Remembering who I am with the Cageless Birds
Right now, I’m back from just trying to find a quiet place outside the house where I could write and think through the week in North Carolina. The brewery near my house that Lisa and I like was too crowded, a couple other places were closed, and the rest were too loud. So, my drive around town ended with me swinging by the taco truck we like in Laporte.
My girls are singing along to Elsa having an awakening of identity with a water horse(?) and some old videos of her parents. Fine. I’ll put my headphones in after this song is done. I mean it’s not the worst song I’ve ever heard. Actually, let me sing this part first:
Show yourself Step into your power Throw yourself Into something new...
Ok, where was I? Right, North Carolina.
The first invitation out to A Place for The Heart was from Lisa. She received the same email I did from the Cageless Birds, but she believed this little email invitation was for me and from the Lord. She didn’t know anything further, or really ask Him or me otherwise. She just believed this invitation to spend a few days with a group of men seeking the Lord together was for me. So we set aside the money and believed the Lord for whatever He wanted to bring to me.
I’ll skip over the early morning connecting flights, the sketchy Lyft drive, room assignments, bunk bed navigations with grown men who hadn’t gone to camp in a decade or two or three. Instead I’ll jump right to our first group breakout with Ryan, our group leader, and the five other grown men standing in a dance studio not sure what would happen next.
He wanted my permission, but like a father asks for permission before pulling a splinter out of his kid’s finger.
After everyone gave their introductions, shared what their hopes were for our week together, and offered up some of who we want to be as men. As I am want to do, I got poetic toward the end and shared some of favorite and rehearsed phrases about who I am. Not necessarily to impress anyone, but not to simply fade into the background either.
“I know my girls will have to forgive me for not being Jesus, but I want to make the space between my love and the love of Jesus as small as possible.”
Sounds good, right? Sounds like someone chasing after a good identity as a good father, right?
After I gave my oration, we sat quietly together. Then, one-by-one, Ryan went around the room and shared the prayers he had prayed over us once he knew we were coming. Slowly, oh so slowly, Ryan took his time to share his prayers to each of us. The pace was something we all needed to adjust to.
I thought I was good. I thought I had worked through the deep matters of the heart with the Lord, and I thought that maybe I could be an encourager to the other men. Maybe I could connect with other members of the staff and share with them how we do community life in Fort Collins. This was going to be a great and peaceful week away from the girls. I could walk and pray around the little lake, maybe do some walking through the hills. Instead, Ryan said this Scripture came to mind every time he prayed for me:
You have kept track of all my wander and weeping You have stored my many tears in Your bottle - not one will be lost For they are all recorded in Your book of remembrance The very moment I call to You for a Father's help The tide of the battle turns and my enemies flee This one thing I know: God is on my side –Psalm 56:8-9 The Passion Translation
It was here, 30 minutes after putting my suitcase down, I became aware that the Lord had so much to talk about. This was not going to be a little hiking and good food vacation, Jesus Himself wanted my attention and it was up to me to allow Him to go within me wherever and however He pleased. He wanted my permission, but like a father asks for permission before pulling a splinter out of his kid’s finger.
The greatest temptation is thinking I am strong enough to fight for myself.
One of the first and primary focuses of our retreat together was this journey toward embracing our beloved-ness. In order for me to even give myself the space to go toward this identification beyond a kind of mindful assurance was to first address the core lies that stood between how I viewed myself and how the Lord looks at me. We called it The Honesty Tool.
I hated this.
Not because I didn’t believe it, but because I just did not want to go into this work again.
I’ve spent my time in therapy, I’ve gone to the Father for years with the hopes of finding some solace, and I’ve worked through trauma, all toward a level of peace within myself. I have believed that I was finally at a place of contentment and satisfaction in where I stood in my relationships and my “lot in life.” But as soon as I saw the path before me, I knew that I was very much in need of salvation. Despite the “this again?!” circling around my head, I knew this was the right place to be.
When Jesus went into the wilderness after being baptized by John, The devil came to tempt Him. Not with sin and avarice as we might believe. Instead the devil tempted the Son of God to provide for and fight for Himself. Jesus, being grounded in complete dependance upon the Father, was now hearing a voice that told Him that He was alone and needed to care for Himself. He was to place demands upon rocks and angels to care for Him since He didn’t have a relationship around Him to feed Him and honor Him.
Here Jesus stood before the liar and reminded him and every lie that we have heard ring in our ears that His whole purpose was to empty Himself into the loving embrace of His Father.
