My Shady Grove

So I'm not serving Blackberry, Cranberry Compote This Year

2011-12-25T00:56:00.002-05:00

Daddy, decked in camo and safety goggles, was dodging airsoft bullets shot by yardstick-high sons giddy with the gift of their father's presence. And I was at my usual post, fingers flying in the kitchen, unhappy and longing to lay in hawk-like perch on the second level of the kids' fort with Cort's sniper in hand.  So much yet to be done, and I was missing all the fun.

This is what I hate about the Christmas season.  Every year I try. Really.   REALLY try to simplify. To plan well. To do in advance. To remember it isn't about presents but about presence--that of our family and that of JESUS. Try to keep Christ central. But then comes the crescendo of last minute items unchecked from the lists of labors loudly lamenting my inefficiency. That crescendo that crowds out the spirit singing Silent Night, Holy Night. That crescendo that blows to smitherines all my careful, meticulous planning.

And tension mounts.
Grows like snow falling in Ontario winters.

Soft and slow at first, a blanket that wraps me, but it becomes heavier, weightier. And it isn't long before I am suffocating, snowed in by it all, my shovel is still in Ontario, and I'm in Georgia and I can't get out.

Blinded by the blizzard.
Blinded to the light.

That's where I was when Jeff was playing airsoft, and I was transferring my blackberry, cranberry compote from stove to fridge. Blinded and singing myself a pity song. That's where I was when the Pyrex pranced out of my hands and like Santa and his reindeer, pirouetted across the kitchen plopping herself onto planked-floor slinging her fruity purple slop on every surface within a twelve mile radius. And I saw stars. (Not the one on my tree or the one from Bethlehem.) A bull chasing red, air coursed my from nostrils, and I'm sure my ears were chimneys and smoke billowed from them.

Thirty minutes I spent cleaning that mess. Wiping doors, table legs-chair legs-stool legs, pantry cupboards, under the refrigerator. How is it possible for compote to centripetally sail in every direction when I had only been traveling in one? I know it multiplied as it flew. Thirty minutes I didn't have. Not in my schedule.
Third batch of short breads waiting to be whipped, and two chickens chanting to be roasted. Counters littered with baking debris and my heart hurting.

"Lord, I know this is a season of joy, but I hate this. I can't see you in this. And how ridiculous is it that I, one so blessed, am seething when I should be singing?"

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was fully God. The Word was with God in the beginning. All things were created by him, and apart from him not one thing was created that has been created. In Him was life, and the life was the light of mankind. And the light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not mastered it." (John :1-5)

The darkness has not mastered it.

The darkness of life--of the moments when gooey, glorified fruit relish slink down our walls--can overwhelm. Can blind. Can snow a soul in.

And I am ashamed when that is my darkness. Want to deny it. Pretend it isn't dark. Pretend the picket fence isn't stained, and the world is perfect because how dare I consider my world dark when there is a deeper shade of black than I have ever known? Children hunger. Children thirst, cry for a mother who is gone, a father who never cared in the first place. Men and women in parks huddle hoping to stay warm on their bench-beds. How can I, fortunate daughter of North America, claim darkness?

Darkness dawns many shades and she is all humanity's beast of the soul.

Christian. Not Christian. Child. Adult. Homebound or homeless. Prince or Pauper. We all know her shadow. She has dressed as serpent tricking Eve to taste, she has heaved her heavy blanket on hunched shoulders and stayed until the doctors give pills, she has clinched fists and coerced them into slinging, she has blinded the rich man to the homeless man, and she has tempted the weary mother to wallow in the mire of miscellaneous mountains that demand her attention. I know because I am that mother, and I have seen darkness dance. I've taken her dangling arm and waltzed a round or two.

But the darkness has not mastered the light.

That word mastered means to overcome it, to overtake it. The darkness has never overtaken the light. Never. No matter the shade, she cannot conquer The Light of the World. I recall the words of Peter, the young boy in Elizabeth Yates' classic, Once in the Year when he asks Benj to further explain what happened when the angels appeared to the shepherds, "What had happened, Benj? What made the night turn to light?"
What indeed makes the night turn to light?

I sat on the floor, eyes giving way to waterfalls of emotion--a mother tired of mothering, and I whispered, "Immanuel--LIGHT with me."

"The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel"--which means, "God with us." (Matthew 1:23)

These dark moments. They're why He came. To redeem them. To cast light when we can't see beyond ourselves.

These moments when celebrating Christmas is a serrated knife to our gut because we're saying goodbye to the family member we loved, when children still thirst in countries an airplane ride away, when teenage children are parents too early, and even the moments when we can't find a justifiable reason. These are the moments Immanuel--God with us--came for. They are the moments that make us eligble for His grace.

The moments when we say,
"Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me..."
But the darkness will not master light.
"...even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is as light to you."
(Psalm 139:11,12)

And that night was a mess, but it was indeed a holy night in my kitchen.
Oh, holy night, the stars were brightly shining. It is the night of our dear Savior's birth.
It was holy not because I felt like the serene images of Mary--hair long, clothed in pallid blue, halo over head--but because Immanuel is brighter than the darkness that overwhelms.

And the wise men followed a star that moved as they moved, guiding them to Ultimate Light.
And I too can follow The Light of Men, follow Him from darkness into light.

I cleaned in silence, wiping away the mess of my own making--my haste, my rushing. It isn't the repercussions, the ramifications, the ripple effects that are altered by the light. It is in the heart that walks through the ramifications--the valleys of the shadows of death, the cleaning of compote, the closing of caskets, the calling out to God for wayward children--that Light makes a difference. Immanuel, God with us, God in us who follow Him, is the meaning of hope, the meaning of Joy To The World.

There is not just light at the end of the tunnel, there is light through the tunnel, within us as we pass her cavernous way.

And Christmas is about that light.
It is the slowing time.

The time when we light up a thousand trees and top them with glowing stars. Just the other day I laughed in wonder at God's own light display dripping in my front yard. Not long after dawn He had ladled the dew so heavy on lanky limbs of maple trees that tiny one centimeter balls of liquid luminated the morning while blue birds made their nests nearby. God's own Christmas tree.

And those bulbs would reflect the sun.

Too, I am a reflection of His Light. The reflection of Son light in my home, my neighborhood, my little world. Sometimes a poor one, it is true.

When the floors and walls were cleaned, I stood, still steaming slightly. Emotions don't always dissolve, but they are like the shadow of a monstrous cat that nested in the folds of insulation between the ceiling joists of my unfinished childhood ceiling, that dawn slowly erased.

And when, moments later, mom came I took shelter in the human arms that God sent, the mother's arms who never stops mothering. Because we are human, after all. We need the touching, the telling that all is well.
But my spirit already knew. Immanuel was there.

And this is the hope of Christmas, that darkness will never master light.

There will be no cranberry, blackberry froo froo on my Christmas table this year, but lighted candles there will be.
To remind me.
He is here.
Here.
With Us.
Through it all.
Amen.

Pray with me:
Immanuel, God come down into my messy kitchen, stepping with me across sticky floors. Immanuel. Teach me to see the holiness in every moment.  Teach me to see the burning of your Light when darkness shrouds my soul.  Let me be a display of Your Light to those with greater darkness than my own. Help me to fix my gaze on You that my eyes will be good and my soul will be so full that a shivering world is wormed by your reflection in me. Amen

The Mothering Chronicles 6: The Choosing Time

2011-12-19T02:32:00.002-05:00

I remember still, the first time he consciously, willingly disobeyed. That over seven hundred times the sun had laddered her way to the sky, and the same number of moons had taken the midnight shift for her before he made a choice to take the consequence instead of our advice is really far longer than many parents experience.

"Nathan, if you throw that toy you will have a consequence. You need to listen and choose. Do you understand?" It was Daddy that said those words, and Daddy has always been very clear.
And he did understand. He nodded, turned, and threw the toy.

He knew.
He chose.
He broke my heart.
They get to do that, you know? Get to choose.
They do.

And it can knock the feet from beneath a surefooted person, knock the wind from a fighter, and knock a weaker person out. Period.

Here's the thing with mothering. We don't get to choose for them forever, and the sooner we realize this, the easier it will be when they begin to make real decision for themselves. I've seen some moms, and I'm not gonna lie--I envy them,that wield influence over their children like carrots to rabbits and sweet feed to quarter horses. Their children just live, eat, breathe what their momma lives, eats, breathes. I marvel at them, wonder how they managed it. And secretly, I wonder if it will last.

Because though I'm convinced my own mother could hang the moon with her love of God and faithfulness in life, I just don't think like her. She raised me, nursed me, bathed me, brought me tea and toast when I was sick, prayed--still prays--for me, bought me school clothes, took me to visit colleges, and I have to say, she has a purple and silver Christmas tree. Purple and silver. Never. Will. I. Have. A. Purple. Tree. Never.

We are both fearfully, wonderfully crafted individuals. Individuals.

God did the hand-making of mankind.

No two alike.

Unique.

One of a kinds.

Like infinite etsy.com, humanity consists of the flesh and bone original creations of God. And if that is the case, then I think it is safe to say, at some point, even those mommas who raise little mini-mommas will someday be forced to accept that their little cookie cuts are gonna iron out all those folds that fit them to the pattern of mom or dad and, like wind catching a kite, the breath of their Creator will blow them full of His plan, His design.

And if they get to choose, they also get to break our hearts. They do.

Because they will not always choose what we believe to be the best. They won't always heed our counsel, our warnings, our guidance. Sometimes they'll be right, sometimes they won't.
He's almost twelve now--that little guy that threw the toy ten years ago. I can count on one hand the number of times he has willfully disobeyed since that day. He's a line tower. He's a rule follower. He's a tell-me-what-you-want-and-I-will-do-everything-in-my-power--to-obey kind of guy. So far. But there are no guarantees. No flawless formulas for forever promises.

Just tonight he told me, "Mom, sometimes I get a little annoyed."
"Why's that?"
"Because there are so many Christians, and they know they should help people, know that there are people who don't have enough, but they don't. Why do we always have to be the ones to do it? It's hard giving things up so other people can have."

I knew he wasn't really annoyed--the only thing he gets annoyed with is my sister's cocker spaniel that refuses to follow the rules of dogdom. What he was really talking about was the tug-of-war between selfless and selfish choices. I knew he had Christmas in mind--our family choosing not to go over the top tipping the scales in retail's favor when there are orphans, and parched people without water. I've struggled too. His heart is gripped, like Paul's with the good that he should, and the fact that that good is not exactly what his heart always wants. And I hear him. I understand.

The choice. The choosing of direction in life.  It's his now. Because now, despite what his outward actions may indicate, it is his heart that is deciding what direction it will take. He may fall in line on the outside, but what about his spirit? Where is it walking?

Robert Frost whispered over my shoulder.
"Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference. "

And claiming credit for the thought because really, there is nothing new under the sun, Mathew chimed in with, "Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it." (Mathew 7:13)

There is the reality that our children may choose wrong over right, and I don't want to think about that because it feels like a thousand mice chewing at my heart. Mothering is a guiding of the heart, but there comes a point when the heart will choose its path.

When reading the Christmas story from Mark's gospel, John the Baptist's words got stuck in my mouth. I'm still chewing them. "Prepare ye the way for the Lord." (Mark 1:3)

Could that be the great mandate of mothers, to prepare the way?

Could it really be just that? Mothering?
Preparing the way for the Jesus choice?

We have family coming for Christmas. Our home will, the day before their arrival, be a hive of activity. The final mopping of floors, the sloshing of suds in toilet bowls, the fresh bedding, the special groceries. It seems so simple to prepare the way for guests. They don't stay forever, though. They visit and leave.

With mothering, we're preparing the heart-home for a permanent resident.

Jeff and I designed our home--before the first thrusting and heaving of 6X6 wall ever occurred, we knew every single centimeter, every corner, every closet. But we didn't design our children's hearts. Their hearts are like buying a home sight unseen. I remember once when my dad sold real estate, a lady who, I think came from California, bought a house without having ever been through it. She showed up, with her kids, her husband, her grand piano, and her home made toffee that stuck to dad's dentures and nearly choked him to death, without the slightest idea what it was really like here. It's that way when our own burst free from womb-water into hands that hunger to hold forever. We don't know their hearts. We weren't the designers.

To prepare them, we must know them.

To know them, we must be with them, spend time, get low on the floor, get scuffed, get muddied, get dirty, get bored--Candy Land is only exciting the first five hundred times you play. Then later, to continue to know them, we must watch football when we'd rather be quilting, have a tea-party when we'd rather be watching football, and stay up until four in the morning because they get talkative at midnight.

It's in the mundane, the hard, that we discover the closets and corners of their hearts.

But it is dangerous territory--the heart knowing. Because it leads to heart-loving, and there is a fine line between heart-love and heart-control, and our Father knows the line, shows the line. He loves perfectly and with perfect love comes the freedom of choice. He gives us that freedom.

And, when they are ready, we must give it to our children. The freedom to choose.

Sometimes it will be like standing before a magnificent orchestra--they are the players, and we are the audience--every note on key. But other times, they are the waterfall, and we are crushed beneath the rush of their choosing. We'll lose our breath, and it will hurt. Hurt to let them choose wrong. Hurt to see them live the consequences. Hurt to stand back when our muscle memory insists on running to rescue because that is what mothers do. Rescue.

For a season.

Preparing the way begins with rescues, but eventually, it involves letting them tumble, letting them wrestle with the tough thinking, the mom-sometimes-I'm-annoyed-kind-of-thinking. The kind of thinking that is heart-path choosing.

Mothering is preparing the way for the greatest choice they will ever make. Will they allow Jesus as their permanent resident?

Essentially, Jesus did that with the disciples. He prepared the way for them to accept Him as their Messiah.
He spent time. He told them stories in a language they understood. He ate with them, slept near them, prayed around them. He trusted God before their eyes. He wrestled with God's will in His life to the point of bleeding, broken capillaries, and ultimately said, "If it is possible, let this cup pass, nevertheless, not my will but thine." (Matthew 26:42)

In preparing the way, He surrendered His will.
The prepared heart has born witness to a parent's surrendered heart. And that sentence is like The Great Wall of China before me--there's no getting around it. To prepare my boys' hearts, I must be surrendered myself.

Surrendered to His plans for them. His purposes for them. His ways for them. His care of them. His love for them.

Because whether or not I can see or understand them, His are all better than mine. Are they not?
As for God, His way is perfect; The word of the LORD is tried; He is a shield to all who take refuge in Him. (Psalm 18:30)

Choices. They will have them. But so do I. And the thing I'm discovering in mothering is this: If my goal is to prepare the way for God's perfect way, I must first live out the belief that His way is, indeed, perfect. They will know He is trustworthy by the proof of my life.

After he--that little boy who barely needs to wear deodorant and yet wrestles with choosing a yielded life or a self-centered life--went to sleep, I lingered long by his side. I cried for the past, and I cried for the future.
"God, I want him to want you always. Want your ways. I want him to agree, to see that Your way is joy, life, that it will make all the difference."

I am a shield to all who take refuge in Me.

"It is so hard, Lord, to trust You with this child.  It is so hard to let him make his own decisions, form his own opinions. Help me, Father, to let You woo Him to Yourself. Help me to trust the mind You molded in him, help me to hold him with hands opened."

I won't have the privilege of choosing forever for these that God has forged through the love of mother and father. None of us get that privilege.  So, in our mothering, we must prepare the way of the heart-home for a resident who will care more completely, wield greater wisdom, and love to fulfill fully all their soul-longings.

It's a gut wrenching task.

