An interview with Lisa Eversgerd

Author: John Lucas Kovasckitz with Lisa Eversgerd

In the summer of 2015, my wife and I quit our jobs and traveled west for four months. We were newlyweds and the world was ours. We spent time in some of the most incredible cities in America: Chicago, Seattle, Portland, San Fransisco, San Diego...and we visited a dozen national parks. We hiked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon and back in one night, and we backpacked in the Tetons. We hiked Angel’s Landing and waded through the Narrows in Zion, we camped on the coast in Olympic, we hiked our first 14er in Colorado, we took in the vastness of Yosemite, and we walked among the Redwoods.

But almost surprisingly upon our return, when people would ask what our favorite spot was on the trip, my answer was Chesaw, Washington. Chesaw is a no-stoplight town near the border of Canada, holding a rodeo area used only for the Fourth of July, a mercantile, a gas station, and a small bar and restaurant. Chesaw also holds some of the most gracious and kind people I’ve ever met - including now my friend and one of my true heroes of life: Lisa Eversgerd.

Lisa is an endurance athlete, a garlic farmer, a homesteader and builder, a soap-maker, a beekeeper, a dreamer and a tireless worker, and a patient teacher with a generous laugh. Lisa also weaves pine needle baskets, sharpens crosscut saws, and is a vegan but doesn’t talk about it much.

In other words, Lisa is one of the rarest breeds of humanity: a humble badass.

Lisa and her husband Jason are homesteaders on twenty acres - where every structure, fence, and row of crops is the direct result of the labor of their hands. Their property contains a beautiful and simple straw bale home (heated by a woodstove in winter, and due to the thickness of the straw is cooled effectively merely by fans in the heat of summer), a sauna, a small guest house where we stayed, a drying cellar, sheds, lovingly maintained gardens and rows of garlic (their cash crop), and since our stay they have added a large greenhouse.

We connected with Lisa and Jason through the WWOOFing database (Worldwide Opportunities on Organic Farms), and stayed for three weeks on their farm. Our time was spent primarily with Lisa, as Jason works for the Forest Service as a Wildland Fighter and the fires were especially bad that year. In the mornings, Danielle and I would wander the grounds picking strawberries and raspberries for breakfast, and then do a few tasks - mounding potatoes, building rudimentary cabinets that closely resembled coffins, harvesting, planting, weeding, and generally following Lisa around to learn whatever we could - before she would tell us we’d worked too much and chase us off (although she seemed to never stop, from dawn to dusk). We would go to the lake, read books or play music, throw sticks for their pup Lucy, or wander to the neighbors’ houses to hear stories. Lisa and Jason’s farm borders communal hippy land - the remaining families from decades past are incredible and warm people, and have built their own pieces of paradise in the foothills.

Danielle and I arrived in time for garlic harvesting, and several evenings after the sun went down (as bright sunlight can burn garlic), we would dig up garlic with Lisa, row after row - occasionally sharing stories but mainly silent, united in our common work.

The guest house where we stayed had an outdoor composting toilet (essentially a bucket with a seat), and I loved the simplicity of it all. I loved showering under the stars at night, and I loved the need to do so - I loved the black soil, alive, underneath my fingernails.

We learned a lot on that farm from Lisa, and it is an experience that I will never forget. It is people like Lisa that give me hope for our culture, for our planet. It is an honor to share some of her story and insights in the interview below, and my hope is that it will add a spark to us all.

Can you give a basic timeline of your life?

Lisa: I grew up in a small town in the mid-west with three beautiful sisters and two very supportive, loving parents.  Life was sheltered in this small town, but I began to break away and find myself at an amazing summer camp tucked away in the middle of the Shawnee National Forest. I returned to this camp for 10 summers, and this is where I developed my deep love of nature, learned the joy of hard, dirty, work and found a family in all of the friends I made there.

