"26" or "A Love Letter to Emma"

Dear Emma and Our Community,

I wasn't supposed to make it this long. Every year, this day is a reminder of that. A reminder of this gift.

Every year on my birthday since I turned 20, inspired by the existential crisis of never being a teen again, I wrote a poem reflecting on the previous year of life.

Usually this is a first-take situation: I write out my thoughts, and hit send.

But this year of life was dense: I got engaged, I got officially/legally divorced (yes, in that order, a story for another time), my grandfather died, I got more connected to my aunt and uncle, I got screwed over like 5 times in regard to internship/practicum placement for my Master's program, I went to Italy and met with scholars from all over the world (and got into an argument with a few of them too despite being the youngest bloke there), I confronted the heart of Christian Imperialism at the Vatican, I wrote and submitted my first research article, I read so many books, I taught classes for the first time, I finished some goals for a prior hobby and started a new hobby, I began coaching volleyball and have fallen in love with my team, I have been more vulnerable, more social, and more real than I've ever been.

And there's one person to blame: my fiancé, Emma.

Emma and I met soon after my previous wife and I split up. By met, I mean I was looking for a noncommittal friends-with-benefits type of deal and instead found myself in a relationship with someone who made being exposed, being vulnerable, and being flawed less scary.

When I met Emma, I had no plan for my life–in fact, my only plan was to survive. This meant alcohol abuse, way too much drug use, and a bunch of people around me that I'd push away as soon as they got too close. I told her from the jump that I wasn't ready for a relationship, I just got out of a marriage, and to be completely honest I didn't think love was a real thing.

And she said, "Okay, but I find you really interesting so I want to see how this plays out." A month later, I wake up at her house. I had had a rough night, a really rough night. A "Drank half a bottle of Black Kraken" kinda night. Halfway through the escapade, my memory is blank but here's what I have been told happened:

I had vomited pretty much everywhere in my house, and called a friend crying to them that I was scared I wasn't going to make it through the night. They said, "Hey I'm in Nashville, so I can't get you. You have two options: you give me your mom's number, or you give me Emma." I don't know what Drunk Elijah's thought process was, but I think sober Elijah knew that I could escape Emma if this went poorly. I couldn't escape my mother. So, I had my friend call a girl that I had hooked up with once or twice before and she came and picked me up and took me to her house and nursed me through the night

And then I wake up at her house. While the previous 12 or so hours prior were a blank, I'll never forget the morning I woke up. She sat on the end of her bed and asked me, "So, when are you going to therapy?" The next week, I went to therapy. I think her willingness to meet me in probably my darkest moment, and not only care for me but hold me to account for it saved my life.

When you go to therapy with knowledge of psychology, it's a trip, because now more than ever do you have to submit to the techniques and tools used on you. You are watching the Wizard behind the curtain work, and you still have to rely on the magic. And my hard heart wasn't ready to rely on anything or anyone. But over that period of time, over the numerous therapy sessions, the pursuit of sobriety, and the confusion that comes with figuring out, "What am I supposed to do now, after I've lost everything?" Emma was a lighthouse that reminded me that just because I lost everything, it did not mean all was lost.

A few months later I started my graduate program in counseling. A few months later after that–I started engaging with the Divine again after not doing so for years. I dumped Emma because I was so scared about what was happening. I knew her game: her absolute loyalty, her pure unconditional love was transforming me from a boy bent on self-destruction, into a man who loves life and people deeply. Emma was hellbent on not just loving me as I am, but wooing me to become the man I always wanted to be–without any requirement that I had to make it there. So, even dumped, she waited for me.

I, with all my walls, and Emma, with a patience so lasting and a love so powerful that it eroded each one with time. It's why we got back together–she's just that powerful. And I'm excited to get married in November.

This past year has been the reward of all of that. I never had many friends growing up, I didn't have many in college either. Sure, I was close with people but I or they served a purpose. There was no relationship based on the premise that what they liked about me was me. I premised it based on what I could do or give because if I based it on who I was all you'd find is lack.

Emma refused to back down in the defense of me being enough.

This had a tremendous spiritual and relational effect on me. I found myself becoming more confident, less needing to compensate for my perceived lack, I exposed my heart, opinions, and thoughts–still with a bit of pretentiousness, but with less defensiveness. I began to become engaged in my community. I have, like, actual friends.

And what this taught me more than anything is that to hide is to take on the posture of Adam in his fallen state. "Who told you you were naked?" God asks with heartbreak (Genesis 3:11a), and the answer isn't the snake. It was Adam and Eve who "realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves." (Genesis 3:7b). We look down at ourselves in our vulnerability and say, "If they know this about me, they will reject me in my totality." So instead of Being we focus instead on Doing. If I can't be my naked, vulnerable self, I will present a list of accomplishments made of fig leaves.

What then is the Alternative? What does the New Adam of Jesus Christ offer? I love what Paul says in Ephesians to answer this question: "For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight." (Ephesians 1:4) Since before Creation, God has never seen humanity lacking–but rather, through the lens of eternity, has looked at us with an unwavering contentment. This is transformative because while God remains committed to love us in our hiding, They are also committed to woo us out of it.

To live Resurrection Life doesn't necessitate you go get enlightened in a cave, it doesn't necessitate that you disengage, it doesn't necessitate that you hide away, rather it requires you to live with such reckless authenticity and vulnerability that it cannot be corrupted by the Fallenness of the world.

Sin is the whisper–not to eat the fruit, the fruit was already eaten–but to participate in the destructive ways in which we hide. There are many, many people who claim to follow Jesus that are also in power at this very moment and use the trappings of Christianity to hide. This is why Christian Nationalism is such a destructive force: it speaks with appropriated language of liberation and authenticity, but acts and behaves with a heart of oppression and hidenness. It is truly an ornate white washed tomb. Dressed in life, but hollow with deadness.

25 was a year where I personally had to confront many things I'm ashamed of, many of my human limitations, many of my fears, and the methods I pick to hide from them. Some of that shit got overwhelming, sometimes it got really dark, but thankfully, Jesus had gone before me when he confronted all of humanity's hiddenness and its destructive effects on the Cross and emerged blameless and victorious in His resurrection. So while much of this was introspective, much of this was self-growth, it was never done by myself. I had a God before me, a community around me, and a lover holding my hand every step of the way.

So what's the poem for this year? Uh. It was hard to make one. So instead I wanted to write a letter, tell a story, and give my hope.

Emma, my love, thank you for wooing me to me. It wooed me to life. Wooed me to God. And wooed me to you. What a gift. Thank you for being with me for another year of my life.

Love,

E