But along the way, there is a fulfilling of our great soul-longings too. And mothering becomes receiving.
Receiving the loving of Father.

And in receiving, we're freed to free them.
To free them to receive him.
We'll be unraveled, but He is the Great Weaver of life.

Pray with me:
God, when it comes to mothering, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. And grant me trust in Your unwavering commitment, unfailing love for my children. Help me to prepare the way. Help me to receive from you, Peace. Amen.

Just Jesus

2011-12-17T10:41:00.001-05:00

"Auntie Sarah, baby Jesus is missing from our manger scene." It was my niece, face the shade of almond skin--the one that never misses anything, but she was missing this.
"Oh, yeah? Really? Where'd he go?" It is true, I wasn't fully listening; a list of to-do's plugged my ears and numbed my heart, and I was deaf. And aren't so many Christians deaf to this truth--that it is sometimes US, those that are supposed to have Him, that are in fact missing Him?
"That's just it; we don't know. He's missing."
"Who?" Mmmhmm. That was me, asking who when she'd already told me. "Jesus?" And isn't it true that so many of US, that are supposed to know who, forget WHO this season is about?
"Yes, Auntie! He's missing from our manger scene."
And like waking from one of those falling dreams, I felt I'd hit the floor; truth had her foot to my throat. Because we lose Jesus at Christmas, don't we? We never mean to do it. But somehow, though He is the centerpiece, He becomes small.
Her ceramic Jesus was missing from the nativity. Jesus missing at Christmas. Of all the pieces of painted porcelain, how could one lose the focal point? Why not a shellacked sheep or shepherd? But Jesus?

Every year, four scraggly sisters and I took turns tipping our toes and stretching arms to reach the mantel top where we placed a member of the milk-white nativity on a stable floor of black velvet scrap. And Jesus was shorter than my pinky finger. But mom never lost Jesus. He was always present, when she pried back cardboard boxes and unwrapped tissue paper padding, waiting to be placed up high for all to take in.

He's there this year too, in a blanket of ceramic straw atop the same midnight velvet on the same mantel. But that's not the Jesus she never lost. Hers is the living Jesus, the one who reigns in her heart--the one from whose offered cup of living water, she's awoken every morning of my life to drink. And in my haste to accomplish and make progress, I've thought more than once that perhaps for just one day she could suspend her routine. But when my honey-hay haired niece told me she was missing Jesus, I swallowed hard the glob of doughy truth. I miss Him too--miss Him at every turn. He's not just in the stable, or on the mantle, he's in that sweet girl's chocolate cheeks, in my boys' laughter squeaking like clarinet in beginner's mouth, He's in the strong back of my husband when he carries a patient from home to ambulance. He is present when husband and fellow fire-fighter drive home, and the car a few feet in front is stopped dead, and His hands cushion as they miss by inches, and though husband's hands shake, His remain steady. Jesus in a manger; Jesus on the highway.
Emmanuel.
God with us.
He's everywhere, and I miss Him.
And Herod too missed Him, hunted Him, wanted to destroy Him, had babies murdered in an attempt to eliminate him, but how can one destroy what they cannot see? And Herod couldn't see. Herod hungered for the worship of mankind, and I hunger for autonomy in my life, but I can't have it both ways. I must choose--no one can serve two masters.  And come now, how many of us want it both ways--especially at Christmas?And if I want Jesus, I must choose to lay aside my agenda long enough to notice Him, to drink from His living water.
John said, "Prepare the way for the Lord," (Matthew 3:3b) and I wonder if I have prepared the way for Him this Christmas season.
The Jesse Tree
The Christmas Tree
The Birthday Cake
The Cantata
The Nursing Home Visits
The Elijah's Closet Toy Ministry
Surely I've made the season about Him, haven't I?
But He isn't in a list, He IS the list. John said prepare the way for Him because it is HE who IS THE WAY for life. And when the Hebrews used that word, way, they meant a well-worn path, a dependable route.  It is He is that well-worn, that dependable route. He is the firm footing for my fluttering size eights.  He is the box that holds all the great gifts, and yet, like the drum set your thirteen year old boy wants for Christmas, He is unwrappable, uncontainable.
My weary eyes have read a thousand tales telling me I need new things this season. A Kinect 360, a Droid phone, more apps, a red toaster because black and stainless are not nearly as pretty anymore, Christmas sweaters knit and pearled by some machine that can't give life. The flyers faint with the weight of all the stuff. And how can my life be so full and yet, without Him, it is empty? Because in Him is fullness of joy.
"You lead me in the path of life; I experience absolute joy in your presence; you always give me sheer delight." (Psalm 16:11)
I can't help but think how many Christmas sermons I've heard, how many devotions I've read, and my mind is saturated with their refrain, but I desire to be squeezed free of the myriad of mantras, like confetti crowding my mind, so that I can see clearly. See just Him. Just Jesus.
Is He really worth all this fuss? Does He really make a difference? Tell me, fellow followers, is it true? Is there really absolute joy--absolute--in His presence? Sheer delight? Really? Because if that's true, than it is no wonder my mother, body aching in exhaustion with the raising of five girls by herself, climbed the morning with the sun to greet her Jesus day after day, year after year.
Errands took longer than I hoped this week, and I treated the boys and myself to a quick bite at a fast food spot. Who am I kidding? I dallied with the doing of errands until stomachs demanded supper--I'd had a hankering for a Buffalo Bleu Chicken Salad for weeks. But when I got home, I couldn't even get the groceries inside before I ran for glass and water. Thirsty. Junk always leaves you thirsty. And so do the other paths in life--they leave us soul thirsty, a condition beyond parched.
Drained.
Dehydrated.
Desperate.
And I have drank from rancid wells in my life, but this absolute joy is not that kind of cistern. The Hebrew word literally means satiety--the condition of being satiated. To be satisfied.
Just to be satisfied. That in itself would be such a gift this season.  And my thoughts agree, "Yes, to be satisfied in my marriage, in my home, with my physical appearance, with my children's progress in school, with our lot in life, with...."
No.
No?
No, I am the way.
In My presence is absolute/fullness of joy.
I give sheer delight.
Already I missed Him. Started hunting for wise men and shepherds. Satisfied with this, content with that. There is no satisfaction apart from the baby in the manger, the person of Jesus. He is the way to satisfaction. Satisfied with Jesus can be a permanent condition when all other things will drive me to further thirst. Everything else is a Dead Sea, and like a flopping fish my life will float to the surface because joy doesn't survive in salted waters.
When Mary, mother-to-be arched her back in labor pains, the inns were filled with travelers on their way to be counted. And Jesus would not be born among the counted because you cannot count Him. You cannot contain Him. You cannot contain the kind of satisfaction, of joy He grants. It is infinite. It is satiety.
And I see that it is not He who is missing, it is we who are missing Him.
And it is not just this season that He desires to be seen. It is not just this one month, when carols call His name and candles are lit, when mistletoe is hung and hearts are tender, that He pours out living water while we swallow eggnog instead.
He came that we would have life abundantly, more than just life in December. His Kingdom is in our hearts and Peace can reign all our days, if we drink from His cup. Jesus on the mantel, all year. Never lost because He is never removed from His rightful Home. And all the world's a stable and wherever I go, the manger is before me. Jesus while I fold five thousand loads of laundry, Jesus while I rejoice over a miracle for my Aunt, Jesus while I weep over the separation of body and soul of a boy so young, Jesus while foreclosure court dates loom, Jesus when children leave for college and choose spouses. Jesus.

Jesus, remaining on my mantel this year because "Better is one day in your courts, than thousands elsewhere."(Psalm 84:10).
Days ago I woke slow and on my way to coffee, my morning accelerator, I stopped to look out the backdoor. An indigo bunting perched on the naked arms of some spent shrub in my garden. She was like a wild blueberry that somehow survived harvest just for this moment. This moment when I stop and see Him. Jesus dropping in for coffee and living water. Jesus saying, "I am the way, I am here. I am joy. Do you see me wearing clothing you can understand? Do you see me perching my creativity for your pleasure?"
And I do.
See Him.
I do.
Pray with me:
Jesus, teach me to slow down more, to lull and pause, to wait and wonder, to anticipate your appearance. Teach me to seek You in the nativities of my life. Teach me to discern when I am drinking from salted wells instead of your living water. Thank you for clothing yourself in the form I could understand, the human form. Let me live the Christmas season all year long. Amen.

A Way Up In The Rain

2011-12-06T23:12:00.009-05:00

The rain started before my feet touched the frigid wooden planks and fell full and wet long after sleeping heads nestled in feathery pillows that night.

"I haven't had a very good day," my youngest one mumbled.

"Why not?" I turned from the kitchen though it clamored still for my attention.

"Because it is just gloomy, mom. It's a gloomy day."

Gloomy. Those days come, don't they? The ones when life is a constant downpour and our soaking, socked feet slosh in puddles that rise like bread dough until we are swimming/treading and praying for the rains to cease. One minute my neighbor was scrubbing, the next she was slipping, dislocating her shoulder, wearing a sling, aching in shrill pain. One moment. And the next moment brought the storm.

I've known these moments well--the day when wedding rings held no more value than the plastic ones in dime store toy machines and vows became subject to change. Rain. Sometimes the rain is our tears and our hearts drown beneath them as they soul pelt. And I've heard the cries of sisters, of brothers begging God to make the gloom stop. The burying of child--life never lived. The tumor that swells like a savage balloon beneath a skull that cannot contain the expansion. The locking of doors that once held home, the giving of keys to a bank that insists it no longer belongs to them.

Jacob knew the rain too. It came because of his doing--as so many storms do in my own life. I choose wrong and rain pours. He tricked his brother out of his birthright. His brother wanted to kill him. I'd say that classified as cloudy with a chance of torrential downpours. So he sought refuge on a journey to his Uncle Laban's. I can't help but think how often I seek refuge in a person when The Refuge and Strength stands, arms open.When he stopped to sleep along the way, he had a dream. It's the dream the toys are made for--the Jacob's ladders. He dreamt of a stairway to heaven. In the dream God spoke to him, telling him he would have as many children as there was dust on the ground, that He would protect him, bring him back to this land, and never leave him until He accomplished all He promised.

When Jacob awoke he said these beautiful words. "Surely the Lord is in this place, but I did not realize it!" Thirteen words strung like pearls into a sentence for all mankind, and I have missed it until this morning when the rain slapped windows and caused the sky to droop grey with its weight. Then, amidst the dusky morning they glowed on the page--a light in the gloom. The Lord is in the place of danger, the place of running, of hiding, of seeking refuge.

Surely, surely the Lord is in this place. And I didn't realize. We never see Him in the rain, do we? We forget He is present in all places, at all times.

And God asks,

"Do you people think that I am some local deity and not the transcendent God?"

I have to be honest and say that sometimes my mind may know that He is an ever present help in times of trouble, but my heart thinks He isn't there.

"Do you really think anyone can hide himself where I cannot see him?"

I sometimes think I'm not worth finding, not worth seeking, so why would this great, worthy God bother with a worthless me?

"Do you not know that I am everywhere?" The Lord asks. (Jeremiah 23:23-24)

Everywhere. Did I not realize it?

I didn't.

I don't.

Not always.

But He is.

Everywhere.

He is.

He is present when the toddler rages, spews hurt and pain, and we want to scream with them because we just don't know how to raise them, and parenting is harder than we thought it would be, and we would like a refund, please. He is present when adult child chooses wrong, and leaves aging mother bent in anguish. He is present when the Ugandan child we kept goes home, and I can't be there to help him through life, can't be there to see that he is fed, can't be there to shelter him from a country that is desert and desolate. He is present.

And doesn't His presence change everything?

Because if He is present and He is good and His love endures forever, then there are love and goodness in the murky, moving rain.

And if He is present, and He is a strong tower and He is the Prince of Peace, then there are strength and peace to clothe us when our soul shivers in pelting storms.

And if He is present than we can "consider it nothing but joy when we fall into all sorts of trials" because He takes all things and forms them for our ultimate good. All things.

And if He is present than we can "in all things give thanks" because He is in it and so it must be in some unutterable, unfathomable way be good.

"We needed the rain, son," I told him gently. "Remember those tulip bulbs you helped me to plant yesterday? And the daffodils? A little rain helps their roots grab hold."

It does, doesn't it? A little rain helps our roots to grab hold of The Anchor of our souls. We need the strong, right arm of our Father, need to grab hold. Sometimes we need the rain to force the hand, force it to reach deeper into His love, His grace, His mercy.

I remember a day a couple weeks back when the rains came. It was the same boy that went digging in his drawers for summer's swim trunks. I wondered where he'd gone when I didn't hear him for a few minutes. But every mother knows that rain in November and swimming trunks out can only mean one thing. I looked out into the yard for the rain-catcher. He was there--at the peak of the apple tree. Branches lifting, carrying, supporting him, he'd climbed it. A way up in the rain.

"Where can I go to escape your spirit? Where can I flee to escape your presence?

If I were to ascend to heaven, you would be there.

If I were to sprawl out in Sheol, there you would be.

If I were to fly away on the wings of the dawn,

and settle down on the other side of the sea,

even there your hand would guide me,

your right hand would grab hold of me.

If I were to say, "Certainly the darkness will cover me,

and the light will turn to night all around me,

even the darkness is not too dark for you to see,

and the night is as bright as day;

darkness and light are the same to you.

Certainly you made my mind and heart,

you wove me together in my mother's womb.

I will give you thanks..."

(Psalm 139:7-14a)

I will give thanks, even for life-rain.

Pray with me: Surely, Lord, you are here. Even now. You are present. Teach me to stop and remember You are present when it hurts, You are present when it is all good, You are present and I give You thanks. Thanks for the rain. Lengthen, strengthen my roots, Father. Let me feel your arms, making the way up while rains fall.

The Chreestmas Boys--When Less Becomes More

2011-11-27T23:04:00.010-05:00

Little shades of brown in itchy blue oxfords wiggling, squirming, inching and us--almond milk skin, hair any shade we choose, and clothes any style that suits. We make small talk among ourselves and grin-gaze across the room at khaki pants and collars colored sky. We wait. Somebody's doing paperwork, and it seems like we're waiting an hour. They eye us cautiously, but familiar. They've done this before. We eye them, giddy. We're all thinking the same thoughts. Which one is ours? Which sweet thing do we get to take home and love on?

And maybe they were thinking too. Will I have a bed tonight or will I sleep on a pallet? Will I share or have my own? What will they feed me? Will the house be too worm? Will it be too cold? Are there dogs at the new home? I'm afraid of dogs. Will their children be nice to me? And it's me that finally asks because it doesn't seem natural for us to sit and stare--they're humans after all, not puppies. Can we talk to them?

Then there's an explosion of bodies, mixing, asking, helloing, and we're all on the floor with them--red and yellow, black and white. Hands shaking hands, ears straining to understand accents not native, and all of us smiling to tell them in the universal language that we are kind, we are safe, we will love them.

A few weeks prior, I asked him if we could host two boys from Children of the World. (http://www.worldhelp.net/cotw/) He's my husband; he knows my heart has rooms for a thousand more children. He knew it would impact us. It did. How can you invite two children from impoverished circumstances into your lives for a few days and NOT expect your hearts to be sliced just a little? We would give them the boys' beds; we would skip school on Monday, spend the day spoiling these little lives. We did that. We are still bleeding.

The man in charge enters the room, papers in fist--a list of rules--all of them designed for the children's comfort and protection.

Don't ask about their past.