After earning my degree in Outdoor Recreation, I started working for the Forest Service on a Trail Crew and again found incredible joy in the hard, physical, work and in the magic I found in the forests and mountains of the west. I spent 16 incredible seasons working on Trail Crews in Alaska, Arizona, Montana and Washington. I went out with a crew for nine days at a time…camping, clearing trails of downed logs with a two-man crosscut saw, and building bridges across swift rivers. This experience - spending 18 days a month living and working in Wilderness areas - solidified my connection with mother nature. The forest, the mountains, and the rivers became my home. The rugged terrain and often adverse weather conditions humbled me, the hours around a campfire in the dark morning hours grounded me, the endless hours of hiking with a heavy backpack and tools made me tough, and the glorious scenery enlivened me.  

The Trail Crew work usually ended by November, and I would then load up my backpack for adventures of a different kind. I would travel to other countries and continue exploring this beautiful planet and the incredible people that inhabit it. I would often spend time WWOOFing on farms, enjoying the connection with families, learning about organic farming, and exploring the countryside. I met kind, generous, inspiring people everywhere I traveled. Traveling is where I first discovered the joy of living in my moments - taking each day as it comes and enjoying every moment - no matter what the situation…finding peace in uncomfortable situations, discovering beauty in simple things and appreciating all of the little things that often go unnoticed.  I found incredible peace and joy in learning to fully live in the moment, and I carry this life lesson into all of my days.

Sometime between Alaska and Montana, I left the US to serve as a Peace Corp Volunteer in Mali, West Africa. This experience was so many things...living alone in a rural African village, communicating solely in a local tribal language, encountering extreme poverty, extreme sickness, extreme malnutrition and starvation, trying to find a way to help my new community...it was exciting, tragic, humbling, and overwhelming at times. But of all the things I remember about my time in Mali, it is the spirit of the Malians that I remember the most.  The people who lived there were beyond kind, generous, and happy. They had very few possessions, but they would sing and dance and celebrate the life they had at every opportunity. They were quick to laugh, help out a neighbor, or to share what little food they had - they taught me so much.

After the Peace Corps, while living and working in Montana, I met my wonderful husband Jason. We relocated to a 20 acre piece of land in rural Washington close to the Canadian border, and began building our life together. We’ve been here for nine years now, and our love for each other, for the land, and for our community here continues to grow every day.

Do you have any spiritual practices or principles?

Lisa: I believe in the power of being in nature and being grateful for every moment of my life. I believe in simple living, nourishing my body and soul with organic and healthy food, helping out neighbors and those less fortunate, and never, ever, forgetting how lucky I am to be alive and healthy. I believe in being kind, generous, patient, and open-minded and accepting of all people - regardless of their race, sex, political and religious beliefs. I believe in finding the good in everyone and every situation I encounter in life. I believe in hard work, living without greed, celebrating life every day, living in the moment, and loving with all of my heart.

What has ultra-running and other long distance feats of endurance taught you?

Lisa: My long distance adventures have taught me many things. I have learned, and am continually reminded, that any feat is 90% mental - you can do anything that you set your mind to doing. Your mind is what normally determines your success. I have learned that you can keep going, even when you think you are exhausted…the 2nd, 3rd…10th wind always comes and gives you energy to continue. You just have to be patient, have confidence, and wait for it. I have learned that there are places in our minds that can only be accessed by certain activities - meditation and ultra distance adventures, to name a few. It is like a secret key to parts of your brain otherwise unavailable - where you discover peace, heighten senses, and a general feeling of calm and focus. Long distance adventures also humble me; exposure to the elements, rugged terrain, lack of water sources and other challenges that arise on these type of adventures make me realize how small I am in the world, how insignificant my “problems” may be, how the world and life is so much bigger than all of the petty stuff we humans stress about. I learn to appreciate the small things: a few moments of luxurious sleep on the side of the trail, cool mountain water when your thirst is huge and warm sunshine when you have been so cold. These adventures also reinforce my desire to live in the moment...to simply enjoy the journey, and to not focus on how many miles are left or how much elevation gain there will be today - I just enjoy the ride. All of these lessons I take back to my daily life.

