Katherine Ann Rush

I was sitting in my Nonprofit & Communication class at the beginning of the semester when my professor asked us if we had ever heard of a 6-word story. (I hadn’t).

She proceeded to explain that Ernest Hemingway had once been told that he would never be able to write a story in 6 words. Accepting the challenge, Hemingway pulled out a napkin, scribbled six words on it, and proved them wrong. My professor flashed these words, penned by Hemingway, onto the screen:

For sale, baby shoes, never worn.

I was immediately struck by the power in this short phrase. A swirling myriad of emotions and circumstances lie behind those words – a thousand explanations of how they string together. Though Hemingway’s original work represents a profound depth and heaviness, six-word stories can communicate deep joy and significance as well. After my professor asked our class to write a six-word story about our “story” with nonprofits, I began thinking about other aspects of my life that have marked me in profound ways, and what six-word stories I would use to somehow pack all of the memories, moments, and impact into a single phrase.

And so we come to Baylor Chi Omega.

As my time in Chi O comes to a close, I’ve begun the process of pondering all that this group has meant to me – its people, its values, and its traditions. However, as I wrote numerous six-word stories to describe these past few years in Chi O, I was unsettled with my own fumbling attempts to string six words together that could express the past few years. It was after much pondering that a C.S. Lewis quote came to mind. As I pondered the words, my heart settled on these as my six-word story, for this truth sums up not only the threads of my life that are tied to Chi O, but those that weave and tangle together in life even outside of this chapter as well. Though these six words spill far beyond Chi O, they truly encompass the most important aspects of what I have learned and experienced in Chi O:

To love is to be vulnerable.

Vulnerable. Our eyes may scan over this word quickly, but deep down, our hearts all react differently to this weighty concept. Some of us shy away from this word – it brings fear that someone truly could know us as we really are. It brings defensiveness to the pride we all harbor, as we think we are the exception to being known. It brings shame to others who have been exposed and hurt in the past. And perhaps to all of us, it brings a measure of discomfort – we don’t want to appear incapable in a world that declares we must succeed. Yet for some, vulnerability brings joy– they have experienced it in the way that leads to the knowing and loving that we all crave.

Perhaps amidst our initial hesitation toward vulnerability, we forget that vulnerability is intrinsically tied to a verb – to love. Love sacrifices self for the sake of another, shows them unmerited favor, and meets real needs. With love often comes an opening up – an opening of our hands, our resources, our time, our hearts, and our lives. 1 Thessalonians 2:8 says “Because we loved you so much, we were delighted to share with you not only the gospel of God but our lives as well.”

As we open our lives to those around us, we see beyond the shiny veneers and are able to roll up our sleeves and jump head first into the mess of life together. Friends see our dirty dishes and unmade beds and hectic schedules. They see where we’ve spilled coffee all over our couch and come to learn the well-worn rhythms of our lives. And, on a deeper level, they begin to see our weakness – our struggles, loneliness, fears, needs, and sin. It is here that the fruit of love, given by the Spirit of God Himself, embraces the messiness of the other and proves itself bold and strong and brave and deep.

At our Chi Omega New Member Retreat, one of our annual traditions is for a New Member advisor to reads the children’s book Miss Rosey Posey and the Fine China Plate to the new member class. In the book, Miss Rosey Posey explains to Natalie that she is like a fine china plate. Unlike the stained paper plates, china plates are kept safe and unstained from anything that could ruin them. They are set apart for a “special purpose,” such as serving chocolate covered strawberries to someone very important. In the same way, Mrs. Rosey Posey explains, Natalie is also set apart for a very special purpose, and is called to walk as one set apart.

Though I love this story and its truth, I remember having one hesitation to its message as I listened to it for the first time – before you can be set apart for a holy calling and walk accordingly, you have to be holy. You can’t just pull a paper plate out of the garbage can, spray some febreeze on it, and serve chocolate covered strawberries on top of the leftover food stains.

I felt uneasy as I listened, like the story was telling all of the Baylor Chi O’s to be something that none of us are – perfect. No one is a perfect china plate. The roots of the gospel flooded to my mind – All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away. (Isaiah 64:6). In the story, Mrs. Rosey Posey tells Natalie that she is not like filthy paper plates. And this is true – we are all made in the image of God. However, on our own, we are not flawless china plates. We are broken ones – the image of God in us marred by sin and rebellion against Him, and the cracked pieces impossible to restore on our own. We deserve to be in the garbage can, not in the display case. Whether we know Jesus or not, we all have felt the burdens of shame, guilt, and fear – a deep inner wrestling that isn’t quite right. Yet try as we may to resolve these deep issues on our own, we can’t seem to do it. A shattered china plate does not get up and fix itself – it cannot do so. Not even the love of our friends can heal us.

Yet it is here that the good news of God floods in, offering hope to the broken both inside and outside of the context of Chi O. Though we reveled in our sin and ran toward it, God made His Son that sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him (2 Corinthians 5:21). Christ died, was buried, and was resurrected for our sins to completely satisfy God’s holiness. In Mrs. Rosey Posey’s terms for kindergartners, Jesus is the only perfect china plate, and God counted His complete perfection as ours because of the cross - making us new creations in Him. Now, we walk as that new creation – in holiness. We are set apart for a special purpose, as Mrs. Rosey Posey said, and are able to live set apart because our broken pieces have been restored.

“For by one sacrifice He (Jesus) has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.” Hebrews 10:14

The vulnerability that comes from taking refuge in a holy God is one way of loving each other, and I have experienced it in Chi O - in quiet conversations in the Chick-fil-a parking lot and through individuals sharing their stories in front of all of us. I have known it in deeply-woven friendships, formed in Chi O during the span of several years over normal things like pizza and road trips and the ebb and flow of changing seasons. I have watched love act in strength as girls rallied to help each other in times of crisis, joy, and the mundane. This vulnerability is rooted and grounded in the love of a God who frees His daughters with His very Son’s crimson blood to walk in the light.

To love is to be vulnerable.

Baylor Chi O, may we strip off our masks, get in the trenches with each other, and by God’s grace love well.