A Liturgy for Leaving

Dear friend,

No, I’m not abandoning the internet or writing. I’ve been awfully silent in this space for far too long because…

I’m writing you another book! I’m spending all my free mental space and physical energy on churning out another manuscript for you, and I honestly can’t wait for you to read it. It’s a book for the broken, for those who think there’s no way I could be brave. It’s a book for those who have been left behind, left out, or forgotten by those who should have cared.

My next book is all about practicing courage to trust that we still have a Good Shepherd who is with us always—no matter what. It’ll release with Zondervan Reflective in May 2022, and I’ll share more here as I go. (Full disclosure: I’ll probably reimagine this space so I can be a bit more regular here too—because I’m clearly bad at keeping up with it.)

In this book, I’m digging deep into my own stories of harm and hope to help you name the places you have been silenced and made small and to hear that God has named you beloved.

It’s full of life-changing (in my humble opinion—lol!) insights from neuroscience about nervous system regulation and learning to live our whole lives in the context of the Good Shepherd being with us. It’s the stuff that has changed my life, is currently making me well up with wild joy, and is changing my therapy clients from scared to strong.

The landscapes where I’ve most learned to practice courage are 1) chronic illness and 2) leaving spiritual abuse. As such, I’m spending a lot of time these days thinking about us orphaned believers, we who fear there might be no place we belong.

Today is Good Friday, and you are on my heart as I type away in my favorite coffee shop. (Yes, you read that right! I am no longer locked down! Bless that vaccine.) So many of us are stumbling with our crosses to calvary this weekend, falsely accused of faithlessness or treachery by the religious folks who were supposed to be our kin, pushed out of the places of our people for the sake of following Christ’s ways of justice and mercy for the weakest. It is a lonely road to follow the footsteps of Jesus.

If you are feeling spiritually orphaned this holy week, I pray that you can sense the groaning solidarity of Jesus, walking with you outside the places of power to give up everything for the sake of love.

I wrote the “Liturgy for Leaving” below for all of us orphaned believers, who have left behind abusive churches and leaders, soul-crushing jobs, gaslighting spouses or families, and the confines of conservatism’s idolatry of certainty—for the sake of fellowship with Christ. These are the words of blessing I wish someone had prayed over me and my husband as we left behind a spiritually abusive church in the Spring of 2018.

Pray this alone, or—if you can—share it with a close friend, mentor, or your household, and pray it together. These words of blessing echo David’s prayer in Psalm 18 after being delivered from King Saul, who hated David for being good, who sought to kill David for his integrity. May these words of blessing wash over you like cleansing tears.

At the cross of Jesus, we can see anew:

it is among the broken that God’s blessing resides.

With deep affection and respect for you. Your sister in our Lord Jesus,

KJ

A Liturgy for Leaving

To be prayed as a couple, with family, or among friends after or while leaving behind communities, churches, jobs, and relationships. The entirety or part of Psalm 18 can be read aloud by one of the participants. A moment of silence is then taken for reflection. 

People: Lord, in our distress, we call to you. We cry to you for help. Evil has nearly blinded our eyes and cut off the oxygen of our hope. The cords of consumerism have entangled us. The ropes of being useful and used by people have coiled tight around our necks. 

Leader: From heaven, God hears your voice. Your cries have come before him, into his ears and into his heart. The earth trembles and shakes with his fury over the harm hurled at you. 

People: Even now, whether we see it and sense it or not, you are reaching down to rescue us, God. You are drawing us out of deep waters. You are freeing us from the hidden enemies of light. They confronted us in the day of our courage, called us names, and told us lies, but, God, you were our support.

Leader: The Lord has brought you out to a spacious place. He has rescued you because he delights in you.

People: The Lord has brought us out to a spacious place. He has rescued us because he delights in us.

Lord, our desire for integrity
Has outweighed our wish
To avoid being wounded.

We have counted the cost
And decided our wholeness
And the wonder of your grace are gifts

for which we are willing to lose everything else.
God, remind us of the blessing
That only the broken can hear.

Show us that the storms raging within us
Are but small shadows of the storm of your fury
To fight for our justice and vindication.

Show us that in leaving people and places
who claim your power, 
we have not left your blessing behind.
It follows us like the rain of tears down our cheeks.

Lift our eyes to the cross,
Where Jesus’s broken body
Still speaks through groans
that it is among the broken
that your blessing resides.

Leader: To the faithful you show yourself faithful.

People: To the blameless, you show yourself blameless. Rest our fears of retaliation and silence all haunting gaslighting in your blamelessness, Lord Christ.

Leader: To the pure your show yourself pure. But to the devious, you show yourself shrewd. Reveal the hidden snares of how others used you, Jesus, as a crutch and canopy for evil to crush these, your dear children.

People: You save the humble but bring low those whose eyes are haughty. Keep us low, Lord Jesus. 

Leader: Turn our eyes to the ground, O Christ, where you kneeled to wash your disciples’ feet on the eve of your death. In our lowliness and loneliness, we want to let you love us down to the dirt under our toenails and the darkest fears in our souls. 

People: Lord, only you can keep our lamps burning. Turn our darkness into light.

Leader: With your help, remind us that the smallest and most silenced can advance against the strongest and loudest. 

People: With you, God, we can scale a wall. 

Leader: The Father is still with you.

People: Christ is still among us.

Leader: The Spirit is yours.

The Lord has brought you out to a spacious place. He has rescued you because he delights in you.

People: The Lord has brought us out to a spacious place. He has rescued us because he delights in us.

A printable PDF of this liturgy is available here for Embodied subscribers. Please forward this email to friends, pastors, etc. if you’d like to share the liturgy with them.