My hope is that in this generation there is an uprising of people going back to the land in an array of capacities, and I also feel that there is at times an over-glorification - or a glossing over - of the true work involved. Having taken an ‘empty’ piece of land and created it into what it is now, what advice would you have for aspiring small farmers or homesteaders?

Lisa: I would highly encourage anyone who desires a back-to-the-land life. We have the ability to create our own reality in this big, beautiful world. Living a simple, self-sufficient, happy life - growing food, tending animals, and working the land can be amazing. This dream requires lots and lots of hard work, planning, knowledge, money, and determination. The amount of financial support needed to build a homestead should not be underestimated - building anything is very expensive. People often think if they are doing the work themselves, that it will not cost much. You will certainly save money by providing the labor, but everything else will cost you more money than you imagine. Drilling a well can cost $10,000-$20,000, getting power (conventional or solar) can cost another $10,000-$20,000, concrete for a foundation can cost $3,000, roofing material can cost $5,000 - it is all expensive. In addition, the amount of work needed to create a homestead is also beyond what most people can imagine.

Building anything is slow, and there are a million important steps to consider. Search out multiple people and books for information, get experience building small structures and growing spaces, learn from others, and never, ever, cut corners. Skipping a step, or not researching a step fully, can cause nightmares in the future.  Do it right the first time - always! Listen when people give you tips - people will tell you what has worked or not worked for them - you can learn so much from other people’s mistakes. Get to know the people at your local building or gardening supply and ask lots of questions - these people can be a wealth of knowledge. Break the work up into steps with tangible goals; sometimes looking at the big picture of all you have left to do can be overwhelming and seem impossible to complete. Take it step by step, one task at a time, and reward yourself. It is also important to remember during the tough times...when you are working a million hours a week, exhausted, frustrated and overwhelmed, that you are doing it - you are creating your homestead. Celebrate your accomplishments…you are living your dream!

One of the main impressions I have of you is that of a tireless worker, but one who finds rest and joy in the process and labor. If this holds true for you, how have you come to this place, and what makes you want to get out of bed in the morning the next day to do it again?

Lisa: I do find joy and peace in working hard towards a goal - simply being in my moments. I love growing organic food, creating a home, building a dream and establishing a way to make a living from my rural, peaceful, homestead. I feel incredibly fortunate to be working on my dream. Even when tirelessly working on a project or task, I feel so blessed to be on my land and free to live my life as I choose. Each morning I rise, I thank my lucky stars for everything I have...my health, my beautiful family, my loving husband, my freedom, my land, healthy food, and my mind.

I am, however, trying to slow down the “work” aspect of my life and find more time for fun - adventures in the mountains, and time with friends and family. I have worked hard my entire life, and I am looking to slow down a bit and add a little balance to my life...to reward myself for all we’ve created and simply enjoy it.

We didn’t get to spend much time with Jason, but my main impression of him is: “man, there’s a guy who loves his wife.” How has working, dreaming, and creating with your partner in such a tangible way strengthened your relationship?

Lisa: It has been lovely - truly wonderful - building a life together. Every day we are grateful that we found each other in this big ol’ crazy world. Building a homestead and farm of course has its challenges and stressful moments, but through communication, hard work, love, and understanding anything can be accomplished.  We try and keep it all in perspective if a situation becomes stressful…in the big picture of the world, with war, disease, poverty, starvation…we are living the dream life. We celebrate our successes and learn from our failures. We support each other, nourish each other’s passions, and are the rock in each other’s lives.  Together we have learned that we can do anything; we can create our own reality - there is such peace and comfort knowing that you will always have your partner by your side and that anything is possible in this life.  We have worked through so much together, and this provides us the confidence that we will work through anything that happens in our future lives…with love and kindness.