But I want to know. I want to know just what it is they will return to. I want to know if they will make it into adulthood. I want to know if they have a mother waiting for them. Is she burying face in pillow at night crying out the raw loss of giving up her little boy for ten whole months? Is she praying he'll learn English well enough to give him a better chance in life? Is she wondering about him while I carry his suitcase--a Jenson containing everything he has in the entire world--to my hybrid? I look at night sky and tell her--heart speaking to heart--I'll be good to him. I understand he's precious cargo. And I long to hold her too, that sweet mother born in a world where her options were so few that separation from the child she grew within would be the sacrifice demanded of her.

Maybe it is me the rules are made to protect. Perhaps my heart would crush beneath the weight of the truth.

They travel the United States for the flipping of ten calendar pages and sing--a choir of needs and hopes in children's frames--to promote awareness, to get sponsors. They sing for their lives.

Water you turned into wine...

They sing these words--they that come from a world with no water, while mine flows freely from 7 different taps at any temperature I desire.

Open the Eyes of the blind.

And it is me that is blind--blind to the needs of the world. Blinded by my own wants, by a country whose God is their stomach, by a media that insists I need everything on sale on Black Friday and Cyber Monday, and my online shopping carts are filled. My stomach is engorged, and I am blind. Open my eyes.

They are hungry. They are thirsty, and they sing about the God who is greater, the God that turns water--that precious thing they walk three hours one way for--into wine for wedding feasts.

God, you are higher than any other.

They sing and I wonder if they understand.

But they do. They understand more than I do. It is I who will learn this week.

If our God is for us, than who could ever stop us?

And If our God is with us, than what could stand against?

I wonder if it is I, a part of North American selfishness, that has stood against what God wanted to do. Could He have used me to share. Did I stand against these sweet children while I filled my closets and my stomach. Were they stumbling over dusty paths with parched tongues like double sided tape while I quenched my thirst with the flick of an oil rubbed bronze tap?

We travel home; the conversation is hard. I don't know what to ask--me, the girl who always has something to say. They respond with "yes" to everything leaving me aching for their true thoughts, their true opinions. My own boys know exactly where they want to eat, and the olive and the black skinned children are just 'yessing' me no matter what I suggest. Yes to ice cream. Yes to McDonald's. Yes to eating at the house. Yes to rice. Yes to juice. Yes to water. Yes to chocolate milk. Yes. Yes. Yes. And then, I hear it--a gasp in word form. The olive skinned one with buzz cut says, "The lights. I love the lights!" His exclamation was a whisper unused to expressing itself.

This one likes the Christmas lights. He thinks. He feels.

And he sings for his life. For the life of others and probably doesn't know the luxury of expressing his own opinions and ideas. But He likes lights; I heard the gasp. Without hesitation, I start driving to town Square where our tree is lit up, lighted holly and poinsettias dangle from lampposts. I drive by every single house I know of that is lit all the way home. He utters and exclaims, and I point left, and my own boys point right, and we are all in awe of the light.

Jesus says, I am their light. These that know the greatest darkness receive The Light readily because they're not blinded by the gaudy light of the world like I am. They see Him. They exclaim over Him.

Christmas music seeps from the speakers into the car, and I sing a bar--a note here and there to fill the empty spaces. They are timid; I hurt at their silent moments. Are they afraid to speak? Do they know the lady whose car in which they ride would keep them forever if she could? Do they understand that she is suffocating sobs because she knows what it is to love a boy, and there are two who just might need that loving bumping shoulders in her back seat? Do they know that were they to cry she would hold them until the night ended? The music is throbbing from the speakers and Drummer Boy begins. I turn the volume up and palm flat I bang the beat onto the console, "Uganda, do you know this one? It's perfect for you! It's the Drummer Boy! Can you hear the drum?" He hears it. He begins the rhythm with me. My boys join in. And we are an international percussion section united by a rhythm we all understand. Shall I play for you pah rum puh pum pum beats air and our hands are bang bang banging on any surface we can find. I wonder which is louder, the beating of my hand or the beating of my heart.

The song ends and we are happy, laughing. Their smiles are electricity; my boys are feeling the shock. We want them to smile enough for a lifetime. Can we give them enough to last? Away In a Manger begins. They recognize it, tell me it is their carol. They sing it. The tune is a little different. We laugh when we all mess it up. But there was no crib for his bed and I wonder what bed they will return to. When the second verse begins I am dumbstruck. Bless all the dear children in thy tender care. Where has that line been my entire life? How many times have I sung those lyrics and not prayed them, not understood I was asking Jesus to bless ALL the children? All of them, in his tender care. All of them. Even these. These two that for forty-eight ridiculously short hours will be mine to give smiles, laughter, joy. The remainder of their lives will be in his tender care. Can I accept His tender care as sufficient?

And how can I sing the words, ask Him to bless, but turn my own eyes away when they leave? What if it is through me He wants to bless them? What if it is through you? http://www.worldhelp.net/cotw/sponsor/

But what if it is me He wants to bless through them? It is He who turned water into wine. He doesn't need my pennies to drill wells and deliver rice. They don't need me--their God is greater--it is I who needs them. I need their need in order to be freed. It is I who needs to be freed from the American Dream--the I-can-have-it-all mentality of North America. Because you can have it all, and have nothing at all.

As they vie for nomination, the republicans debate the status of a country where once an immigrant could cross crashing cloudy seas to make his fortune. They insist we should return to our great economic state, but I mourn the reality that we are among the world's wealthiest ten percent and yet we want more, better, faster, mightier. And children are hungry. My heart knows there is no answer a President can bring, that true change doesn't occur from the top down, but from within to without. From within my heart, my children's hearts. From selfish to selfless to Christ-filled to hungry children filled.

I remember James' words, Grieve and mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. (James 4:9) I understand him. Be broken, he said. See things for what they really are. See them in light of Jesus' heart. The New Living Translation says, "Let there be sadness for what you have done...." Yes, let there be sadness for a life of selfishness, and let their be an anchoring of my soul this day. Let me be pierced deeply enough to leave a scar. Let me bleed a while that I might be left with weakness for those who have less.

Words we mulled on after dinner during memory time pulse in my spirit. Do not accumulate for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal. But accumulate for yourselves treasures in heaven where moth and rust do not destroy, and thieves do not break in and steal. I wonder if it is possible to have both? It isn't wrong to have possessions, is it? But the ones that I choose to store--meaning to keep for the future--should not be physical. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. And I want my heart hunger to be eternal, not temporal. But the catalogues come in the mail. There is a new cell phone out that would make my life easier. There is a better gaming system that would surely mean family fun. And our BBQ is now 13 years old; is not that old enough to merit a new one for Christmas? The eye is the lamp of the body. So, the things I see then, the things I choose to see, to focus on will cast light for my entire body, my life. If then your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is diseased, your whole body will be full of darkness. And mine has diseases that cause blindness. Our nation too, needs bifocals. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness! No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money. (Matthew 6:10-24 There it is in black and white--we can't serve both. We may have both, but we cannot serve both. We will be a house divided. We will eventually collapse under the pressure of two lords. But perhaps what I want is less that I may gain more. And if I left the grill to sit with all the other BBQ's at Home Depot and bought 3 goats instead http://goh.worldhelp.net/goats/ then 3 families would have milk--nutrition, and an income. And wouldn't that be more for me too? More for my children too? Wouldn't the nourishing of 3 families who have never owned a BBQ and cook their rice three times a day over an open fire with scraps of garbage as fuel become food for my family's soul?

My oldest is working on writing his life's purpose statement. He lamented to me, "Mom, sometimes I've been thinking about my life's purpose, and I see that a lot of things don't line up with it."

"It's hard, isn't it?" I look into his creek-water eyes and wish I could raise a boy to live the easy life, a boy that could take the road more traveled.

"Yes, it's the broken life." We've talked about this--broken living. It's the better way to take communion, we believe. There is a time for the wafers and juice, but we find that we remember Jesus better by breaking ourselves--stepping outside of what is comfortable. Giving up a meal, feeding homeless families, hugging powdery seniors' necks at nursing homes--things not comfortable for raggedy, rough boys--are a part of our family communions.

"Remember Jesus? It had to be hard for him watching his brothers and sisters growing up doing their own thing while He knew He would be breaking loaves and fishes, walking amongst the poor, the diseased, hanging from a cross. He lived to redeem. Lived broken so we could be whole."

"Yes. He probably didn't always enjoy that." My son relates to the idea of Jesus as a boy.

"When we give up here, we gain later. Those who live poor in spirit inherit the Kingdom of heaven."

"But we'll be rich in a better way in heaven, mom. That's what it means about storing up treasures in heaven. We'll have that in eternity." He knows. He gets it. He holds my hand and I look deep into his riverbed eyes--the pupils water smoothed pebbles--and love him.

The Ugandan and Philippine boy slept the last two nights in another host home, but they were with us still. We carry them now. We carry their people, their families, their thirst. A Christmas tree towers over ten feet tall in my living room--the room that only weeks ago I lamented being too small to host the homeschool mom's Christmas party, the room that when they entered, they exclaimed It is so big, Auntie! I had thought they would enjoy seeing the shiny decorations. Playfully, I wrapped one in strands of crimson wooden cranberries. "I'm a Chreestmas boy, Auntie! A Chreestmas boy," he had exclaimed.

Indeed, he is a Christ-boy. In his face I see a hundred thousand faces--hunger, pain, thirst, need, loneliness. Those were the real reasons Christ came, weren't they? The real reasons for all our merry making this time of year are about what we can give, not what we will receive.

Open my eyes, Father. Leave me bleeding a while longer. Let them linger in my heart--The Chreestmas boys. Amen.

http://www.worldhelp.net/ http://www.compassion.ca/

Embers--The Lifting of Stooped Shoulders

2011-11-18T20:59:00.010-05:00

His lips were reduced to a single slip of pink embroidery thread--a thin line holding back a torrent of tears--when he came. Already, he had thrown the Newton's cradle, a tangled knot of weighted silver balls and fishing line, into the bulging garbage can. In full resignation he announced, "It's broken; we can't fix it this time." Shoulders stooped, his head drooped, and his eyes filled with drips he refused to let flow. Bent over. My boy. And I saw the words, none of them eloquent, all of them embers in the furnace of hope. The Lord...lifts up all who are bent over." (Psalm 145:14) Life bends us over sometimes. It just does. A single slip of hand had sent Cort's hard earned Newton's Cradle soaring through the air where a thousand invisible fingers worked together to tie and tangle the lines so that they were spaghetti, and his heart couldn't bare it all. Holding his rescued wreckage in calloused palms, I thought of my own tangles--the motor in our car that gave up with Christmas around the corner. I thought of the family who saw the soil cover the coffin this week, the neighbor who went from blowing leaves off her deck to immobile in less than a week. I remembered my sister's text telling me a baby where she works died. Another boy overdosed. Life bends, and bends, and bends. My hands held a child's set of knots, but in my heart there grows the knots of a lifetime--a mass of death, divorce, tumors, and billowing bills. Some my own. Some others. All twisting, turning, touching my spirit, whispering, Bend. And that word bend? It means to submit--to bend before a King. And how is it that it is life that causes us to bend when we say we are followers of the King of Kings? How is it that we slump our shoulders and stoop our hearts to the overwhelming flood that gushes when the King of Kings says, "The Lord is near all who cry out to him," (Psalm 145:18) And when did we start crying instead of crying out to the God who is near? Lord, help me to bend to you, that you might lift me up. Show me how to bend to you and not the circumstances. What if we purpose to bend to the King when life demands we bend to it? Daniel danced this waltz--the one where he bends to the one true God. The decree was that no one would pray to any human or God other than King Darius. That was the decree. Bend. Bend to another, not your God. And Daniel bent. He bent to his God offering prayers and thanks. The situation was dire. Surely he knew he risked his body to the shredding of lion's teeth. Yet he bent. He prayed. He thanked. Scripture says, "just as he had been accustomed to do previously."(Daniel 6:11) He was in a familiar pattern where bending to the Sovereign God was his habit. And I think of my own habits. I examine them next to Daniels'. Why, when difficulty bares her jagged teeth do we bend to her when our God remains enthroned? Don't we realize all the raging universe is on a leash? "The Lord has established his throne in heaven; his kingdom extends over everything." Psalm 103:19 Everything. Extends over everything. Extends over the suffocating moment when we know our child is no longer present in their earthly frame. Extends over the moment when husband of twenty years walks out, and we are left murmuring a thousand times, "Don't leave." Extends over the negative bank account, extends over the day when the sun climbs into the sky and you realize you've chased a dollar your entire life and yet have nothing. Extends to the babies in Haiti at the orphanage where they haven't had rice for three days. In His kingdom, His subjects, we are. Even the suffering ones? Even the destitute ones? Yes, even them. And even the bravest of us, the most-determined-to-not-question Him of us all must sometimes admit we want to know. Why? Why then, if we are all His subjects, must we be bent? Why, Oh Great King, do you sit back when children starve? Why do you let young ones die and old ones wither? Why do you allow the wars and the pain? I am just an untangler of human knots, the child-sized spider's webs, not the great universal utterings that together become a theological loftiness beyond the reach of my 67 inches. But still, I hear mankind's murmur--a low mumble at first, and then the fields sway, and the trees flail and I hear them all together--a chorus of questions. "He is the one...who heals all your diseases, who delivers your life from the pit, who crowns you with his loyal love and compassion, who satisfies your life with good things...executes justice for all the oppressed." (Psalm 103:3-6) Now hear me whisper here because I don't mean to tread toes, I only mean to explore our hearts in truth. What if the promise for healing isn't always realized in this parenthesis we call life? What if it comes on an eternal timetable our human minds can't fathom? And what if it isn't our finances He delivers from the pit but our very life--the heart that is freed to make good decisions with the resources we have? What if we still see foreclosure, but our spirit is unchained from the pit of self indulgence and greed, from the sense of entitlement that insisted we needed that mortgage in the first place? What if while our white knuckled hands wring the empty swaddling blanket we sense the Holy Spirit lullaby that soothes our sorrow in His loyal love, in His compassion? What if it still hurts, but He's present? What if justice for the Haitian, the Ecuadorian, the African orphans comes when eternity is revealed? What if pain is sometimes the precursor to joy? What if His ways are higher than ours? What if we bend to the unknown of God's ways? I thought about quitting. That darn Newton's Cradle took me almost an hour to unknot. We waited six weeks on China to ship us that $4.99 desk oddity, and somehow I knew it was more than a proof of Newton's laws. But those embers--The Lord lifting up those who are bent over--they were still burning in my heart. I had to lift the shoulders of my boy because really, when he threw that toy in the garbage and told me it was hopeless, he still had the embers too. He hadn't given up. He'd come to me, hadn't he? He'd hoped. He'd hoped that maybe, just maybe mommy could take the tangles and sort them out, piece by piece. I won't always be able to do that for him. But he'll know, won't he, that I still love him? That day, when the mess is too big, and the circumstances aren't going to be changed by the keyboard clicking pads of mommy's fingertips? On that day, he'll still know he is loved. I'll grieve, and I'll ache, and I'll swallow forkfuls of swollen angst as I watch the day I can't make things better for him. It is somehow the same with God--those who suffer greatest are the most deeply attended by the heart of God. The promise is not that He will fix the Newton's Cradle, not that He will shift the continents of our lives into alignment, but that He supports all who fall, and lifts all who are bent over. Supports ALL. Lifts ALL. Extends over ALL. What, my friends is your ALL? Because there is a decree demanding you bend to that ALL. Can you name it ALL? God gave Adam the chore of naming. We too must name, both the good and the bad. Now can you turn your back on ALL that you have named? Can you turn your eyes upon Jesus? Can you go to Him and bend before His ways, before His goodness, before His mercy, before His compassion, before his purpose? Can you bend to Him? Because if you can, He will lift you up. "Now unto Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all we ask or imagine...." (Eph. 3:20) "And we know that all things work together for good..."(Romans 8:28) Hope burns not because the world is right, but because the God who made the world remains right. And He will never let go. It has been written and sung more beautifully than I can express. Will you click and listen? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kRaF4DI5Sg&feature=share

The Mothering Chronicles 5: Of Mustard Seeds and Faith

2011-11-09T15:13:00.009-05:00

"It's impossible for me to have self control. I can't do it no matter how hard I try." Beliefs admitted in a current of puddles poured from a hurting heart. Brother gets a Kleenex for our youngest, and I wish it would wipe away more than tears, cleanse him of his doubt. With God ALL things are possible. All things.

