd like you to hear mine.
It is upon me to speak about this subject. I walked among you and still do. Jim and I stood in public places of ministry leading in a variety of venues for decades. Yoga hasn't changed my affection for Christ. It has enhanced it and grown it.
I want to share a couple things. First I want to share a resource with you. Why rewrite something? While I can't say I have read through every article upon the site, I have read some. Some I agree thoroughly with and others I would add or take away specific points. But why recreate the wheel completely. Read and think and discern for yourself.
So a resource I have recently found is this website/blog. Christians Practicing Yoga.
One article I have really liked upon the site is an interview with a woman named, Joanne Spence.
Her words and the book titles she mentions are ones I am working my through.
I didn't want to bring a defense to yoga into my Christian community. But we don't always get to choose such things.
I am one who loves Christ deeply. I was brought to faith not through the words of a man or woman but through a direct experience that I can not negate nor do I wish to. I love Christ deeply and have served church and para church organizations for most of my adult life. What I would say to those so struggling with my yoga practice, is that we should be struggling and attempting to sort out in house issues with such diligence and such motivation. The horrors and sorrows I have seen within Christian organizations have brought such harm, and affected the lives of multitudes. It is to those things I wish that you wouldn't turn a blind eye. But you like the preachers you like, and at times could care less about their actual lives as a man or a woman. Affairs go justified. Arrogance goes unseen. Pride and envy and jealousy and greed go through and through while we keep our heads in the sand, buying the books and going to the conferences and feeding gluttonously at the expense you understand not. Those are some of the things I wish you would address with such fervor as how Christians should feel about yoga.
But it is easier to reach out and strike at yoga. It is always easier to look at the poles in others eyes. But I think there's a story about that somewhere in the Gospels that we read.
Secondly, besides giving to you resources and not re creating the wheel, (so appreciative of others who have walked this road. So grateful for those I know and have been recently introduced to and those I have just met via sites like this one listed.) I want to express to you what yoga has meant to me.
You have trusted me for decades to be discerning, as we would call it within our circles; prophetic/revelatory, seer, intuit, empath. I really haven't changed. About a decade and a half ago when I was standing before you teaching you how to drop "Christianese" as a language, teaching you how to speak plainly about spiritual realities, teaching you how to see and touch those that needed love and affection and spirit and truth.. I was no different, teaching you to know and understand your dreams and what they were saying to you and how to interpret the dreams of others and bring understanding and life to friends, co-workers and family
Some of you even told me I was going to hell back then. But to those who could touch and catch the vision of what was happening, we found life together. We explored and we found the places to live a natural way understanding supernatural phenomenon, but carrying it forward into our lives in ways that brought forth life and peace and joy. This journey is no different. It truly is a continuation. A search to touch what it means to live in a body. To know that Christ came in a body. To join understanding and live a holistic life of Body, Soul and Spirit. To be strengthened in my inner woman and find Spirit and life and light there.
Mainly I wanted to say, I started yoga for two reasons and I kept it a private journey until I could feel the push of Holy Spirit to share. To share my yoga journey publicly. I knew it would be a can of worms. I knew not the depth nor the degree. But I have no regrets. The reason for that has a lot to do with my two fold reason for beginning yoga. First, if you have read any of my blogs or have ever heard me speak, there is an awareness of past abuse. I will leave it at that for this posting. I have never touched a modality of healing liken to yoga. Physical movement touching breathe touching being intentionally in the now moment spurred me on and created in me the likeness of which Ezekiel talks about. Dry bones coming to life with the Breath of Spirit reverberating deeply.. I found peace living in my body in ways I never had touched before.
While Yoga is not a religion, it is a method through which Body, Soul, and Spirit find union and I have never .. Hear me.. NEVER existed so thoroughly in my body as I have since starting my yoga practice. This is not deception. This is life in the richest form. I will not stand by and hear my community of faith call good evil and that is partially what you have done.
Secondly and I take this to heart. I lost my person almost a year ago to this date. She loved yoga. She had mats. I never got to ask her what her favorite posture was, although my mom will say she loved the mediation. I can imagine that of her. My mom gave me her mats. I went to yoga, with a mat, never having watched a YouTube Video. I went to yoga, with her mat. I went to yoga in those days because my heart ached and I missed her beyond expression. I went to yoga in those days, oblivious to what would happen within my community of faith. Oblivious to that loss that would come because the loss my heart was enduring was beyond great. So no loss of you could even touch, even the slightest bit the immense loss of that person. I stand in a place as a woman of faith, fully convinced that my God loves my yoga practice and smiles upon me as I stand and breathe and move. I stand in a place as a woman of faith having lost friends, community, and in some cases credibility. But I stand in a place as a woman of faith having stood. I stand in this place as a woman of faith loving yoga and loving Jesus and knowing that I know that I know that I know that it is well with my soul.
I stand at a moment of almost touching the year to the day this magnificent human being ceased to walk the face of the earth. So I get it. I get what you think about me and yoga. I get what you think of yoga. What I am asking of you is that you would read and educate yourself. People perish for lack of understanding and fear creates divides.
I think it is time to cease looking at and for the poles in the eyes of others..... I think it is time for a intelligible discussion not based on fear and lack of knowledge but insightful gathering of truth.
My yoga practice has transformed my life on and off the mat. My faith stands firm. My heart stands strong. My entire being is resolute.
thank you!
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