For more information on Lisa and Jason’s farm, or to order handmade soap (it’s incredible), garlic powder, or a pine needle basket, visit lostcreekorganics.com

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Why we're moving into a van

Author: John Lucas Kovasckitz

In two days, we’re leaving behind our dream kitchen. It’s full of natural light in the mornings, and usually smells of my wife’s coffee. The windows above the sink overlook a wooded area sloping sharply to a creek, and today melting snow lingers on the limbs outside. There are creaky hardwoods underfoot, with deep scratches - probably long ago from a beloved dog - and burn marks showing an outline of where a wood stove used to reside. Its cupboards and countertops are now bare, but cookbooks and handmade mugs were arranged just so on the shelves, with a red KitchenAid mixer on the counter. The kitchen drawers are the ones that you can’t slam shut - push them too hard and they glide into place. On the ceiling are a few yellowed spots from when the roof leaked on our first night in the house.

There’s a full basement below, and a loft above. In the adjoining living room is our rattly propane heater, next to which sat our record player. Bedroom to the left, bathroom to the right, and ahead is the guest room where we kept our large collection of books. Rocking chair and swing on the front porch, hot tub on the deck. From the front porch is a view of some of the surrounding ridges, and when the leaves are full the yard feels hidden from the rest of the world.

Simply put, we were renting a palace.

Danielle and I fell in love with this house a little over a year ago, and we’ve made it our home since. But somewhere in the hot tub, or on the way to the wine cellar (not really, but we do have a wine rack in the mud room…) we started dreaming about what it would be like to live in a van.

I think it was initially my wife’s idea. And that’s one of the great things about her: she’s up for trying crazy things. Because it is crazy. We realize that.

We began following a lot of Instagram accounts of people building out vans, and watched a lot of YouTube videos. We’re not trailblazers (sure, there were the original hippies), but there has been a recent upsurge of people - climbers, surfers, overall adventurers and lovers of travel - that have created a growing community of Vanlifers.

Although our building experience together collectively amounted to nil, Danielle was ambitious enough to believe that we could create our own home in a van, and she was convincing enough to persuade me.

We searched religiously for vans, and inevitably the ones we wanted were snatched away (or turned out to be Craigslist scams), but we managed to testdrive a few in the process. We looked at an older Ford in Waxhaw - not quite up to par, but owned by a friendly man who gave us glasses of sweet tea and eggs from his chickens as we left.

We tested an enormous Mercedes Sprinter - essentially a bus, that through a miracle I didn’t use to kill several people. The lot where it was parked was on a slope, and after putting it in drive I pushed the brakes to the floor (or so I thought), and yet still we were rolling faster and faster towards the road and traffic. It was fast-motion and slow-motion at the same time, and I remember yelling, “It’s not stopping! It’s not stopping!” Cars were coming quickly from both directions, and I rolled in front of one car that was able to stop, and hesitated on the gas before a car (that I didn’t see at all) sped past in the opposite direction. If I wouldn’t have hesitated on the gas, someone probably would have been killed...my wife, brother-in-law, mother-in-law, and the owner were also in the van - as well as the other drivers on the road. We pulled over, and I realized that my shoe had been caught on a lip a couple of inches before the brakes would have been fully floored. I was mortified, sweating bullets, and was fairly shaken up for days replaying it in my mind.

The Mercedes was rusty and had several warning lights engaged, but needless to say, we didn’t buy it. Danielle and I became discouraged with the search, and I vowed to stop looking for a certain amount of time for the sake of both our sanities. After about a week, I cheated and found Wadlow.

Wadlow is a 2008 Ford E250 with a high roof, which - at full height standing within - my head barely grazes the ceiling and Danielle is fine and dandy. Wadlow is tall, white, and a little dorky but loveable - aptly named after the late Robert Wadlow, who stood at 8’11”. He was “The Giant of Illinois”, and the tallest man who ever lived.

Our Wadlow came complete with berber carpet and ugly blinds, so we took it camping the first week. It was fairly functional as it was - before we ripped, unscrewed, and overall demolished the interior and threw its contents onto our driveway.

Sweet Lord, have mercy on us. We don’t know what we're doing.

Thank God for Josh, Danielle’s younger brother. He’s nineteen, and yet somehow has watched enough how-to videos to know how to do an array of handy things with confidence that we certainly don’t have. He was our general contractor; he wandered the aisles of Lowe’s Hardware with us (where inevitably I would become overwhelmed, and Danielle and I would get into a fight), he took our calls when we were in over our heads more than usual, and we bribed him with food to come guide and assist for long days on several occasions.