Sometimes we call them thunderstorms--they churn and swirl and threaten our peaceful days above the overgrown wheat that shades Corty's eyes. The powerful emotions, the passion, the deep sense of conviction about things that insist on trying to control his tender young heart. And he tries. Oh how he tries. Tries to swallow big gulps of tempers and squelch the downpour of feelings, like Mt. St. Helens, that rage and roar. I know his journey. He is his mother's son. We share in this. Feelings that become mountains. And self-control being a fruit of the Spirit, we are bankrupt at times to conquer the mountains.

At night I pull the downy comfort tight over his shoulders--two bones covered in creamy skin-- and think of amazing grace that covers his raw heart. He feels helpless, not having passed enough days yet to understand what it means to be held in the hands of the Mighty God. Lord, show me how to teach him. Show me how to help him harness his passions for you.

And when, though she has risen, the sun still hides below the mountains beginning to bald now with the season's shedding, I linger long enough between lemongrass sheets to ask again, Lord, wisdom for this day. Wisdom and patience.

After beans are ground, dark elixir brewed, oatmeal spooned to break fasts, we gather to eat The Bread of life. We are wading like fishermen through Paul's letter to the Hebrews. Theology for 9 and 11 year olds, theology for a mother, theology for daddy--we've gotten water in our boots. It's heavy stuff. Daddy's better at it than I, but he's at the station, so it is just mom. I'm relieved when the chapter is 11 and I've eaten these words before. Now faith is being sure of what we hope for, being convinced of what we do not see. (Hebrews 11:1) And I know why it took us over a week longer than I'd planned to pass through this book. He knew. Omniscient. He always knows. He's in the business of ordering our steps if we will but still ourselves long enough to notice. We need the faith chapter on this day.

Faith is being sure of what we hope for. Sure--convinced--no question--without doubt. That's what I say to the boys. But later I look and find it is, in the Greek, a compound word. Hypostasis. I like it for it's ease of pronunciation. A preposition combined with a verb. The preposition telling the verb just where the action will take place. The action is to make stand, to place. The preposition is under. Faith is a state of being in which there is a sure foundation placed under our feet. A sure foundation. I am remembering the cement trucks bringing their sloppy stone soup to our giant square hole we dug from the side of the hill--they carried our liquid foundation. Frames had been erected to hold the elephant colored glop until it had hardened. We waited patiently. You can't rush poured concrete as it dries. You can't rush a sure foundation--that thing that sets everything else to rights, that thing that keeps homes level, corners square, walls that don't wave. And faith is that to us--that thing that keeps us level when life is upside down.

Then this other word, so little I almost missed it, what. Being convinced of what we do not see. Spoken in Greek it would have read, "Being convinced of the established fact we do not see."

So this is faith: A sure foundation placed under our feet setting our lives to right, to stability, and the condition of being convinced beyond question of the established facts that we cannot see with our naked eye. Father, give us spiritual eyes to see YOU as an established fact. When we watch the blazing maple catch fire with autumn winds, may we know You are consuming fire. When we listen to the morning dove pair sing sweet serenades may we know you as Love. Let us see with our hearts that the visible has its origin in the invisible. (Heb. 11:3)

Then there is the list--the greats--Noah, Enoch, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Moses. And this, "And these all were commended for their faith, yet they did not receive what was promised." (Heb. 11:39) All those years. Four thousand years of believing, being sure, and yet not one of them actually saw the full fruition of God's promise. So theirs was a life of faith--feet placed with God-facts underneath. Lives built on that.

I fell in love with a farm house perched like a canary on a hillside of honeybees and rabbits tobbaco. If strings were attached to my heart, that farm house gripped them all in her hands and drug me to her, heart first, logical mind second. Patient and wise, my sweet husband walked her floors with me. My dad too, came. Both of them knowing and yet realizing I would have to see reality for myself. She was perfect. Then we looked beneath her heart pine floors. Like a hundred arms with elbows resting on the clay, rocks were stacked, sometimes with shims of wood, sometimes large, other times the size of my husband's fists, 2 feet or so high. Spread at somewhat regular intervals, these ancient piles held the yellow bird atop her perch. How had she stood all these years? When "structural re-engineering" came up the strings were snipped, and I comforted myself with extensive photographs--I could replicate her. Still, I can't help but think somehow that house stood though her foundation appeared crazy to the logical mind. It was a sure fact the naked eye couldn't see as sensible, but somehow she stood a couple hundred years.

And I have a son who says, "It just isn't possible, mommy." He's looking with the naked eye. But Jesus said, "I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a grain of mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you." (Matt.17:20) And I am thinking, How small then, must our faith be? And my young one is thinking his faith must require a microscope to view because he can't control his emotions. And I'm thinking about the big things. Bills. Raising rowdy boys to be mighty men. Staying married when my parents didn't make it past 17 years. Educating my children in a way that goes against the norms. Are they learning enough? Can I really do this? And the friend who knows that everyday with her son is the last day he will have that much physical capability because Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy has taken up residence within the frame of his flesh and bone. The mother and father who have spent nearly 2 months gripping the railing of some hospital bed wondering if their daughter will recover from the accident. Faith the size of a mustard seed. Surely our faith is that large, and yet we don't move mountains, we don't see healings all the time.

I remember the dear one who just passed through the cancer cadence and though she is whole, she was made so by medical technology. What of mustard seed faith? I think, then, of the charm my grandmother passed to me. A marble sized sphere of glass, one side spider's web cracked, the other in tact and suspended in its center, a mustard seed. A mustard seed to dangle on a chain about my neck. God knows no accidents, and He knows I need to see what Jesus meant when he spoke of mustard seeds and faith. I've always felt it a piercing truth that mine is smaller than the charm I wear.

But today, as hazel almond eyes and foamy, foggy blue eyes look at me, hurt by what they feel is their inadequate faith, I realize it. I hear it in my spirit. Outside the window there stands a small mountain dressed for Thanksgiving in topaz and cinnamon. They can move that mountain. One shovel at a time. You can move that mountain. One shovel at a time. One shovel. Noah built that boat before he ever saw a drop of rain. The showy miracles were few until the days of Moses. But yet generations believed. Generations of people stood on firm foundations of sure faith. They moved mountains of people to continue to believe one child at a time, one person at a time. Self-Control comes one heart-yielded moment at a time--a small shovel filled with the emotions of a mountain of passion that will one day be used to glorify God. And if the healing comes through radiation, then the mountain to be moved is not the cancer, but the life learning to fully yield. And if the child isn't restored to full health, the faith is not small. The foundation remains sure--but the mountain will not be moved in a single sweep of His strong right arm every time. Sometimes the mountains are in our own souls--the visible mountain is the sickness and it has roots in the invisible heart learning to trust the goodness of God. And maybe the man with greater faith is he whose feet remain planted when the visible miracles don't come, he whose back grows strong with lifting the small shovels of mountain.

And I realize I can't always give these boys perfect answers, easy solutions. Sometimes it is in the shoveling day after day after long raw day that the mountains are moved. All I can offer my children is the sure foundation. Faith. Faith in the God who is able to do immeasurably more than we ask or imagine, the God who is working all things together for our good, the God who is able to keep you from falling, who promises the fruits of His Spirit in our lives, faith that with that very God, ALL things are possible.

An afternoon object lesson seems like the most practical way to take this faith theology and rub it into the fibre of our lives like oil on a leather saddle. We take a bike ride through the mountains--and I see them today as movable. I choose a long hill. I say you can climb it, boys. It is not insurmountable. And they do. And calves burning, hearts quaking at our temples, I whisper, "You did that one foot pushing one pedal down at a time. Look what you climbed. You can develop self-control. One moment at a time. One day at a time. Believe that with your God all things are possible. He won't quit on you; you have faith the size of a mustard seed--maybe even bigger." And mouths smile. And I see that perseverance is faith's best friend.

If we give them faith--a sure foundation--we teach them that their lives are not built on educations, family wealth, knowledge, skills, or even what they may amass, but on the Rock of Ages. Give them faith when they are young, and show them that faith is not just about the miracles that make us cry out in awe, but about the slow and steady trust over measly moments, the winters, the springs, the mountains that make up our lifetimes. And when we fail, my fellow moms, when we fail? That is when we remind them of our own humanity, then point them to their feet and remind them that their feet are firmly planted, not in us, but in the great unchanging I AM.

So, tonight, as a joke I serve mustard seeds for dinner. And the boys think I'm serious. Maybe they are just half starved because the dinner bell dings late, but they chase those tiny pods down and eat them. If mustard seeds are our faith, then our faith has a kick. I laugh at the creativity of our God, that he would choose the spicy mustard seed to illustrate his parable, because mustard seeds and lives grounded in faith both pack a punch. And while they eat the seeds, eyes crossing, noses curling, voice boxes squeaking, swirling with spice-laughter, I pray. Father, cause their soul soil to take these seeds of faith and let them grow. I remember that what I do in moderation, they will do in excess and I add, "Father, I confess my days of unbelief. Cause my faith to multiply. Let it grow before the eyes of my wee ones. Amen.

The Mothering Chronicles 4: Falling Short of Picket Fences

2011-11-02T21:31:00.011-04:00

November nodded at me today, with her egg-yolk sun and scattered whites on a blue sky plate. Her trees rusty, with October's last rains and breath like maple candy, brought four visitors--a fellow firefighter and his family. A fine family we now call friends. Theirs are two sweet boys with hair the color of butter left to sit from breakfast to dinner. Little ones. Smaller than mine. And I remembered. I remembered feet that fit in palms of hands. Chatter only I could decipher. Soothers that needed microchips because God forbid we lost them. Faces stained with food. Feet that longed to climb, to jump, to do the things big brother did. Smiles. Smiles that set off fireworks in my stomach. How a dogwood stick was fascinating. How stairs were to them like midnight lights to summer bugs. How I remembered. Seven years have seeped away since last I saw those images in flesh and blood. I look at the masterpieces life painted in my heart and wonder what images will be there seven years further along this arc of time. So much of myself is reflected in who the boys are becoming. So much of their daddy too. (How I thank God for that.) Mothering them--this heavenly calling that somehow found me when I didn't know it was all I wanted, all I ever truly longed for in life--has been like a mirror to my soul. They show me who I am. I haven't always liked the reflection. A spilled cup released bitter words. Did they fall from my lips? Babies at my bedside in buttoned jammies, and I am resentful that Daddy doesn't hear them. It is me again, lifting downy covers and arching my back to make a cocoon in which they curl. It is me scratching backs until eyelids fall and breathing steadies, while he sleeps. Resentful? Me? Yes, at times. Even if we pretend it isn't so, our babes show us the truth. Admitting, acknowledging, and refusing to accept unloveliness are the changing ingredients. Visions of perfection, of milk and cookies, and picket fences were all I knew when Nate lay safely in my water bed tummy. My heart broke when the reality of my imperfection deluged my soul until I was asphyxiated with the truth. So far from perfection. Far far from that word. But still, so high, so holy a calling. To fall short seems unacceptable. Unacceptable, yes. Inevitable? That too. But Paul said he forgot what was behind and strained toward what lay before him--his high calling. James said consider it pure joy, brothers because perseverance is cooked in the crock of trials. And mothering, though I longed for it, is indeed a trial at times. Paul too said, "Whatever happens, my dear brothers and sisters, rejoice in the Lord...for it is a safeguard for your faith." (Phil. 1:3 NLT) Whatever happens, rejoice. Paul said he had many valid reasons to be confident in his flesh, in his ability, his education, his skill. But he rejoiced in none of that. His joy came clothed in swaddling clothes. He rejoiced not in who he was, but in a savior who already paid for each failure. A savior who washed those dropped moments, those careless words, those selfish feelings with the spilled blood of a life fully spent. If I could sit knee to knee with the mothers, eye to eye, hearts in hands held open, I'd say, "You'll fail. You'll be less than you hoped. You'll smudge your masterpieces with paintbrushes dipped in darkness. But Jesus. But Jesus, my friend." Jesus repaints the soiled spots because "Love covers a multitude of wrongs." (I Cor. 13) And He is love. He covers. He restores. (Is. 38:16, Job 33:26, Joel 2:25-26) He heals. (Psalm 107:20, Is. 57:17-19) He makes all things new. (Rev. 21:5) And when we feel entirely unable, it is He who remains "able to do exceeding abundantly above all we can ask or imagine." (Eph. 3:20) To mother, and mother well, we must plan to rejoice when we fail--not in the fractured fragments of brokenness that can result from our humanity, but in the opportunity to point our children to the flawless Father who fails not. It will prove the safeguard of our families and our personal faith. Rejoice, sisters, in the net that catches our oopses, our man-I-wish-I-could-take-that-backs, our will they ever survive me as their moms, and purifies them. When nighttime swelled, I slipped into their room just to watch them sleep a moment or two. And there were the locks of hair, curtains over Cort's eyes. There were the freckles--eleven years of crumbs we forgot to wipe away dozing on Nate's cheeks. I sat, swiping hair and connecting the dotted freckles, by each boy. And I prayed. Father, redeem the times. Redeem the moments when this passionate, creative boy pushes against this passionate, creative momma until we hurt and bruise. Redeem the minutes when math is wrong, and he doesn't get it, and I can't figure out why, and we lock our horns together, and turn and twist until our emotions are tangled. Let not my failures mar their beauty. Let them see you when they see me, when they hear me. And I rejoiced. They sleep warm, in peaceful beds--made by their father's hands and their mother's heart--with brows at ease, and hearts filled with the knowledge that they are loved, that they are worthy of love, that they are fearfullyand wonderfully crafted. They know. And I rejoice. It is enough.

