Elephant and Protection
Today I am handing you over to Jen Hatmaker. She is brilliant and compassionate and you are in good hands.
I heard her teach from this subject on Tuesday night and I am still trying to absorb it all.
Here is Jen:
See, in the wild, when a mama elephant is giving birth, all the other female elephants in the herd back around her in formation. They close ranks so that the delivering mama cannot even be seen in the middle. They stomp and kick up dirt and soil to throw attackers off the scent and basically act like a pack of badasses.
They surround the mama and incoming baby in protection, sending a clear signal to predators that if they want to attack their friend while she is vulnerable, they'll have to get through 40 tons of female aggression first.
When the baby elephant is delivered, the sister elephants do two things: they kick sand or dirt over the newborn to protect its fragile skin from the sun, and then they all start trumpeting, a female celebration of new life, of sisterhood, of something beautiful being born in a harsh, wild world despite enemies and attackers and predators and odds.
Scientists tell us this: They normally take this formation in only two cases - under attack by predators like lions, or during the birth of a new elephant.
This is what we do, girls. When our sisters are vulnerable, when they are giving birth to new life, new ideas, new ministries, new spaces, when they are under attack, when they need their people to surround them so they can create, deliver, heal, recover...we get in formation. We close ranks and literally have each others' backs. You want to mess with our sis? Come through us first. Good luck.
And when delivery comes, when new life makes its entrance, when healing finally begins, when the night has passed and our sister is ready to rise back up, we sound our trumpets because we saw it through together. We celebrate! We cheer! We raise our glasses and give thanks.
I have this picture saved in three different places and in a frame. (I also have an elephant ring given to me and my girlfriends from Tara Porter Livesay - it tells me: never alone.) Maybe you need this too. If you are closing ranks around a vulnerable sister, or if your girls have you surrounded while you are tender, this is how we do it.
There is no community like a community of women.
-Jen Hatmaker
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As Jen finished telling us this story - she asked that we step out in courage and stand if we needed to be in the middle, if we needed to be protected.
Would anyone stand?
Then one by one, women all over the sanctuary stood up, knees wobbling.
And then...perfect strangers wrapped their brave sisters in love. Hugging, reaching out shoulder to shoulder, even holding hands. The physical presence of other women saying, We are with you, sister, was magical. Transformational.
I was standing, hugging my mom, hugging strangers, and sobbing in gratitude for the moment.
When I was younger, I thought people were either strong or weak.
Now I know better.
Most of us are both - at the exact same time.
Life is messy and beautiful and makes your heart expand and shatter. Makes no sense, and yet - that's been my experience. Has that been yours?
There is no way to avoid the messy - we are all messy and we are all beautiful.
- catia