We certainly couldn’t have done it without Josh, but I’m incredibly proud of my wife and I (cue sequence music). We learned how to use power tools together, we laid floors together, we dreamed together. We sanded, stained, drilled, cut, painted, and we measured twice and cut once (although sometimes we still measured wrong). Building out a van is incredibly difficult. Hardly anything is square - the walls curve, the roof slopes, there are weird tubes and wires to factor, you generally can't drill where you'd like, and sometimes even nineteen-year-old wonderboy doesn’t have the answers.

But looking back and seeing Wadlow now, we kicked ass. Right out of town.

But all of this still certainly begs the foundational question: why? Why give up the palace for the chariot? The palace has ample electricity, a fridge and oven, a comfortable (large) bed, space for family and friends and all of our books and records and instruments and our red KitchenAid and our Christmas tree and our TV, and not to mention running water...leading to things we will unfortunately notably not have in the van - a toilet and shower...

The simple answer is this: because we want to live differently.

Danielle and I work half the month - week on, week off, fully immersed care - at a cottage (which, you will be happy to know, has toilets and showers) living with children within the foster care system. Collectively, Danielle and I pull an entry-middle-class salary, which around $1,000 per month was directed towards the rent and utilities for our house, where at most we were spending half the month. We love to travel, to meet new people and to explore new places, but our living situation made us far less likely to do so with our expensive rental house sitting empty.

Living in a van will cause us to buy less stuff, and to greater value experience and time together. Two plates, two bowls, two spoons…

We’ve been purging heavily over the last few months in preparation for move-out day - which the headache and process of subleasing our house is a novel in itself. We’ve given away many of our possessions and stored the rest that have made the cut, and it’s caused us to ask ourselves what we actually need to be happy. We’re planning on downsizing to one cell phone to share (without a data plan), and my beloved Subaru that I bought when I was eighteen will soon go up for sale.

We bought Wadlow in cash for $13,500, and have put about $2,000 in additions. It has 76k on the odometer, and around $15k for (hopefully) a reliable car and home in one isn’t too bad. No rental payments, no car payments, no debt.

For our time in the van, we want to live simply. We want to read good books and to write. We want to volunteer on small farms in the area when we aren’t working, and to visit with friends and family. We want to hike and camp in new places. It won’t be easy, we know this...we’ll be two people living in 65 square feet. We’ll fight sometimes. We’ll smell bad at times, and probably have a close call or two looking for a bathroom. We’ll measure twice, cut once, and still get it wrong in a lot of areas.

But I think that one day looking back, we’ll say that we kicked ass. Right out of town.

We’re excited to take our home with us on the road, and to see where it leads. I think the real answer to the question of why we’re doing this in the first place is simply this: we have no idea. We have no idea where we’re headed or why, but the unknown is calling and we are answering as practically as we know how.

Follow the unknown and see where it leads. Give up the palace for the chariot in your own way, and you may find that your comfort was a cheap sacrifice for the adventure and beauty ahead. We’ll see you on the road.

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Songwriting

Author: John Lucas Kovasckitz

I don’t claim to be the best musician, and I certainly don’t claim to be a great performer (although it is an area in which I want to grow and improve, I currently view performing - with exceptions - as primarily a necessary evil...signed, a classic introvert).

However, I believe in my abilities as a songwriter.

I’ve been seriously writing songs for about twelve years, and I’ve been writing (what I consider to be) good songs for about seven years. Notice a lengthy period of songs falling in categories such as being “good for an adolescent”, or “good enough for a church youth group”, etc. before becoming what I consider to be simply good with no reservations.

I was not a child prodigy, despite what my mother thought. I remember as a kid writing a rap about Jonah (the guy from the Bible who was swallowed by a fish), and I believed at the time it was great stuff. It was not. Somewhere on an old home video tape (hopefully destroyed by now, but labeled “Rock Star Luke”) is me playing my hit song, “I’m Just Dancing Around for No Particular Reason” - the title is essentially the entirety of the lyrics.