The Mothering Chronicles 3: Take Back Your Time

2011-10-25T17:21:00.006-04:00

Time. Moments into seconds into minutes into hours into days into lifetimes. Into lifetimes. Lord, "teach us to number our days that we may gain a heart of wisdom." Our first child came as an unexpected gift, and we wondered if we could afford to have a baby. We wondered the wrong thing. We should have asked ourselves if we were willing to give up enough time. In the early days of Nathan's life I remember thinking it mattered that the floor was clean. I remember thinking I should be involved in ministry, should serve my neighbors and community, should learn to quilt, and cook from scratch. I recall days when I watched the clock for his next nap time because I had more things to do, more to accomplish. I'm a doer. My mother used to tell me, "Sarah, nap when he naps." It is true, I probably wouldn't have slept, but how I wish now, that I had lay beside that sparkly eyed, button-nosed bubba to watch as he drifted into soft slumber. How I wish. Almost twelve years have passed since he needed two naps a day. Today as I sorted knitted scarves and winter's bloated jackets, I discovered it will be Cort wearing Nate's camo coat from last season. Nate has out grown it; yet again he hurries beyond my reach. Bigger. Faster. Older. And I can't get any of it back. Do I dare ask myself how many times it was my senseless mouth that parted to utter those poisonous words, "In a minute, baby. I'll be with you in a minute." I don't dare. I can't. Or do I attempt to count the times it was my pointer that stood straight up signaling my red-cheeked-just-in-from-outside-with-a-discovery-in-hand boys to wait while I finished a phone conversation? Was that my finger? Oh that I could cut it off now. I can't get their questions back. I can't get their curiosity back. I can't get their discoveries back. If there was only one thing I could say to a mother while her waist stretches to hold the tender life within her cocoon, it would be this: Take back your time; your wee one will need it. Harvey MacKay, author of bestseller Swim With The Sharks Without Being Eaten Alive said, "Decide what your priorities are and how much time you will spend on them. If you don't, someone else will." Selah. (Am I allowed to say Selah after a non-verse quote? I think I will. It bares repeating.) If you don't claim your moments, they will be eaten--scratch that--devoured by the world in which you live. That's a fact. I know. There is just no way around this fact. Children need our time. Practically speaking, children are needy. They need to be fed, they need to be changed, they need help with their homework, they need their laundry washed, they need new clothes, they need boo boos kissed, and they need bedtime stories. Later, they need help with learning to drive and college applications. But more important than their practical needs is their deep desire for connection. Every human being on earth longs to matter to someone, longs to be heard, longs to be enjoyed for who they are. This need, THIS NEED, oh yes, this need is the challenge. Unlike our children's physical needs, this illusive need will take our time when offered, but will rarely demand it. It is this need that is most easily ignored. But mothers, this is the reality: If we as parents don't meet this need, someone or something else will. Period. Albert Einstein said, "What counts can't always be counted; what can be counted doesn't always count." In my kitchen sits a bucketful of peppers, a table spread with green beans, and a mess of other miscellaneous vegetables we pulled from the garden after the second hard frost. They're waiting to be put up for the winter. My youngest son too was waiting today. He never said it out loud, but as he diligently pushed through his cursive lesson and attentively answered his Greek and Latin questions with eyes wandering in opposite directions--one to the clock, the other to the window--I knew what he was longing to do. Like the Pied Piper, his chartreuse (don't tell him that's the color) birthday bike was beckoning him to climb the autumn mountains. Do you know what his face looked like when I said, "Let's go for a run--you can ride your bike." Do you know? Of course you do, because you've seen it on your own little one. His heart sang in harmony with mine and we needed no words. The peppers and beans can wait. Take back your time, moms. Take it back so that you can strategically release it on those precious souls that matter more than the telephone, more than the ladies luncheon at the church, more than your job, more than facebook, more than television. I can give you a count of some things. At least eight loads of laundry in a week--sometimes eight in a day. Two trips to the grocery store a week, minimum. The floor gets swept at least fourteen times in a week. (I don't really know how many times it gets swept. I have a dog and two boys. Our floor needs to be swept 14 times a day!) There are 21 meals and ten to fifteen snacks per child each week. There are the dishes that are washed. The dog that needs to be fed. The garden. The home projects. But the truth is, one could never measure my days--not the parts that count. There's no way to account for the extra three chapters of Huck Finn read to boys hungry for adventure when the moon is high, and their minds are free to run. There's no way to tally the bounce tag bruises that tar my shins from trampoline tumbling. No one will know, when my floors are dirty, I spent that time learning how to run a post with my boys on the greatest football field in the world--our yard. But those are the moments that will last. Plan now, young mothers, to give your children your time. It will lay a foundation that later you will wish you had. If your children are not accustomed to interacting with you, talking with you, sharing their interests with you, sharing their discoveries, their fears, their hopes, their crazy ideas with you, then when they are old, and you feel their ideas and opinions matter, they will have long ago learned to share them with someone else. Someone who knew they mattered all along. Don't offer them the entertainment of a TV show when you can offer them the comfort of your voice and a vivid book. Don't crowd your life with appointments, and social engagements every weekend when you could give them a hike to the nearest waterfall to drink in the creativity of their Creator. They need you. They need you to point them to their Creator, and that takes hours and hours of time laying the foundation for a connective relationship that will someday leave their hearts open to receive the greatest wisdom from you. And for us moms who have perhaps missed a few opportunities along the way; it is never too late. Never. Our heavenly Father hungers to redeem all things, longs to restore years the locusts ate, invites us to allow him to bring from the ashes of time burned away a beauty that reflects Him. His mercies are new every morning. So receive them afresh. Begin again today. Take back your time, and then, give it to those that matter. Pray with Me Lord, how undeserving I am of these sweet children. How careless I can be with their hearts. Teach me to number our days together that I may not miss a moment. Restore those times when I've forgotten what is truly countable. Open their hearts to me that I may reflect you to them. Help me to release my calendar, my plans, my to do lists and grasp this gift of their lives instead. May they see in me a reflection of your desire to be with them always. Amen. Read with Me Psalm 90: 1-6, 12 Ecc. 3:1-14 My Personal Top FIVE Time Takers (There are a lot of other things, but these seem to be the most pressing on my life recently. Please don't feel I think any of these things are inherently wrong. That's not the case. They can just sometimes start to monopolize my life.) 1. Responding to emails and facebook messages throughout the day instead of at one set time per day. I hate a full inbox/can't stand to leave something unreplied to. (My hubby told me research says that for every email you respond to, it takes you five minutes to get back on task. I've implemented a new plan for my inbox!) 2. Telephone. I've learned to set specific times in the day when I talk on the phone or respond to phone calls. I always check my messages in case of emergencies, but as a homeschool mom, I have to realize the kids need me to be present mentally as well as physically while they learn. 3. Television (Get rid of it if you can bare the thought. If not, get DVR so you choose when you watch, and fast forward through the commercials) Think of all the incredible novels you could read with the time you spend vegging out watching cooking shows or I love Raymond re-runs. 4. Guilt based commitments. I hate saying no. Hate it. But people will never stop asking. Learn to say, not this time. If that's too hard, learn to say, "Let me pray about it." 5. Overbooked Social Calendar. (Yours or your kids) In his book, Have A New Kid By Friday, Dr. Kevin Leman recommends one or two family social commitments per month. That may sound extreme, but here's the thing, God gave your kids to YOU, not your BFFs. And how low is your self esteem anyway that you believe your kids need a friend with them at all times in order to have fun? Put your big girl pants on and become relevant to your kids. YOU are a family--treasure time together. My Five Fave Ways to Connect 1. Jumping on the Trampoline, playing football, frisbee or other outside sport. The boys EAT.THIS.UP. They love it. 2. Games. Inside we love games--CLUE is our newest board game. UNO. Yahtzee. 3. Walks/Bike Rides/Hikes 4. In the summer, at the lake, the kids love it when I get in the water with them. I do too. In the winter, they love it when I go out in the snow with them. 5. Asking questions about their favorite activities as if they are the expert and I have NO clue. Ask question after question for a minimum of ten minutes. Sometimes my boys actually hug me when we're having this type of conversation b/c they are spontaneously overcome with joy that I'm just listening to them.

The Mothering Chronicles 2: Patience and Love

2011-09-16T18:47:00.001-04:00

Time evaporates--don't you find--like a meringue or cotton candy. I used to imagine that as my boys grew in independence I'd surely find more time to write and yet I'm discovering that in fact, the opposite has proven true. And speaking of boys--sweet boys--mine are growing. And with their growth I find that my world somehow shrinks. I'm in that phase of life where if I didn't carefully wrap my dreams and goals and place them safely away, I could perhaps lose them--lose myself even. It's the mothering time of life for me. The time when football and Robin Hood trump reading the home decorating magazine and when taking them to the skate park seems a better choice than a quiet cup of tea on my deck with a Maya Angelou novel. To trade a moment of what they need for what I may want is almost unthinkable. My day will come again, but for now, for now? For now, it is them. There are afternoons or days or even weeks when we are a babbling brook dancing our way over the time-smoothed pebbles that fill our lives, times when we are a melodious foursome happy and content in all things. Then there are moments when the harmony of mom, dad, and sons is somewhat akin to the call of a blue jay or a crow at some horribly early hour, and I cringe, thinking surely this isn't what God wants. And how it pains the heart of a parent to see that miniature version of yourself making choices that hurt themselves and your family. Tempting it is to spend hours searching the internet for the wisdom of some sage pastor or some great author with several books on Amazon proving their merit as an expert on my child. And I'll admit I've googled 'developmental stages of boys' in hopes of discovering some new key to unlocking the behavior I desperately want to see in my little guys. The thing about parenting that I'm discovering is this--it's very personal. It's a walk through a road that I believe is intended to show us the love of our Father as we love our own. So, I find myself over and over--knees callousing--at His feet asking for wisdom. He did promise, after all to give it fully and willingly. And there at His feet I've been affirmed. He loves because He is love. He loves both me and those sweet boys of mine. He sees the moldable hearts of my boys, and He sees the ache in my own heart. "I know, and I'm sovereign." "I'll not abandon the work of my hands." "Don't grow weary in well doing." Don't grow weary. Sometimes when it comes to parenting we want instant behavior changes. We want to say, "Listen here, buddy, I'm the momma! You're the boy, and you are gonna do what I say!" But, how gentle God is with us, how patient He remains with us when we are out of tune with His life within us. If I parent like that, I may get an immediate behavior change, but I've lost the heart of my child. That is sprint parenting when in fact we are running a marathon. I'm not as concerned with the immediate behavior of my son as I am the long-term bent of his heart. II Thessalonians 3:5 says, "May the Lord lead your hearts in God's love and Christ's patience." Ahh, a mothering key. Two keys in fact. God's love. Christ's patience. Apparently, it is desirable that we be lead into both since Paul took the time to utter them on behalf on the Thessalonians. Here is the thing about God's love. When Paul says may you be lead into God's love he may as well have said may you be lead into God. God and love. The two are interchangeable. God is love. The fruit of God within us--His Holy Spirit--is love. Love comes from His life within us. It is not a trait of God; it is God. Immediately then, I am reminded of the abiding principles in John 15. "Apart from me, you can do nothing." If we are to be filled with God's love as we parent, we must take time to abide in Love. Saying it is a challenge to find time to abide to a mother of little ones is like saying the earth is round. Yeah. We know. And you'll never hear me say it should be done for half an hour at six in the morning. I might as well swear at you. Here's what I do recommend. There's a great little book called, Jesus Calling written by Sarah Young. Get your hands on it. If you have time for nothing else in your day, read this before you get out of bed. A short two or three paragraph encouragement written from the perspective of God, you will be sustained by mostly scripture paraphrased in words we understand. (Incidentally, that's why I like it.) And get into the Psalms. Those are two great places to glean spiritual vitamins when you may not have time for the full meal. God will grant you days when feasting happens, but in between, have some simple way to drink deeply from the love of God. And let me just say, as much as I love to blog, don't depend entirely on blogs. Of course I hope you'll keep reading mine when you have time, but taking your nourishment only from blogs or even most books is similar to drinking coffee from your husband's cup in the morning. God wants to meet with you. He wants to fill your cup. Then there's that word. Patience. Just the other day I asked my mom, a prayer warrior, what specifically she'd been praying for me. She gave me her list, and I told her she needed to add patience to the list. I don't know what prompted me to ask for such a thing--maybe it was because my son told me my voice got high and squeaky earlier in the day when I was frustrated, and he was concerned I might be struggling with self-control. Saint Augustine once said, "Patience is the companion of wisdom," and Alexander Dumeas Pere said, "All patience is summed up in two words--wait and hope." I would add that patience is but a fruit of God's Spirit within. Patience is the overflow of the wisdom that comes from understanding that we wait, we hope, in the goodness of God where our children are concerned. They may be 2 and pitching a tantrum or twenty and high as a kite. Either way, our real anchor is the knowledge that God's concern over those children is greater than our own. He is working in their lives. He loves them. He cares what happens to them. He is orchestrating circumstances to reveal Himself to them. Taking a step back from the permanent marker smiley faces drawn all over the freshly painted wall long enough to remember, 'God is revealing Himself to my children right now, through me,' may be just the amount of waiting and hoping it takes to display the fruit of patience. They're not perfect. Neither are we. But, we're the mothers. Our role is one of patience and one of love. At the risk of being misunderstood, let me say both love and patience will sometimes mean consequences. But when those things come from a heart that is filled, one that has taken time to abide in The Source of patience and love, they are so much more readily received. If you'll give me some room here, I'd like to address a practical picture of this. Let me say ahead of time, I'm not addressing corporal punishment--that's a larger can of worms. But, if you'll hear me out, I think you'll understand where I'm going with this. Often in the heat of the moment, we are tempted to pop our kids a little swat on their chubby bottoms. I'm talking about the screaming kid that gets a quick swat. Let me ask you this, when you are furious with your husband over some situation, would it help at all if he gave you a smack on the backside? Usually when we are frustrated to the point of tantrum, what we desperately need is someone to stop the music, press the pause button on life and say, "Can you tell me what you are feeling?" A swat doesn't teach the heart. Our goal as moms is not to gain the immediate behavior we want at the loss of our child's heart. Our goal is to pack enough fuel in our pockets to take us on the quest for their hearts. That means we may leave the grocery cart in the store filled with groceries, (I've done it) and calmly walk to the car. We may say quietly, "I can see you are so upset we won't be able to talk right now, but I'm going to take you home where you are safe. I want you to be able to calm down, and I love you." Then, more often than not, that raging child will be asleep by the time we are home. When they wake, they will be calmer and ready for some teaching. Or they may squawk and scream for the next two hours. Either way. We wait. We hope. (Read: practice patience) When they are calm, we address the behavior. We let them know they will never get the candy bar by screaming, even if we're forced to call Grandma to pick up milk and bread because we left the grocery store ten days in a row! We teach them why that doesn't work. We may even give them a chance to try the entire scenario again the next day after we've walked them through how it will go ahead of time. Did I mention that mothering is not convenient? It interferes with our schedule, and may mean that we have to eat dry cereal for breakfast because the milk was left in the buggy at the Piggly Wiggly. Here's the reality, most of us are not patient enough to be that inconvenienced. Come on now. You just read that scenario, and the idea of not picking up your prescription and desert for tonight's dinner guests is making your hair stand on end! Not. Repeat. NOT convenient. So, we give in and let them have the candy bar, or we swat them on the booty. And they may in fact be quiet because they got a good smack. Either way, we lose. Patience says, "I'll slow this down. I'll be inconvenienced. I'll pause my agenda long enough to orchestrate a world where I can reveal the love of God to my sweet child in the hopes of winning him to Christ." Maybe I should have said the prerequisite for patience is this: Expect to be inconvenienced. Children are not convenient. They are precious people with their own feelings, thoughts, perspectives and ideas. They are made in the image of God and we should give them the same respect we expect from them. Here's what I'm convinced of. Mothering is a reflection of God to our children. We're doing our level best to mirror Him to them. We are their first experience of God. We will need to take some time, even if it is only two minutes, to drink from Him because the things we wish to reveal are fruits of His life within us, not a manufacturable parenting commodity we can otherwise muster. One of my favorite passages is I Peter 1:3, "His divine power has given us everything we need pertaining to life and godliness through the rich knowledge of the one who called us..." Recently, my husband pointed out that indeed we do have everything we need for life and godliness, but it comes through knowledge of God. Knowledge alone puffs up and inflates our opinions of ourselves, but knowledge applied is a totally different animal. That, my dear mothering friends, is wisdom. May we apply the knowledge of our Father who is both love and patience in our homes like a balm that covers the wounds, that protects the hearts, that softens the edges, that guides the personalities, and that restores the natural rhythm to our families. Pray with me: Father, I'm not always patient. I'm not always loving. I'm human in every way. But I long to reflect you to my children. I long to create an environment in our home that is perfumed with your presence. Help me father to learn to wait and hope--not in my abilities, but in your sovereignty. Fill me with yourself. Overflow from me. Read with me: I Corinthians 13