The Father pours Himself out in love and blessing and honor into the heart of the son, withholding nothing until He empties Himself in affection. The Son responds to this resounding and blinding love by flinging His heart and will as a holy and all consuming offering of praise and adoration into the heart of the Father until His is consumed.
And from this continual cherishing affection and hopeful glory giving, my Jesus calls me His Beloved. As I am, with or without my permission or understanding, Jesus makes room next to Him just so I might lay my head on His chest.
But before I could accept any tenderness like this, I first needed to become honest with my heart. I needed to allow my heart to be open so I could hear what He had to say about everything I thought had been settled within me.
Underneath every temptation is a healthy need not being met.
As much as I believed that I was in the right and “fighting the good fight of faith,” all my walls and defenses were now possibly not as resilient and long-standing as I had hoped. What if I wasn’t supposed to fight for myself in the first place? What if His tender invitation to His side was actually offering Himself as my protector and shield? But then it became clear, I have lived as though it’s only me on the line, fighting for whatever I believe is rightly due to me and my family. This includes fighting for love from those I think owe me love.
The greatest temptation is thinking I am strong enough to fight for myself.
Believe there’s gas in your tank. It won’t help.
Much of the attention asked of me was toward addressing my true identity in contrast to lies I have believed about myself and my relationships. As much as I could spit out the biblical truths of my place within the family of God as a child of God, ransomed by Jesus’ blood and saved through His resurrection from the dead, my life was and will continue to be shaped not according to my beliefs, but by my actions.
Dallas Willard said, “Our actions reveal our beliefs 100% of the time.” So despite all my intentions and persuasive self talk, how I live is the true expression of what I believe about myself, my relationships, my place in this world, and God Himself. This is why I was asked to face and address the deep-seated lies that have marked me.
The great dilemma here is not in countering each lie with the correct response; being right and knowing the truth are two completely different matters. Dallas Willard, a new voice for me, also said:
“No one has ever yet made a belief true by believing it. Try it. Try making a belief true just by believing it or by having an attitude of some sort towards it. Believe there’s gas in your tank. It won’t help.”
Truth: Can We Do Without It?
Believing the lies that have moved me to action or inaction has yet to have any affect upon the truth of who my Father has made me to be.
Here are some of the lies brought to our attention:
- I am what I do
- I am what others think
- I am what I have
- I am alone
- I am not enough
- I am not important or valuable
- I am not seen
- I am powerless, unlovable, hopeless, disqualified, forgotten, bad, the problem, a disappointment, an embarrassment, alone, replaceable, not special, broken and cannot be fixed.
- God is a bad Father
- God is not enough
- God is punishing me
- God is angry
- God is a liar
- God is incapable
- God is setting me up for failure
- God is careless and not trustworthy
- God is using me and pressuring me
- God is confusing
- God is distant, weak, not safe, conditional in His love and affection, and has abandoned me.
So which of these statements do you believe to be true right now. How do you think these lies affect your everyday life?
Lies are barriers to the voice of God. They have yet to move or inform His view of me. However, in the same way Adam pulled some leaves over his waist and hips, I grab these lies over and over again like clothes that just don’t fit me. So when He comes to me, I place between us all that I believe. And then, by my actions, I demand He explain Himself for how I see our relationship. But I don’t want to listen to what He wants to say. I’m mad, He needs to submit to my false beliefs, and even if He were to do so, I don’t really want to hear it. That’s not God; that’s my anxious self not having any place to put my anger and grief.
In the same way people will yell at customer service because of the bad day they’re having, despite the T-Mobile agent having done nothing to them, I rant and rave at my Father.
I’m grieving, and I don’t know if I’m safe enough to grieve with Him. I want Him to hold me and speak kindly to me, but each barrier I dig in around me makes me feel like I have to protect myself from the very God who has saved me and loved me with an everlasting love.
"I hate You for killing my dad, and I hate You all the more for trying to kill me."
“May the Lamb that was slain receive the reward of His suffering.”
With all of our raw and vulnerable hearts tenderly held before the Lord, and with some spectacular food and coffee greeting us throughout the day, we were surrounded by men who have given themselves over to creating holy spaces for us to come before the Lord. Hours set aside for unhurried worship without the need for lighting or announcement videos. Slow paced and thoughtful groups where each of us had the time and attention and safety to simply share our hearts. This was the standard of hospitality they offered just for us.
On the last day together, Jake had a session for us.
Instead of circling up in our groups or sitting together for more teaching, he had us all hike up the hill silently. As we climbed to the top of the path, the other men stood around a pile of stones. One of the guys had a little bucket with chalk, a couple others were sorting out the heavier rocks from lighter ones. I knew this was a moment, because I felt terrified.