My parents bought my brother and I a guitar when I was ten (followed later by a keyboard and drums - yes, my parents are truly saints). I took three guitar lessons before quitting...scales were hard and my fingers hurt. I later picked it back up on my own, fell in love with music, and I have learned without formal instruction since. I slowly started getting better and writing seriously, and eventually began recording my on a very used Macbook.

I released four EPs for free through Noisetrade over the years, each progressively getting better and receiving more attention, until I reached the pinnacle of my engineering capabilities and hired Everett Hardin - with funds raised via Kickstarter - to produce and engineer my first full-length album, Promised Land in 2015...an album of what I believe to be twelve good songs. Shameless plug: its 7-song sequel, A Thousand Cathedrals, is coming soon. 

I relay this history to show a bit of the journey, and to show that there is a journey. Good art takes time, and I think that above all it takes perseverance. Your fingers will hurt and you will want to quit. You will write dozens of crappy songs before you write any good ones. You will record something that you finally like, and no one will download it...even when you give it away for free.

Do it anyway. In my experience, this is all part of the process.

I consider myself to be a successful songwriter. However, I am not - at least currently - a financially successful songwriter. And yes, there is a difference. My wife and I have full-time jobs outside of music, and I’m happy if the money I make from what I create pays for recording costs and occasionally a new instrument.

I don’t make music for the money, and if I did I would have quit a long time ago. I make music because it is a part of who I am. I make music to express myself in ways that I would otherwise be unable, as a way to know the Creator through creating, and to connect with others on a deep level. I get messages all over the world from people who relay that my music has helped them through deaths or divorces, from people who have proposed with one of my songs or used one as their first dance at their wedding...or from people that have seen God more clearly through what I write. To me, these stories are greater than financial success.

Although, to be clear, I like getting paid.

I also get a fair amount of requests from people asking about my songwriting process, or if I have any advice or suggestions for aspiring songwriters. Let’s move into some of the practicals...and if you’re not a songwriter but have made it this far, stay with me. Many of these bullets are applicable to any art form, or most things worth doing for that matter.

• Again, persevere. If you feel that there are songs inside your bones, there will probably be a long journey to find them. Practice your instrument often, so that when the words do come, you won’t be distracted by a poor foundation.

• Have easy access to your instrument(s). If you keep your guitar in a case tucked away in a closet, it will not be played. Keep your guitar in a stand, or hang it on a wall where you will see it often. Even something as simple as leaving the keys exposed instead of covered on an upright piano will make you more likely to play.

• Have a place (or several) where you can go to be alone. I am usually unable to get in “the zone” to write when other people are around - even my wife. I like to play outdoors when the weather is nice, or near a window if it is cold or wet outside. If you live in a more crowded environment, you may find that you need to write later in the night or early in the morning. Find a time and place where you can sing and try out lyrics without being heard by others. I usually play and sing random words and phrases, looking for a thread. A thread is a lyrical phrase, a melody, an image...even a single word that you know is special somehow. I realize that there is something mystical about this. When I’m creating music is often when I most clearly feel the presence of the Spirit (whom I believe to be inside of us all)...and songwriting, when I have experienced it at its very best, I would almost describe as a conversation with that Spirit.

Threads do not have to come while you are in a position of writing. While hiking in Washington state, the line “I have the dust on my boots of a thousand cathedrals” came into my mind. It stayed there without further progression for a couple of months before forming into a complete song, later to become the title track of my upcoming EP.

• Once you find a thread, write it down quickly - otherwise you will forget. If it is a phrase with a particular melody, make a quick recording. One of my favorite things about my iPhone is the voice notes app. Keep a notebook or a voice notes folder with threads that you can come back and explore later. Sometimes I am able to hold a finished song in an hour, and sometimes I wrestle with a certain song for months. Don’t get frustrated with the process - if a song is bucking you off of its back, come back to it later. You may need to learn or experience something in your own life before the thread is able to be followed further.