The Mothering Chronicles 1: Comfort

2011-09-05T00:58:00.003-04:00

Eleven and nine years old and nearing half grown, my boys are like two feet that kick at the backs of your knees causing you to fall forward instantly. They keep me on my knees in prayer, not because they are bad boys, but because I want to get it right. And don't we all? Within every sincere parents' hearts is not there a boiling pot of desire to raise them well? Is not there the most acute sense of responsibility for these lives that were trusted to our feeble, human care? Often I tell God He's the one who gave them to me so He has to give me wisdom. If he doesn't, it will be his fault when I fatally blow it with them. And you know, I think in those moments, He must chuckle. After all, it was in fact Him who trusted these sweet little men to Jeff and I's care, and He did that through the sieve of His sovereignty and omniscience. Surely God must think to Himself, "Yes, Sarah, I did give them to you and I knew what I was doing all along. I'm able to handle this." Today, my youngest came to me with lips stretched horizontally across his chubby cheeks, "Mommy, will you jump with me?" The trampoline. Four springs gone and about fifty more to go before my moonlighting career as Jumping Jill finally comes to a close. But then, my to do list was calling too. The grin on my boy got wider and the to do list started hollering, "Lesson plans! Cook Supper. Plan for Writer's Guild! Call your mother. Write a book! Save the world!" And somehow, this task oriented momma had the grace to choose the greater thing. As we played Tic-Toc, a highly technical game where my legs are the hands of the clock and they attempt to knock the kids down resulting in multiple bruises on my shins, I thought about the fact that my son is going to be nine in five days. Nine years old--that's the halfway to college point. Nine years old--that's the final year before double digits. Nine years old---that means I have probably bounced more with him in the past than I will in the future. People tell you it flies. They tell you to treasure the special moments. They tell you to choose the best things, to leave the laundry, to leave the cleaning, to love your babies while you can. The other night we were at an ultimate frisbee game with our boys, and a couple whose children are near flying the coop phase walked up with take-out in their hands. He was smelling like he might have put on aftershave and she was looking like a sun-smacked peach in her skirt and matching blouse. Their eldest boy, a senior, was playing that night. It turned out they were on a date night. Why in the world were they at a frisbee league game in 90 degree weather with styrofoam trays of Cuban cuisine when their kids were old enough to fend for themselves? I didn't have to ask. I knew. They aren't counting down the years anymore. They're counting down the days. The days. I'd be doing the same thing. Like a parallel parking spot on Main Street in some antique town, we get this tiny window of opportunity to impact, to steer, to channel our children's lives and character. And there is no practising, no dress rehearsal. It's all live. All of it. The Bible just confirms the inevitable--the very first reference to mother in the Bible is when God says, "therefore a man shall leave his mother..." (Gen. 2:24) They are definitely going to leave us at some point despite the fact that I've gotten both mine to promise they'll never get married, and will always live on the property near me. (So what if I bribed them with clean laundry and unlimited chocolate chip cookies!) Thanks God! You'd think he could have at least saved that little tidbit for some more obscure book like Jude. And a close look at the Proverbs seems to confirm that how these sweet little cherubs turn out when their baby fat has dissolved into muscle and chest hair, is intrinsically linked with a mother's gladness or shame. (Proverbs 10:1, 15:20, 19:26, 23:25, 28:24, 29:15) We are SO on the hook. So where in the world do we go for direction? For solid guidance? Naturally, I head to the Word of God, but you've probably already figured out there are not a ton of references to the act of mothering in God's Word. We've got Hannah who desperately prayed for a child, but made a bargain with God and had to leave her beloved son in the care of Eli. What can we learn from her? How to get a baby? (I didn't need any help in that department. Jeff and I managed pretty well on our own.) Then there's Rebekah who taught her son to deceive and lie. She's not got a ton to offer when it comes to parenting advice. There's Sarah, but she tried to manufacture the promises of God by getting her hand maiden to sleep with her hubby so they could have a child. Let's not forget Eve, but then again, maybe we should. One of her sons murdered the other. So we're kind of left with Elizabeth and Mary. Slim pickings. Or are they? Let me take you to two references that have truly affirmed my gut instincts as a mother. The first is Isaiah 66:13 where God says, "As a mother comforts a child, so I will comfort you..." The second is found in I Thessalonians 2:7 where Paul says, "but we were gentle among you, like a mother caring for her little children." At first read I thought little of either of these passages. In fact, I've never even stopped to consider them in light of mothering. The first is referencing God's treatment of the Israelites and the second, Paul's treatment of the Thessalonian believers. Truth be told, I wish I had stopped to see the significance of these passages for mothers many years ago. As you know, I'm raising boys. Naturally, I want them to be mighty, manly men when they grow up. Who wouldn't hope that for their boys? One of five girls, I have lacked in the experience with boys arena. Often that reality has caused me to defer to the 'wisdom' of those sometimes loud voices around me. "Don't coddle your boys. They'll be sissies." "Don't fuss over their cuts and bruises. Teach them to be tough." But God didn't even give this as instruction, did you notice that? A clear assumption about mothering is made right here in God's Word. Mothers will comfort. Did you catch that? Moms will indeed comfort their children. Not only will they comfort them, but they will be gentle. These are not instructions, these are givens. In fact the Hebrew word for comfort used in Isaiah actually means, "to be sorry, to be moved to pity, have compassion." (Strong's) It is a verb which from a grammatical stand point demands action. What does that look like? What is the difference between comforting and coddling? I've seen some coddling mommas out there, let me tell you. But I've also seen some downright indifferent mommas too. Both extremes are dangerous territory--one a mire of quicksand and the other a concrete landing below a thousand foot drop. First, let me just affirm those mommies who are presently in the throws of stacking diapers and patting little dimpled bottoms to sleep. I remember those days well, the debates of letting them cry it out, when to pick them up, when to leave them be. Oh I remember. And can I just tell you those sleepless nights will not last forever. They won't. I don't regret one single time that I went into my boys' bedrooms and picked their tiny little frames up when they cried for me. Not once. But I do hate the memory of the night that I stood at the door while my oldest cried for me, and I didn't go to him because a book by an expert said I should let him cry it out--his long term memory wasn't formed; he'd be fine. And I thank God that Jeff and I didn't continue with that path. Okay, okay. I know I just struck a match that is attached to a grenade. Got it. It's a mine field out here in this sleeping through the night territory, and now I'll need to dance my way through it. Allow me some grace here, moms. I know we all have our opinions. My palms are itching and I'm short of breath at the thought of stepping on a toe, so please know that this comes from a gentle heart. (And if you want to discuss it further, feel free to email me.) God's word assumes a mom will be moved to active compassion. That's straight out of the Hebrew texts and with that we can't argue. What does that compassion look like? Let me ask you one question. How far away do you want God to be when He comforts you? Because that passage in Isaiah says that God will comfort the Israelites as a mom comforts her baby. In no way is this meant to be a judgment on anyone's parenting choices. It also is not a judgment on any parenting books. But, I'm not afraid to speak the truths of God's Word and though I've remained largely silent on this topic in public forums, I do believe that our guts tell us things, but we doubt them because of what the experts say. For new moms this can be so challenging because we are exhausted, overwhelmed and uncertain of everything. So, we rely heavily on resources available. No one ever pointed me to these passages when I was making these choices. God's word says He is "near the broken hearted." (Psalm 34:18) So again, how far away do you want to be when your baby's heart is crying out for you? I'll just end this little discussion with the admonishment to get before your Father; ask Him to speak into your heart how near He desires you to be as you comfort your little one through the night. Don't let your senior neighbor or your well meaning mother-in-law or the stack of books you got from Barnes & Noble be your ultimate guide. God promises His Spirit will guide you into all truth. These are decisions you want to be able to stand on later. So get the wisdom from your Father. Second, let me say to the moms of boys once and for all: It is okay to comfort your boys. They will not grow up to be wimps, momma's boys or helpless critters defenseless in a world where they must be strong. Comforting will not do that to your child. Coddling will. There is a difference. When Nate took a tumble as a toddler, I went running. When he fell as an elementary school student, I went walking. Now that he's a middle schooler he runs to me when he's fallen to show me how good the bruise is going to be, and only every once in a while will he let me offer comfort over his "ouie's." He doesn't need me to kiss away the scrapes or scratches now. He needs me to admire his strength and insist he's tough because he doesn't need a band aid. If they are fifteen years old and still need you to bandage their paper cuts there's a chance you're coddling, but, moms don't be afraid to love rough and tumble boys as they grow. They will tell you when it is too much, and you will know. Let me also say here, that if dad is in the picture, he will respond differently. That is okay. He's going to insist that boy is just fine. He'll say to shake it off. That's great. That's his role. Lastly, whether we have boys or girls, comfort is something that requires action. Instinctual in most of us, but often squelched for fear of spoiling, comfort is indeed a tool from God for mothers to use in the raising of their children. It is a godly trait. A child who has been comforted will be a compassionate individual as they grow. They will understand sympathy and empathy because they have experienced those facets of comfort. And it never stops. I remember being 21 years old, a new bride living in a foreign country with my young husband. There were times when we just had no clue what we were doing and more than once, I lay sobbing in confusion and homesickness. You know what I pictured in those moments? I pictured laying my head on my mother's lap, her hands stroking my hair. A mother always comforts, even when she isn't with us. We will all do it differently. Not everyone speaks the way I do to my children. There are tomboy mommas, and sugary-sweet moms, there are matter of fact moms and there are the Aunt Bee's of Mayberry types. But what is important is this: We get the privilege of being the comforters to our little ones. Later, in the New Testament, the Holy Spirit is called The Comforter. We mothers will develop our children's understanding of God as a Comforter just as daddies will mold their child's understanding of God as Father. That's a humbling honor. When yielded to God, we, as moms will reflect God's image as Comforter to our children. I've always thought of God as represented by the dads, but the truth is that both parents get to provide the first glimpses of God to their children. Wow. When my boys read Jesus' promise of The Comforter in John, I wonder if they'll think of me. I pray so. I pray so. (It is my hope, Lord willing, to do a series of posts on mothering. This is the first in that series. I believe there are more to come, but for now, Moms, comfort your children and know that it was you God chose to mother your children. You are doing a wonderful job.) Pray with me: Holy Spirit, you are The Comforter. Teach me to comfort my children in a way that reflects You to them. Teach me to be tender and compassionate toward their needs. Teach me to know when to speak words of comfort and when to simply hold a hand in comfort. Teach me boundaries and keep my comfort healthy. Comfort me with your truth that I will overflow that to my children. Thank you for trusting me with their hearts. Amen. Read with me: John 14

Scrambled Eggs with a Side of Bacon

2011-09-02T08:03:00.006-04:00

My life is a plate of scrambled eggs--the kind you get at those twenty-four hour waffle places--flopping over the edge of the plate and suffocated by tomatoes, cheese, chili, slivered scallions and diced ham. Way more than any normal human should consume in one week let alone one year, I find my mouth full, my hand forging a path between plate and face. I'm a very focused person--when I gave birth to the boys, I determined I wouldn't scream, yell or curse. I attained that goal by keeping my eyes closed, thinking only of breathing and pushing. But somehow now, as I look about my home, there are so many miscellaneous things that manage to find their way in my home--not going to admit to inviting them myself--I hardly know where to begin to focus. Like the egg platter topped with the entire month's groceries, my little world lies under a heap of things. I'm left wondering where to begin. Charles Hummel wrote a book aptly titled The Tyranny of the Urgent. I don't even have to read the contents to know it relates to me. For mothers the urgencies of a self-mutating laundry pile, cabinets that empty themselves weekly of their groceries, floors that are really magnetic dirt grabbers, toilet seats that look like they caught the drips of a ceiling leaking strange yellow moisture, and the child whose voice got stuck on repeat, "I'm hungry." all inhale our time before we even consider some of the bigger tasks left undone. There are jobs to go to, school projects, or in my case school lesson plans, window-sills infested with ladybug skeletons from last fall, and four years worth of unprinted digital photos that also clamor for our attention. Add to that paying bills, planning birthday parties, and kids' extra curricular activities, and the calendar starts to resemble a piece of paper that you put through the printer twice on the same side! " Hummel writes in his book, "Have you ever wished for a thirty-four hour day? Surely this extra time would relieve the pressure under which we live. Our lives leave a trail of unfinished tasks. Unanswered letters, unvisited friends, unread books, haunt quiet moments when we stop to evaluate what we have accomplished." Hummel really nails the heart of it for me when he mentions the unvisited friends, the unanswered letters. Once thriving under your attentive care, precious relationships somehow get neglected because the basic physical demands of life insist on taking priority. My sister and I were just talking last night, a chance we both treasure because of its rarity these days, about how we mourn the loss of time to interact more with those we love. I don't mind the laundry or dusty sills so much as my heart aches to spend more time with the lady I talked to for an hour at my son's football practise who tells me of losing custody of her children because of years of hard drug use. Or the dear mother who tells me she doesn't believe in Jesus as the Savior. Where is the time for me to research her questions and offer her some intelligent answers? Then there are meals waiting to be cooked for families infected with sickness, diseases that refuse to release their grip. There are marriages aching, and there are teens with much to say and few who listen. I used to think people could get most things done if they'd just get organized. God has since humbled me, helped me to see the needs of this world are greater than the strength of my arms. Where once I kept a thousand plates spinning at full speed, I now see that there are ten thousand more stacking themselves beside me, bidding me to toss them high into the air as well. Realizing this reality of life is one step toward smiling at the mass of scrambled eggs and putting the fork down. Accepting that we weren't really meant to eat all that food, to spin all those plates, that is a real challenge. This week, as needs have surfaced at every turn, I'm reminded of Psalm 46:10, "Be still and know that I am God." Another translation says, "Stop your striving and recognize that I am God." Stillness. Now that's a state of being about which I know very little. Naturally a doer, a goer, a go-getter, stillness is as foreign to me as it is to a wiggling worm. And yet, scripture says be still, stop striving. Why? Because we are NOT God. "Recognize that I am God." Nowhere in scripture does it say, "You need to take over for me, Sarah." Trust me. I've checked. I love the name for himself that God selects in this passage. It's the same name He used in Genesis 1:1 when He said, "In the beginning, God..." What a perfect choice because He's always existed, He was there at the beginning, He penned our places in this world, and He didn't need us for any of that. It is indeed He who remains God even now amidst this great tyranny of urgencies that screech out like a band of black crows. Forgive my boldness when I say followers of Christ are deceived if we believe that God is depending on us. That He will use us, even delights in using us to share His heart with the world is undeniable, but to say that He needs us is simply not true. The lives of people about me will continue to function whether I am involved or not. I will miss out on growth and glimpses of the greatness of God if I choose to turn a blind eye, but God doesn't abandon His purposes when one of his people is too busy to carry out His plans. That's not how He works. So often we hear well meaning Christians say things like, "If you don't do this, who will?" To that, I would humbly answer, "God will make a way because He IS the way." By saying that, I don't mean that we get a pass excusing us from getting our hands dirty and our feet wet in the lives of the people by whom we are surrounded. On the contrary, I find myself knee deep wading in the waters of people's worlds all the time. But it is truly prideful to believe that we are the only ones that can handle every circumstance. Often us "doers" or "Martha's" end up robbing the less type A personalities of a chance to get involved because we are so quick to assume we are needed in every area. What God is whispering to my soul is this, "Sarah, stop striving. Stop fretting over every single situation and circumstance by which you pass. I've called you to abide in me. Apart from me, you can't do anything. Draw from me. I will teach you the way you should walk.I am the God who formed all of this world. I formed these lives. I know these needs. I am their God. I will order your steps. Listen to me. Seek me. Don't lean on your understanding of situations, I will make your paths straight." The lives I touch, the people I assist, the conversations I have, they all need to be responded to not because of their place in line, who made the request or how loud they call out, but in the order that my Father whispers to my Spirit. As I seek Him in prayer He will usher me to the people and circumstances with which He desires me to be involved. It's been a long time since I went to the Waffle King, but this much I know. Those plates filled with eggs under a mountain of artery clogging cholesterol can be very enticing. I love a little bit of everything on my plate. But when it comes to life, though it too is filled to overflowing, I'm choosing to sit still before my Father and allow Him to be God. Stopping. Stilling. Waiting. Allowing God to bring to the surface those bites I'm meant to chew requires trust that He is indeed God over all the universe, God over all the details, and that He remains able to meet every single need. After all, it was Him who created us all. Read with me: Psalm 46 Galatians 6:9,10 Pray with me: Father, let me hear your voice. When I look around I can become overwhelmed with the needs surrounding me--my children, my family, my friends, my neighbors, but they aren't really mine, are they, Father? They're yours. Help me to remember you care far more than I about all these needs. I confess my pride in assuming I could tackle life apart from you. Help me to walk only in the steps you have chosen for me. Help me to surrender to your ways, your plans, your will. Help me to be still and recognize you are the Strong God who Reigns over all. Amen

