Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. \u00a0If my faith should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my blog to take\u2026<\/p>\n
In the past 24 hours I have had a few unfortunate run-ins with some of my Christian sisters and brothers that have left me spiraling in a\u00a0whirlpool\u00a0of tears, just nigh of giving up. I even briefly fantasized that this would be the last Easter I would celebrate as part of a tribe that wields spiritual abuse with such calculating deftness. Praise be for other sisters and brothers (Mike and R. Jay) who lifted their voices in crystal clear support, offering solid theology of compassion and love in the conversations where my very humanity was stripped to the bone. This afternoon I received a private message on Facebook from Joanna that I can only\u00a0understand\u00a0as the in-breaking of the radical grace I blather on about. She has given me permission to share her words \u2013 not as a self-congratulatory, self-righteous post but as one that I hope will resonate with others as we stumble toward Easter.<\/p>\n
Joanna, your message is most definitely a replenishing drink of grace for the parched heart of this Christian. \u00a0You cannot possibly know how very much I appreciate hearing from you. \u00a0The holy spirit certainly rushes in when we most need her presence. You are incredibly generous to share glimpses of your journey with me and to allow me to share that with others. \u00a0I am grateful to know how my own journey of falling toward grace has impacted your own.<\/p>\n
Hi Kim,<\/p>\n
I doubt that you remember me, but I graduated from Agnes Scott three years ago. I attended a few of your services there and even tried to attend your online church, but I am hopeless at Second Life.<\/p>\n
I just wanted to send you a message to tell you how much your posts and blogs over the past several years have meant to me. I try not to be a \u201cblog-stalker\u201d and comment or repost everything you say, so it occurred to me that you may have no idea of the profound impact you have had on my life.<\/p>\n
I grew up in the Southern Baptist Church, and I\u2019ve struggled my whole life with the fact that, because of my sexual orientation, I was clearly flawed, perverted, evil, demented (you name it, I\u2019ve heard it said). As a teenager, I railed the other way; knowing that I couldn\u2019t change who I was, I decided that Christianity and religion must be wrong.<\/p>\n
It took a lot of time, soul-searching, and reading to realize that I could be both a Christian and a lesbian. It\u2019s still something I struggle with, especially when I see the vitriolic hate that comes from sects of the Christian faith, but I know what God has put into my heart, and I know that I am fearfully and wonderfully made.<\/p>\n
I know this is trite and cliche, and I\u2019m not trying to take up all your time, but this is where you come in. Your blogs and posts opened my eyes up to possibilities I did not know existed \u2014 that I could not only be tolerated in the Christian faith, but that denying my identity was to say that God has somehow made a mistake. The profundity of your writing often leaves me in grateful tears or quiet comfort.<\/p>\n
Your writing not only opened up and healed a wounded, damaged heart, but your writing has been one of the sustaining forces over the past three years. After college, I moved to Birmingham for law school. Law school is a psychological torture all on its own, let alone being away from my girlfriend for the past three years, meeting all new people, fearfully re-closeting myself for fear of the consequences of being out in a conservative city, and then slowly and painfully coming out to all of them. If I didn\u2019t have such a strong online community reminding me that love is out there, I don\u2019t know that I would have had the courage to stick with it.<\/p>\n
Anyway, I didn\u2019t mean to make this an all-about-me letter. What I really wanted to tell you is that I appreciate what you are doing, and I hope that you will continue for many years to come.<\/p>\n
By the way, I\u2019ll be moving back to the Atlanta area in May (after graduation!). Any recommendations on churches?<\/p>\n
Thank you!<\/p>\n
Joanna<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
We really never know all the ways we to touch the lives of others but this day Joanna has blessed me beyond my measure.<\/p>\n
Please forgive me if I can\u2019t wait \u00a0\u2013 Christ is risen, Christ is risen indeed!<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/306\/2013\/03\/beautiful_rainbow_1.jpg\" "\\"beautiful_rainbow_1\\"")
<\/a><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. \u00a0If my faith should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my blog to take\u2026 In the past 24 hours I have had a few unfortunate run-ins with some of my Christian sisters and brothers that have left me […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1039,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1116","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
Stumbling toward Easter, falling toward grace<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. \u00a0If my faith should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my blog to take... In the past 24\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/2013\/03\/stumbling-toward-easter-falling-toward-grace\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Stumbling toward Easter, falling toward grace\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. \u00a0If my faith should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my blog to take... In the past 24\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/2013\/03\/stumbling-toward-easter-falling-toward-grace\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Kimberly Knight\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-03-28T22:37:27+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2017-10-30T11:53:36+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/wp.patheos.com.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/files\/2013\/03\/beautiful_rainbow_1.