• Many people are stuck with what to write about. Write about what matters; write about what moves you. If a song does not first speak deeply to you, it will not move others, and it will not have authenticity. Do not write what you think other people want to hear. Write from your perspective, write from the perspective of someone you love, write from the perspective of your enemy...have the audacity to write from the perspective of God (I have personally done all of these). Read books that matter, watch films that move you. Serve others, love others. Let your life feed your art and let your art feed your life.

• When you have a finished song, have the bravery to share it with someone else - usually my wife is my first set of ears. A smoky bar on open mic night is not my recommended place for a debut. Show your music first to someone that you love and trust, and move outwards as you continue to write and grow.

Bear in mind that this is all blanket advice from my own experiences, and is in no way a set formula. I’d love to hear your own thoughts, questions, and experiences. I believe that art created with boldness and honesty has the power to change destructive cultural and societal directions, and can bring unity across our constructed borders.

Be brave my friends, and let’s write a new song together.

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The Pursuit of Bravery: This is my religion

Author: John Lucas Kovasckitz

The pursuit of bravery is the pursuit of love, for love is the purpose; love is the beginning. In the beginning there was love, but love has no beginning for love always was. Love caused the stars to be formed, and love caused man to rise from their dust.

I believe that love, the beginning before the beginning (what always was), the great Mystery or Spirit which can be experienced but not explained, are ways to describe God - among countless others. I believe that God is alive...that the fabric of God is within us and that we are within the fabric of God.

From a young age, I was given the language of Christianity to describe and to encounter God. I still speak in this language, for it is my mother-tongue, and I now believe that this is perhaps the best way to describe Christianity or any other religion: as a language by which humanity attempts to speak to each other about God, and as a means to know God.

Languages are imperfect means of communication, limited by the use of words we have created. In fact, much more is communicated without or beyond words. All religions are imperfect means to know God - a God I believe to desire to speak to us all in a language that we can understand. I believe that what, and how, we communicate (read here: how a religion or faith is acted upon, and how it works within) is more important than the language in which the words are contained. From the pen of the Apostle Paul: “If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn't love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.” (1 Cor. 13:1)

I prayed the simple prayer of salvation when I was seven, and I was baptized weeping as a teenager...I meant it. As a child I read the Beginner’s Bible with colorful pictures several times through before I graduated to the one with no pictures and the passages that are often dark and confusing. It too I read cover to cover. The church is where I learned to sing; I played on music teams and led worship services every Sunday for years, and as a teenager I would often lead on Sunday mornings and then again that Sunday night for my peers in youth group. Friday night worship gatherings, Wednesday night Bible studies. All of this to say, I was deep within the culture and I took my faith seriously. I spoke the language and I spoke it well.

But as I approached my college years, I found that I could not wait to go out on my own, away from the church that held much of my identity. This was not because I believed my church to be evil (I have only the highest respect for the community in which I was raised, and the integrity of the people within), or that I myself wanted to go through a “wild and sinful” stage to perhaps experiment with drugs and sex, but rather I had a growing dissatisfaction with, and aversion to, much of the doctrine and underlying messages of the Christianity with which I was presented.

I wouldn’t have had the words for it then, but I wanted to meet God on my own terms, away from the avenues in which I was raised, and to find my own story. What followed were years of deconstruction to the bare bones of what I believed, and the subsequent reconstruction of my faith. This reconstruction is not over, and I hope that I never consider myself to have arrived at ultimate spiritual truth, refusing to grow deeper or to continue to seek God in more fullness. I have much to learn, and I still have many questions...yet I believe my language and life to be richer on the other side.

Much of my spiritual dissatisfaction grew primarily from exclusionism; I feel that within the culture of Christianity, there is either blatantly professed spirit of exclusion, or a mentality found beneath the surface. We hold the one truth; us against the world, either sinner or a saint, saved by the blood of a savior who has done all of the work and heavy lifting for us.