But A Vapor

2011-08-03T22:14:00.009-04:00

In January of 2008 I dreamt of death--my own. What a rumbling within my heart ensued in the days after that night! To stare into the reality that our days are not without end is unnerving, shocking even. I think of the movie "Bucket List" and songs with lyrics like, "live like you were dying." Their message like strokes of bold red on a white wall scream out the truth of our mortality. Yesterday I had my annual physical. The cholesterol came back good, the blood counts were fine, my foot still involuntarily jolts when my knee is tapped by the rubber mallet thingymajig. My sugar was a touch high, but when the lady asked me if I had a healthy diet, I failed to mention the Chic-Fil-A vanilla milkshake that served as my lunch on the way down. Instead I mentioned my organic garden; she seemed happy. Those organic carrots really raise blood sugar levels, I hear! I walked out of the Dr.'s with an A+ for health and the promise of many more good reports. But what if it had been different? What if, when she listened to my heart she heard a flutter or pause that shouldn't have been? What if when she checked for lumps she had come across one so stationary that she knew it could mean only one thing? What if she looked me square in the eyes and said in a gentle tone, "It isn't good, Sarah." What then? Would anything change? Tomorrow, I will spend time with someone who is in fact dying--shedding that mortal shell that carries our soul for a parenthesis on earth amidst eternity's ceaseless timeline. And I wonder, when she got the news, did anything change? I keep thinking of this lady's life over the years. I remember her since I was about 12. Just shy of 25 years I've watched her be the same--watched her love, watched her pray, watched her encourage, watched her stand beside her husband, watched her touch the lives of those around her, watched her perpetually worship. I'll most remember her as a lady among ladies, and one who loved her God. How would I be remembered? Really? Part of me wants to say, "Wait, I'm still working on that. Don't remember me yet. I need to tweak a few things first." My boys are young, my bill of health is good, my days are filled with schooling, gardening, cooking, neighboring, friending, daughtering, sistering, organizing, planning, laundry ( I should list that twice) dog training, bill paying. Filled. I feel, most of the time, like the carry-on I packed for a trip to Maine a couple years ago that was supposed to hold everything I needed for an entire long weekend. Or like a laundry basket that's been filled with water--it leaks everywhere. There's so much in my little sliver of life that I can barely keep all the ends tied let alone t's crossed and i's dotted. It's a tender time, I think, because my life won't be swollen and full and bulging forever. I'm going to wake up one day to silence in my home instead of the quiet, steady breathing of my early riser patiently waiting for me to greet the sun with him. And his tackling, tumbling brother won't knock me over with surprise jumps onto my back because he'll be grown. The Psalmist must have thought about these things too because he said, "So teach us to number our days, so that we might live wisely." (Psalm 90:12) And I'm left wondering, "If I'm to live like I'm dying--which, in truth I am--than what things should be on my daily bucket list?" There are like two million things and people all lined up, some not so patiently, waiting to make the cut. "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength...love your neighbor as yourself." (Matthew 22) Love God. Love people. Seems so simple. Maybe it is. Maybe every single action I take needs to go through this one filter, "Will I be loving God and loving people as I love myself if I do this thing?" And if I followed that mantra, then maybe my legacy would be tweaked enough. Maybe I would be remembered like this. She loved. She loved. That would be something. So, I know tomorrow isn't promised to me. I'm married to a firefighter. I face the reality of danger every third day when he leaves for his shift and I wonder, Will he come home? But what am I doing with the moments that are given me? What am I doing with the sweet precious mornings when that little rooster patters into my room wide awake and ready to discuss the NFL strike and the other one dives into my bed like it's a swimming pool? What am I doing with the few minutes between when the boys have gone to bed and Jeff is still up before he goes on shift? What am I doing with the people God puts in my life--the junior counselors at camp, the campers, the neighbors, the sisters, the friends, the parents? It is indeed a tender time, a time not to be taken for granted, not to be wasted. It is the allotted time. The bucket list time. Not the bucket list of adventures I want to take, but of seizing the moments that are my present reality and squeezing every ounce of life out of them that I possibly can. Ephesians 5:15 says we are to live carefully "redeeming the time" we are given. That word redeem carries with it the idea of rescuing something from being lost. My youngest son can't keep up with his shoes. He has about five thousand pairs, and none of them are where they are supposed to be at the proper time. When Sunday comes his brown dress shoes are surely down by the creek, and his camouflage boots are the only two matching shoes to be found. Sometimes I pick up his shoes, put them in a pile on top of the dryer, and just wait to see how long it takes him to notice they are all missing. He never has noticed. Not once. What if our minutes and hours were like that? God found them squandered and scattered haphazardly here and there, and He picked them up and placed them altogether for us to see collectively just how many precious moments we lost? I can't imagine what it would be like to really see all of that time together in one lump sum. It's my heart's desire to rescue the time God has given me. James 4:14 says, "...you are but a vapor, here for a little while and then vanishing." Like an early morning mist that whispers across a sleeping lake, our souls drift through these mortal days, only to return to the arms of eternity. May their journey leave behind the fragrance of God. Pray with me: Lord, I'm humbled that you've given me time. More of it than many. Help me daily to use every single fiber of it for love. Loving others, loving you, loving who you've made me to be. May I be known for love. Amen. Read with me: Ephesians 5:15,16

When the planting is done

2011-08-01T09:38:00.005-04:00

Over 400 kids, almost 7000 meals, (eaten by all of us, not just me!) 3 long weeks, and less than 4 hours of sleep per night, the children's Bible camp my family helps with each year has come to a close. Still dizzy from the frenzy of activity, I sat this morning, sipping freshly ground coffee when I read this quote: "Don't judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds that you plant." Robert Louis Stevenson. Immediately the three very different weeks of camp came to my mind. Teen week came first with a smorgasbord of cowboy boots, skinny jeans, flip flops, plaids, and diverse backgrounds. From 7 different states these 13-18 year olds walked onto campus, most of them genuinely ready to meet with God in some very real way. 7-9 year old week came next--a hurricane of young ones with energy that, if harnessed, could power our country naturally for quite some time. Many of these were so small, their main purpose was to have fun. Our purpose of course, was to show them God's love while they had fun. Not always easy. Then there were the 10-12 year olds. Wave upon wave of them rolled in, pillows, suitcases, and duffel bags in hand. 170 of them! We were like an anthill that from the outside looks like little people running everywhere, but upon close examination, there is direction and purpose to every step. These were the children who stood at the crossroads ready to make some long term decisions about what they will believe and whom they will serve. Again, our goal was to reveal the love of God and point them in that direction. One Saturday between camps, I ran home and planted some winter squash and pumpkin seeds for fall harvest. The conditions must have been perfect because seeds that normally take 14 or more days to germinate were over an inch tall the following Friday when I returned home. I couldn't believe how quickly they came up this year. That was teen week in a nutshell. We planted, we watered, and we saw growth that very week. Overwhelming growth. Then there was the week of young campers where we slugged it, kissed boo boos, hugged necks, combed hair, wrestled, encouraged the occasional shower,(why do kids hate to shower?) all while constantly pointing with our hearts as loudly as we could, to the love of God. We taught, we shared, we tickled, we prayed, and we prayed again. But the fruit, the harvest is not as evident in these young ones. It isn't that they don't grow, but growth is measured differently at that age, and much of what we are doing then is just laying the foundation. On what will these little ones build their lives? A loving God? A world that offers bigger gaming systems, newer cell phones, and a Justice fall line of clothing just in time for back to school? We pray they left camp with a heart that stands on the love of their Father. And finally we swam in an ocean of 10-12 year olds where one was as distracted as my chocolate lab when a squirrel crosses our path, and the other was as focused as my chocolate lab becomes on said squirrel. One's listening, one's not, and we were just praying, "God let them all hear. Let them understand that we've tried both foundations and yours is better. Yours is greater. Yours is enough." Some of them come to tell you what they learned, but many are quiet and you are left to wonder. Did they hear? Did they understand? Being a dorm mom, I was with the kids constantly. There were many glimpses into the fruit that was ripening in their hearts. One little girl said to me, "I didn't know that God's hand would never be against me. I didn't know He will always love me until I came here." Fruit. Thank you, God. Another little girl after sharing about a life in foster care said, "I think I need to forgive my mom." Amen. But I have to wonder about the kitchen staff--those who labored tirelessly in over 80 degree temperatures, chopping, slicing, stirring, and kneading with little to no interaction with the kids. These were the servants who fed their tummies so others of us could feed their souls. A child with a full belly is in a much better place to feed their soul. But, those who worked in the kitchen didn't get to see any fruit. They just served with a spiritual dot dot dot at the end of each day. Was what they were doing impacting eternity? There were also those who wrote checks and those who planted seeds in a prayer closet somewhere far from the campus. There were the people who showed up weeks before to clear out the cobwebs and prepare the campus. None of them had the privilege of hearing how God had worked in these little ones' hearts. They saw no fruit. But they served. They planted seeds. Without planting of seeds, there is no crop. The last two years my garden has yielded enough cucumbers to make salads and eat with my family. But this year, I've had so many cucumbers that I'm giving away bags full to others, and still have baskets filled all over my house. Here's the interesting part, I've planted the same amount of seeds each year. There's a passage in I Corinthians, "I planted, Apollos watered, but God caused it to grow. So neither the one who plants counts for anything, nor the one who waters, but God who causes the growth." Who can say why one year I have mountains of cucumbers and another I have few? Who can say what the real fruit of Canal Lake Bible Camp really will be? We can count conversions, rededications, callings to ministry--if we like. But, truly it is God who causes growth. I'd rather not try to measure the harvest. Instead, I'd like to find myself content in knowing, I planted. I planted with all my heart. With every ounce of energy and strength I had, I planted. And so did the kitchen workers, the cleaning ladies, the prayer warriors, the board members, and many others. And now, we'll pray to the Lord of the harvest to bring about fruit in all these hearts. Imagine what would happen if all of these over 400 kids chose to continue to seek after the heart of God in their lives! Imagine what would happen in ours schools, in our town, in our state if they chose to build their lives on the truths of Jesus and not worldly wisdom. And I'm praying to that end, but I remember too, the parable of the shepherd who left 99 sheep to find one lost lamb. As a child I loved that story, but as an adult I realize that even if all the fundraisers, all the meals, all the work yielded only one heart turned toward God, it would be worth it. It would. God's not willing that any should perish, and His love knows no bounds. He will reach to the ends of the earth to restore His children to Himself. Pray with me to that end, please. God, we know you were sovereign in each child that attended camp. We know you were sovereign in each adult who helped in some way. We know you have purposes that are far beyond our understanding. God, we've planted with everything in us, will you bring about growth? Will you protect these seeds, bring them warmth, bring them sun, bring them rain and let them take root? Will you bring about a safe environment for them to grow? We trust you with the harvest. Thank you for letting us plant. Amen.

Felling Trees

2011-04-18T09:45:00.004-04:00

April showers bring May flowers. Surely the person who first gave wind to those words lived here in the mountains of Georgia because April seems always to be the month of deluge before May inevitably pins sun's yellow yolk to velvet blue skies. This year the rains have been accompanied by tornado warnings, crazy buckets of hail, darkened skies electrocuted by lightning and convulsive thunder. It's been years since I've seen a spring with this many storms in short succession. At the entrance to our subdivision, my neighbors' house sits beneath towering poplars and oak trees. I called to check in on them after we'd passed yet another spring storm, when they told me they were going to have some trees cut down. Explaining that during the previous nights' winds they watched those trees sway perilously close to their home, they were confident that left to another nasty storm, those trees could do significant damage to their life's investment. I understood. Easily twice the height of their three story home, I couldn't help but consider those trees as I drove by their house later that week. No matter the soundness of their home, it remained no match for the havoc those poplars could wreak. They would have to be felled. Psalm 29:9 says, "The Lord's shout bends the large trees and strips the leaves from the forests. Everyone in his temple says, "Majestic!"" In our lives, have we not known some great and insurmountable tree that towers dangerously close to the people and things we hold dear? I've watched drug and alcohol addiction sway over the heart and mind of someone I desperately love. I've seen foreclosure notices cloud the skies and crowd the lives of dear friends, and I've known pain and hurt left to grow into giants that threatened once happy marriages. Yes, I've known trees that needed a good felling. And our God is able to do that with one shout. One single shout from our Creator bends the very things that threaten to overtake our lives. Just as the storm the other night sucked the dogwood blossoms from the arms of their trees, one shout from our God strips circumstances of the power they appear to have in our lives. Psalm 29 goes on to say, "The Lord sits enthroned over the engulfing waters, the Lord sits enthroned as the eternal king." There's a dam not far from our home that serves to regulate the amount of water held in our lake and used for power production. Only a few times in my life have I known that dam to be filled to capacity and the waters to pour over like the falls of Niagara. It is in that state now--a surging army of frothy water perpetually cascades over the dam. Armed with cameras, people are driving out there just to see the sight. Flooded lives though are not so breathtaking, are they? Interestingly that is the word David uses here to describe the water. Flood. It's the same word used in Genesis to describe the great flood of mankind. This is the only other place in the Old Testament where that same word is used. Imagine a situation so great in David's life that the only thing he could liken it to was the very flood that swallowed humanity, plants, animals and life in one gulp! What I love about that passage is not the description of the circumstances but the picture David painted of God. God is sitting enthroned over the engulfing waters. Reminiscent of Jesus' own slumbering amidst New Testament storms on the Galilean Sea, our Father remains so in control that he has not even had to get up off his throne to handle the situations in our lives. He is still on the throne of all creation, still seated as sovereign King. This is our God. So able, that though the contents of our lives may appear to be overflowing and our own ability to hold them together may be entirely maxed out, He remains unfazed and utterly able. The last verse of that chapter says, "The Lord gives his people strength; the Lord grants his people security." I love grants because they are free. God requires nothing in the granting of strength to his people. The Hebrew phrasing here implies a military type of strength. The idea that when things seem beyond our ability to handle, God will bring in reinforcements is so reassuring. The reality of our lives is that He never leaves us to face giants alone. He never turns His back when the waters spill over our worlds. Instead, He freely gives His people the security of knowing that He remains enthroned. Remains able. Remains in control. Our God remains. So my neighbors will have a tree guy come do his thing. He's an expert in the taking down of trees whose limbs threaten the stability of a home. But what about you and I? Where will we turn for the felling of situations and circumstances in our own worlds? It is so tempting to take matters into our hands, to exhaust every avenue possible to find resolution. Yet there are times when the truth is we need to simply, "Be still and know that He is God." (Psalm 46:10) A picture comes to mind of little me planted like a spider inside some small lifeboat at the edge of the dam attempting to prevent myself from being carried over the edge by the rushing water. Furiously rowing, I am fighting a battle never meant to be won by my feeble arms. There are times in our lives, when we have to surrender to the flood and the trees and the storms. There are times when we need to ask God to help us see the spiritual world around us instead of the physical. What if in that same picture I could see God--the greater, invisible hand that cradles my little boat. "Faith," my friends is the very "substance of things hoped for, the evidence not seen." (Hebrews 11:1) We may not be able to see the hands of our Father at work, but we can stand in the security that He is working. May we hear the shouts of our Father. May we sense His presence. May we live amidst the storms in the greater reality that our God remains on the throne, unfazed. "And if our God is for us, than who can stand against?" (Romans 8:31)