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Kimberly Knight\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Kimberly Knight\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/2013\/03\/stumbling-toward-easter-falling-toward-grace\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/2013\/03\/stumbling-toward-easter-falling-toward-grace\/\",\"name\":\"Stumbling toward Easter, falling toward grace\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2013-03-28T22:37:27+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2017-10-30T11:53:36+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/#\/schema\/person\/95fdfe55b8a91ac8bcd40b3ad603d048\"},\"description\":\"Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. \u00a0If my faith should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my blog to take... In the past 24\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/2013\/03\/stumbling-toward-easter-falling-toward-grace\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/2013\/03\/stumbling-toward-easter-falling-toward-grace\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/2013\/03\/stumbling-toward-easter-falling-toward-grace\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Stumbling toward Easter, falling toward grace\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/\",\"name\":\"Kimberly Knight\",\"description\":\"Conversations about being Christian and gay in America\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/#\/schema\/person\/95fdfe55b8a91ac8bcd40b3ad603d048\",\"name\":\"Kimberly Knight\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f8ca2ee15d6156658c0c947113c623ba?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f8ca2ee15d6156658c0c947113c623ba?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Kimberly Knight\"},\"description\":\"Kimberly has a long history of back-pew sitting, Wednesday night supper eatin' and generally trying God\u2019s patience since 1969. She's lucky enough to have made her technology addiction a career and serves as both the Director of Digital Strategy as a southern liberal arts college and Minister of Digital community with Extravagance UCC.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/author\/kimberlyknight\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Stumbling toward Easter, falling toward grace","description":"Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. \u00a0If my faith should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my blog to take... In the past 24","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/2013\/03\/stumbling-toward-easter-falling-toward-grace\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Stumbling toward Easter, falling toward grace","og_description":"Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. \u00a0If my faith should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my blog to take... In the past 24","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/2013\/03\/stumbling-toward-easter-falling-toward-grace\/","og_site_name":"Kimberly Knight","article_published_time":"2013-03-28T22:37:27+00:00","article_modified_time":"2017-10-30T11:53:36+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/wp.patheos.com.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/files\/2013\/03\/beautiful_rainbow_1.jpg"}],"author":"Kimberly Knight","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Kimberly Knight","Est. reading time":"4 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/2013\/03\/stumbling-toward-easter-falling-toward-grace\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/2013\/03\/stumbling-toward-easter-falling-toward-grace\/","name":"Stumbling toward Easter, falling toward grace","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/#website"},"datePublished":"2013-03-28T22:37:27+00:00","dateModified":"2017-10-30T11:53:36+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/#\/schema\/person\/95fdfe55b8a91ac8bcd40b3ad603d048"},"description":"Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. \u00a0If my faith should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my blog to take... In the past 24","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/2013\/03\/stumbling-toward-easter-falling-toward-grace\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/2013\/03\/stumbling-toward-easter-falling-toward-grace\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/2013\/03\/stumbling-toward-easter-falling-toward-grace\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Stumbling toward Easter, falling toward grace"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/","name":"Kimberly Knight","description":"Conversations about being Christian and gay in America","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/#\/schema\/person\/95fdfe55b8a91ac8bcd40b3ad603d048","name":"Kimberly Knight","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f8ca2ee15d6156658c0c947113c623ba?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f8ca2ee15d6156658c0c947113c623ba?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Kimberly Knight"},"description":"Kimberly has a long history of back-pew sitting, Wednesday night supper eatin' and generally trying God\u2019s patience since 1969. She's lucky enough to have made her technology addiction a career and serves as both the Director of Digital Strategy as a southern liberal arts college and Minister of Digital community with Extravagance UCC.","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/author\/kimberlyknight\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1116","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1039"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1116"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1116\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1116"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1116"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/kimberlyknight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1116"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}