Right before we walked up the hill, my group sat at a picnic table. It was noon, so the sun just sat in our eyes until we all agreed to move the table into the shade. As we all grabbed a corner of the table, I lifted wrong and pulled my back. From the seizures last summer, my back was still in recovery. The pain shot down my legs and snapped the breath out of my chest. I dropped the table and apologized with a kind of “y’all change what you’re doing for my sake, either out of kindness or guilt.”
I was afraid and I was mad. “This again!?”
We stood around this little altar silently and slightly out of breath. Jake then said that within our hearts exist these burdens that we hold onto. We know they aren’t who we are or who we want to be, but we carry them. Even if they crush us, we carry them.
“I want y’all to find a rock and write on it the burden you carry.”
Some wrote things like money, lust, addiction, and all the others one might think of. I wrote, “Fear of death.”
"I hate You for killing my dad, and I hate You all the more for trying to kill me."
We then each lifted up the stone. As I went to lift mine, Billy came to me remembering what I said at the table and asked if he could help. My anger was surrounding me and my shoulders and legs and fists. With his thoughtfulness ignored, I could’ve punched him.
“I got it, thanks.”
Stones on shoulders, we slowly and silently walked down the hill, passing the little prayer chapel with a stained glass window. Then we came to a little clearing with wooden stretchers on the ground in a line. Each was fitted with wooden poles sticking out from the side. Jake told us that we were to place our burdens in these stretchers, line up along the poles, and lift them together.
“Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.”
Galations 6:2
I could not have been madder at God.
“You killed my father, and You tried to kill me. You know I know what it’s like to live without a dad, and yet You killed him anyway. What will happen to my girls and Lisa if You try again? You kill so trauma can teach us. What if you kill me and they have to bury me?
I grab my pole and start yanking this box down the hill. I could care less about the men alongside me. They’re going too slow and I just want to throw this whole matter away from me. I can see the sweat falling off the nose of one my group member. I don’t care. I don’t slow down. My strength and rage surges and I just take the front of this box in both my arms. Why? Because I am angry at God, and He hasn’t explained Himself to my satisfaction.
We come down the hill and circle the lake to a grassy valley. Each group has their own 3-2-1 for putting the stretchers down. We all catch our breath and wipe the sweat away. Jake, having carried his own stone, stood at the valley and said that it was time to give these burdens to the Lord. We were to do so by flinging them one-by-one into the valley.
“God did not give us these burdens to carry. In fact He said, His burden is light. So, each of us will come to the edge of the road here and throw our burdens down. And as we do, we will give them to the Lord proclaiming, “May the Lamb that was slain receive the reward of His suffering!”
In 1732, two Moravian missionaries said this as they embarked to sell themselves into slavery only for the sake of bringing the Gospel to 3000 slaves on an island in the West Indies:
“Family members were emotional, weeping. Was their extreme sacrifice wise? Was it necessary? The housings had been cast off and were curled up on the pier. As the ship slipped away with the tide and the gap widened, the young men linked arms, raised their hands and shouted across the spreading gap, “May the Lamb that was slain receive the reward of His suffering.”
Paris Reidhead
I am angry at God, and He hasn’t explained Himself to my satisfaction.
Finally, I turned my anger to the Lord asking for mercy. I didn’t hope for a reasonable defense that would once and for all cool my rage and settle my anxiety; I wanted deliverance from this burden. As each man walked up, threw their stone down, and shouted into the valley so that their voice rang out across the land, I wept before my Father just wanting an embrace. Then He said:
“What if I don’t kill you?” What if it is My will that you remain until I return?”
In his Gospel, John wrote this question to Peter as the last word of Christ he would write down. Even though he made it plain that there was a supposed world of books before him in which to testify to the life of his Teacher, all that he actively chose to not include, the last of Christ’s words to his Church was a question regarding His will over the life and death of His beloved disciple.
“What if I don’t take anything from him?”
“What if you, Peter, suffer in your body greater than any of us while John is carried in honor in his old age?”
“Peter, and the rest of you disciples, what if My will for My beloved is for you to trust and not understand as you may want to right now?”
The most grateful act I can offer to my Father is embracing my identity in Him. This means that I must then forsake and discount any other identifier I might look for or fight against. Even if I hate what is said about me, and even if I’m the one to say it, that attention in and of itself is a kind of distracted idolatry. I’m listening to another voice trying to tell me who I am. If He’s the one who breathed life into my lungs, my grattidute then is to simply breathe out.