For years I wrestled with the concept of a loving God that would create the earth and humanity full of beauty and innocence, but open to be wrecked...for the earth to become for so many a place of literal hell through wars, genocide, extreme poverty, and other unbearable injustices. And then, at the end of it all, if we did not accept loving and forgiving Jesus as our savior - through a simple prayer, and within the murkiness of human consciousness - we would not merely perish, but we would burn forever within the torments of an eternal hell. The privileged who had accepted Christ would receive salvation and live forever within heaven, a place of peace and fullness - communion with God.

I found that I could no longer believe in this narrative of God.

Richard Rohr writes, “Any discovery or recovery of our divine union has been called ‘heaven’ by most traditions. Its loss has been called ‘hell’. The tragic result of our amnesia is that we cannot imagine that these terms are first of all referring to present experiences. When you do not know who you are, you push all enlightenment off into a possible future reward and punishment system, within which hardly anyone wins. Only the True Self knows that heaven is now and that its loss is hell - now … Heaven is the state of union both here and later.” He further concludes, “If your notion of heaven is based on exclusion of anybody else, then it is by definition not heaven. The more you exclude, the more hellish and lonely your existence always is.”

When hell is solely something to come, we ignore the deep injustice happening all around us. When heaven is solely something to come, we ignore the present existence of God.

I still believe in some form of afterlife or reunion after bodily death, void of the suffering and darkness evident today. But I believe that the kingdom of heaven is to be found - and brought about - here, and now...amidst all of our beauty and wreckage.

I believe that we are eternal beings, and that in some form heaven or hell can be eventually fully entered by our own choosing (for love requires a choice); we can either live from the True nature in which we have been created, or we can choose to live fully from the ego - which ultimately tells us that we are god. The ego is not necessarily primarily evil, but has evil capabilities - unlike our True selves. The journey of shedding our false self, or ego, and realizing and reconnecting with our True self (that which is already one with God) I believe to be the way of “salvation”.

I have personally found the life of Jesus to be the ultimate example to humanity of transcending the ego, and further, that what Jesus represents transcends Christianity. I believe God to be bigger than our religions and the names we have ascribed to God, which divide the “believer” and the “infidel”.

I believe that the truth of God can be found in the pages of scripture, that its writers were inspired by God and intimately knew Him, but that the Bible is a part of humanity’s journey to discover and to know God, and not an overarching guidebook to be taken out of cultural and historical context. I believe that the character, heart, and desires of a living and infinite God can not, and should not, be limited to what we read in the Bible or any other text.

I believe that God is love, and that love is the most universal and fundamental language of all. I believe that God is within us all, regardless of our actions or beliefs.

Many people within the Christian community, many whom I respect deeply, would say that my convictions are at best a watering down of the Gospel, and at worst dangerous assertions. I would submit personally that I have found the true watering down of the Gospel to be a faith that costs nothing.

For if our faith costs nothing, it is worth nothing.

This is not to say that we are “saved” by our outward actions, but if my faith does not change the way that I live and love others, if it does not aid in my treatment of the land and my abhorrence to my own selfishness and greed, if it does not bring forth greater yields of the fruits of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, goodness, and self-control, then my faith is worthless. My prayers are empty and self-centered, my heaven is empty and self-centered.

My words are not an attempt to attack Christianity or the church, and are certainly not meant to separate myself from the foundational teachings of Christ. Rather, my words are an attempt to call forth something greater both personally and collectively.

Jesus did not live a life of comfort or excess. He had little patience for religious dogma. He challenged oppressive authority. He broke down barriers and stereotypes. And he gave up his life for love.

I believe that we’re more alike than we are different. We may not vote the same way politically, hold the same beliefs about God (or even agree on His existence), but we all hold love.  

Love is the master key to it all. Love does not stand for injustice. Love does not count differences, it transcends. Love unites, love heals. Love is not a weakness, but a power beyond measure.

My religion is love. My creed is to love God and to love others, no matter the cost.

In this confusing world, both broken and beautiful, containing the first smiles of newborns, nuclear weapons, sunsets, marriages, divorces, poverty, racial discrimination, sex trafficking, favorite songs, the smell of coffee, the touch of your partner’s hand, murder, species extinction, deforestation, and seeds in good soil, God can be found and made known when we love.

This is my religion.

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