He gets the first word. He gets my undivided attention. When I forget, my eyes and ears go elsewhere. Suddenly I stop feeling and acting like who He made me to be. This distracted forsaking of self is a slow burn. So slow, I don’t know when I stopped noticing the char creeping over my heart. And the kindest rebuke from Him is not to correct me through shame, but to show me again and again who He is.
50+ men running in a circle around the room
Our last night together began with loud dancing swirling worship. Men all around me poured their life to the Lord without restraint. We were screaming and it was love tearing itself out of our hearts, refusing to be restrained. Think if trees blowing in the wind just uprooted themselves so they could fling their branches more.
And then my back started hurting again.
I went and sat on a couch along the wall and closed my eyes. I tried to keep some kind of worshipful expression on my face, with my hands lifted up over my head, but I was tired, again, just tired. I squeezed my eyes tighter and tighter, just because I couldn’t look at anyone, and I figured if I appeared to be in some kind of acceptable worship stance, I wouldn’t appear to be the odd man out.
The music got louder and louder. I could hear exuberance filling up the place. And my eyes were torqued closed. Suddenly, Cadence came over and shook me. He said, “You can’t miss out on this!”
I looked up and I saw all 50+ men swirling in a circle running around the room.
He went to lift me up, and I tried to stop him by saying, “My back is really hurting. I can’t-“
Instead, when he leant down to help me, fire went down my shoulders and through my ribs and across my hips. The pain was immediately gone.
“Oh absolutely!” I jumped up and began running. Running, spinning, tears all over the place. The pain was gone, and I could just give Him everything again.
Hallelujah
My Name is John
“What if it’s My will that he remain…?”
After we exploded our souls upon the heart of the Father, we stood around the room. Jonathan (I think) brought to our attention the power of declaration. So much of our time was simply looking at and addressing the lies encamped around our hearts that kept us from seeing like He sees. And part of this work has its footing settled in the power of our declarations.
And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, for they loved not their lives even unto death.
Revelation 12:11
We were each given some time to write out our declarations. This was to be said to any and all who have attempted to speak into our identity outside of who we are in the Father. This was to be screamed out from our chests. One by one, each man stood up, said their name, their father and mother’s names, their spouse’s and children’s names.
[Side note: we all started counting how many kids each dad had. One guy had seven kids I think, and he didn't look to be older than 30.]
We would then name the lie about God and about ourselves, and then we would declare the truth. And with this truth, each of us said to the lies and liars, “Who are you to try and take my destiny?”
Mine went like this:
My name is John Mark Guerra, son of John Guerra, George Henderson, and Stephanie Henderson, husband to Lisa Guerra, and father to Haven Faith and Mary Anna.
Tonight, I am looking at the lie that God looks me over, and that I have to fight for everything and I have to prove myself as worthy of attention and affection.
Who are you to try and take my destiny?
(Picture me screaming this in a silent room filled with men fighting for me.)
I declare that God is looking right at me, giving His undivided attention. He fights for me. He loves to hear me sing. He’s read every word I’ve ever written. He holds all my tears, and my name is written in His book.
I declare I am John His Beloved, and I am welcome to lay my head upon His chest and ask Him to care for me. I declare that I can trust Him with my life.
And this is where it ends.
Coming back to see Him and see myself in Him – without agenda, propped up words about myself, or even the weight of trauma that will never give an account for itself. My heart is His responsibility, not mine, not anyone else’s either. I’ll leave it here with a couple pieces of what He said to me as I waited for my plane to take me back to Colorado and back to the little house with girls scream singing Disney songs and a wife trying to pay bills and confirm doctor appointments on her phone while these singing girls climb all over her:
"John Mark, I wouldn't have the world I wanted to make if you weren't here. "I want your heart to live in my house, because my house and my family isn't complete until your whole life and your entire heart fill the place I made just for you. John Mark, you are my beloved and I'm so proud of the man you've become. I love just watching you listen for me. I like seeing your eyes focus sideways when you know you hear me talking to you, just to you." "I want you all to myself right now. The others may need you in a bit, but I want this plane ride to be just you and me. Don't worry about the time right now." "If you need to, keep time on Me."
He’s beautiful. He looks right at me and is always smiling. He’s like an eagle soaring over me, covered in flowers and gold, with eyes that take my breath away. He’s always been beautiful. And He’s always been proud of me. He has always called me His beloved, and that’s why I like my first name again.
Much love, jm.
Sincere Simple Sacred 
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