Pondering

2010-12-09T08:52:00.005-05:00

Verse 19. It's the one that always gets me. I don't why exactly, but the phrase, "Mary treasured all these things and pondered them in her heart" (Luke 2:19) is as captivating to me now as it was when I was a little girl. Here was a young lady, barely a woman from what historians tell us, who had seen an angel, heard tale of her barren cousin's miraculous pregnancy, carried a baby and birthed it in a stable of all places, and was visited by shepherds who also saw angels and found she and her infant son by their direction. She's lead quite an extraordinary life. And I wonder, what did she ponder? The passage says she pondered "these things" and I have to think it was the miracles, the promises made to her that came to fruition right before her eyes, even within her own body, on which she let her heart linger. Matthew 6:9-10 says, "Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven where moths and rust do not destroy and thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is there your heart will be also." At Christmas, I can't help but think of all the material treasures we cling to. We make our lists, we check them twice. We add more to our lists. We stretch ourselves in every way possible and rarely is it all enough. And days later, the discarded wrappings are bulging from over-taxed garbage bins waiting at the curb, largely forgotten, new toys are laying about the house in various corners, the brooms shifts aggressively over crumbs and scraps, and the season is tidied and tucked away for another year. There is nothing wrong at all with gift-giving or any holiday festivity. I am just pointing out that what is often the treasure of our children's hearts and even that of our own hearts days before Christmas is soon forgotten days after. And we are left picking up miscellaneous pieces. Then there was Mary. She was given this beautiful son. Sure He was God incarnate, but to a young mother who nourished him, clothed him, comforted his tears, sang him to sleep, taught him Jewish customs, and kissed his skinned knees, I am sure he was more son than God. And only three decades after giving birth to that sweet baby she would lose him to a death that would kill most women from grief. He didn't become king on earth in the way many hoped. He was ripped from her life violently and without mercy. Gone. There can be no pain like that of losing your own child. It is unutterable. Indescribable. How did that woman survive? I think it must go back to what she treasured early on as a young girl. She had seen the faithfulness of God. She had seen that Yahweh was "not slack concerning his promises." (II Peter 3:9) She had seen that when he told her she would bring forth a son, she did just that. She had seen His protection of that young son when he brought visions to Joseph that they should leave the place they were staying for the safety of the child. She treasured and pondered the character and promises of God. When faced with the greatest, deepest lost, she had a treasure trove within her heart of things that moths and rust do not destroy, that man can never crucify. With every passing year I learn that we are less and less invincible. The marriage I thought was made in heaven crumbles, the man I thought so strong stumbles, the home of someone's childhood burns to the ground, the healthy little girl becomes racked with cancer, the friends once so close are a distant memory. Life is so full of change. There's that saying that the only things certain in life are death and taxes. There's some truth to that addage, but to it I would add that the greatest certainty in life is the faithfulness of our God to fulfill his promises. So this season, I'm making a point to examine what exactly it is I treasure and to focus my pondering on the faithfulness of God in my own life. I'm treasuring the times He's carried me through. I'm pondering the times when I saw His promises materialize in my little world. Because I don't know if I will get tomorrow. And if I do receive tomorrow, I do not truely know who or what I will find there with me. But this I do know, if I meet tomorrow, I meet it in the company of the God who promises never to leave, never to forsake. There are uncertainties in my life even now--things that I worry over, surprises, curveballs, things we weren't expecting. But God knew. Scripture says, "You will keep in perfect peace him whose mind is steadfast on thee. For he trusts in you." (Isaiah 26:3) May I be found pondering the God who remains good in all circumstances; may that be where my heart is found. In that there is peace. And didn't the angel proclaim, "Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace....to all men." (Luke 2:14) Pray with me: Jesus, YOU are life. You are joy. You are peace. You are hope. You are ALL that I could ever need. May I see YOU for who you are. May my heart not become crowded with treasures that could dissolve tomorrow but may my heart be filled to overflowing with YOU. I treasure YOU this season. Amen. Read with me: What God has promised. II Peter 1:4 Philippians 4:19 II Cor. 12:9 I Cor. 10:13 Jude 24 Romans 8:28 John 3:16 Psalm 46:1 Matthew 11:28 (a link with a lot more-- www.smilegodlovesyou.org/promises.html )

Ye Shall Know the Truth

2010-09-29T22:53:00.004-04:00

I haven't written in months--not that I haven't wanted to write, but I guess more directly, I haven't had much to say. I've had questions. Lots and lots of questions, lately. I did my time in a Bible school and learned all the right answers, but in recent years, I've had questions based out of real life, not theory. The kind of questions I'm referencing are those that no theology major can answer, no book can satisfy, no degree can squelch, and frankly, they are birthed in the streets of life rather than some textbook with yellowed pages. When first we married, Jeff and I bought a Victorian house that was built in the 1870's and because the laundry was in the unfinished, damp and otherwise unused basement, I was forced to frequent that area of the house. It was there that I could see a few cracks in the foundation. A firm foundation it was, but time had revealed a few spots where no matter how great the builder, there were now small cracks. They weren't of major concern--in fact the house will probably stand until the rapture--but they did exist. And only time had revealed them, and only those with an intimate knowledge of the house would ever understand their presence because from the street, the house looked like any other. Those cracks are much like my questions. They have appeared over time--as life has adjusted and settled and weathered more than one storm. My foundation remains firm, but there are these moments of punctuation where I ask, where I wonder, where I am willing to admit, I just don't get some things. And I've grown to understand that pat answers and the ones that come from cookie cutters are for the faint of heart and true questions are for those who have the courage to stand in the face of culture and tradition and history and say, with all respect, "I see how it is, how it has been for the last century or ten centuries and I'm not sure I agree. I'm not sure it's right. And I need to dig deeper. And I'm okay with that." So, over these last months, I've been asking. I've been wondering. Reading. Thinking. Raising my kids and cooking and cleaning--those elite activities that don't pause for questions. And I have a few answers and a whole lot more questions. It seems a treacherous journey in some respects--dangerous to question, to speculate outside of the box in which I've spent the majority of my Christian life. Most people just aren't comfortable with questions. Like those crazy 11 X 14 photographs you always get free with the package, questions just don't seem to fit neatly into our Christian worlds. A while back I told someone that I was questioning the institution of traditional church, for example, and they offered me a rather blank expression--maybe it was a deer in headlights kind of face--and said, "Yeah, I've read books about things like that." I wanted to say, "Books, huh? Well, I'm living it." The thing is I don't think questions really bothered Jesus. He met with Nicodemus after all. And Job had just a small bit of cud he wanted to chew with his Creator. Of course there was Saint Francis of Assissi, a courageous monk who took the time to think through the corruption that had begun to permeate the monastic order of his day to the extent that he was even imprisoned for a time. And then there was Martin Luther--the very father of reformation and therefore a man unafraid to question. It is good company that I feel I am keeping these days. I can tell you with confidence that questions don't leave me comfortable. What if the answers I find force me to make different life choices? What if the answers I find don't line up with my friends' thoughts? What if they contradict what I have taught my own children? Or God forbid this one, what if the things I come to believe are not the same as my spouse? Ohmygosh! What if???? Yeah. What if? Well, I don't know. But, this I do know. My God remains greater. Greater than the sum of all my questions. Greater indeed. Today, on my walk, I soaked in the ruby leaves of the dogwood and the amber of the poplar trees and then, in my garden, I held the delicate petals of the autumn peas and couldn't help but remember. He's still Creator. This much I know. He's still the one who formed a fish that looks like tin foil and a stingray with polkadots. He's still amazing. He's still the one who gave my eldest an unquenchable thirst for football and books and my youngest a hankering for a sketch pad and pencil. He's still the one who invented the gravity that holds my feet to the ground and He's still the one who tucks the beach in with the blanketing tides. He's still the one who striped the zebra and dotted the dalmation. He remains Creator. He remains Savior. He remains sovereign. And, I think it is in fact, He who invites me to question. Perhaps the truth of the matter is that my questions find their true source in His Truth within me. Perhaps they are his invitation to know not what I believe in, but WHO I believe in. Perhaps the questions are like the crumbs of Hansel and Gretel, left to draw me to The Truth. After all, it was Jesus who said, "Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free." John 8:32. Read with me: Proverbs 8:14 Counsel is mine, and sound wisdom; I am understanding, I have strength. Pray With Me: Lord, now we see through a glass only partially, but someday, we will see clearly. In the meantime, Father, grant me the courage to seek Your Face, and the wisdom to accept the answers you send. Cause me to know you more. May I not be filled with greater knowledge, but rather emptied of useless knowledge and filled to fullness with Your heart. Amen.

I Saw You

2010-04-26T08:41:00.007-04:00

There dangles from the eaves of my house, like a ruby hourglass, a hummingbird feeder; a lighthouse suspended for those self-propelled ships of the air with beaks almost as long as their thumb-sized bodies. It was March when I hoisted myself onto the railing of my deck, some thirty-six feet in the air and coiled it's attaching wire through the metal on the eaves. There it hung--a signal that a sugar water banquet had been spread. And then I waited. See I have a thing for hummingbirds. Amazing to me are their tiny wings that flutter and flap over sixty times before I can finish saying one Mississippi. Unfathomable. And I want to be with them. I want to see them; to watch them. So the routine begins each year after the feeder has been filled and hung that I take my quiet time outside on one of my red rockers--painted red over black or white as another signal to them that food is nearby--and watch. I know they will come, and so it is only a waiting game. Eventually I hear it--a sound not unlike that of a bumblebee and yet distinctively different, more purposeful, almost like an ant-sized helicopter. And without moving my body at all, I avert my eyes from the passage I am reading to watch his first landing, his first sip of the nectar I've prepared.

To describe how I feel when he comes is probably an exercise in futility but I will try. I plan for them. I think about the reds of blossoms, the nectar giving properties of the flowers I choose, the overall appeal of the plants I place in my gardens and planters all in relation to the hummingbird. And that first motoring sound of his wings, the signal that he has come, is so entirely expected--I knew he'd come because I'd made everything ready for him--and yet so entirely gratifying--the work I'd done yielded the desired results.

Then begins a week or so of just watching, enjoying. Every morning I sit on the rocker propping my Bible against my knees, coffee mug placed precariously on the rocker's arm or more solidly on last year's abandoned toad habitat, and wait. They both come now--male and female--to drink. Every morning. Usually twice. They return too, throughout the day, but it is in the morning that I see them. And eventually I begin to move around them. When they become confident that I won't harm them, I attempt to make their photo which too is an exercise in futility since no image I've ever collected has compared to the real thing. But I try.

It's about 8 square inches, I'd say. The space occupied by feeder and bird can't be much more than that in size. I have to zoom right in with my camera to bring that small section of life into focus. Atop the hill from my neighbor's vantage, you'd never know they were there. Just eight tiny inches of a world filled with statues of liberty, Mount Everests and Grand Canyons--so insignificant really. But I see those eight square inches every single day. I observe them with joy, with care, with determination, with dedication. I am unstoppingly compelled to enjoy them because it was I who made a place for them; it was I who planned for them. And they came--to my eight square inches.

I read from John the first morning I waited for the birds to join me. Jesus had been in Bethany and decided to travel north to Galilee. Nothing Jesus ever did was coincidence. He did, after all, have the knowledge of God miraculously available to his human form. So when he found Philip and spoke, "Follow me" I believe though Philip may have been floored, Jesus was probably expecting him. And upon being told to follow, Philip did exactly what I would have done. He ran off to Nathanael and told him, "We have found the one Moses wrote about in the law, and the prophets also wrote about--Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph."

A little history for those who may not already know. The Jews were living under Roman rule. They had been without a word from God or prophet for around 400 years. 400 years of oppression, of battles, of existence without any tangible hope or proof that their God still cared. 400 hundred years of silence. Have you ever felt that heaven remained silent while you called and called under your throat was dry and your voice no longer made a sound? Amongst a melting pot of cultures, beliefs, peoples from all manner of nations--Greek Roman, German, Egyptian, African--and multiple gods to go with each nation, the Jews had been left to wonder if any of it had ever even been real. How was their God any different from the pagan gods of other nations? And yet they had the law of Moses. They had the words of the prophets promising that someday a Messiah would come. And their understanding of this promise was much more literal than is ours today. They understood it to mean that when their Messiah came it would mean redemption from Roman rule, and the oppressive rule of other kings and emperors that He would bring. He would be King, but not of their hearts, of their literal world. They saw their countrymen brutally crucified on jagged spikes, they lost their husbands and their children to Roman whims, they gave their last coins to the Roman tax and lived in towns where Roman soldiers could drop their heavy packs before them and insist they carry the load of Rome for a mile. Though their lives were not all bad; they did live in fear. And I would venture to say that many if not all had doubts and there had to have been those who were cynical at best and more than likely hopeless. Nathanael, a Galilean himself knew the basin in which Nazareth lay and transparently replied to Philip, "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" In him there would not be found political correctness, nor any desire to pretend that he believed the prophecy of a Messiah could be fulfilled by a carpenter from Nazareth.

Philip simply told him "Come and see." Come and see for himself--which on a side note is perhaps the most wonderful evangelistic phrase ever spoken. We spend so much time trying to learn the best evangelistic teachings, approaches and methods when all Philip said was, "Come and see." An invitation to come and discover Christ from a trusted person may be the most compelling way to share the path of Jesus ever used. (Exit tangent.)

As soon as Jesus sees Nathanael he says, "Look a true Israelite in whom there is no deceit!" In other words, "Here's the real deal. Here's a man who is authentic and in whom I find no falsehood." And Nathanael says to him, "How do you know me?" How? How can you know who I am? I'm just a Galilean--one of thousands. Tell me how you--a carpenter from Nazareth--can presume to know my heart?

And without hesitation Jesus says, "Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you." I saw you, Nathanael before Philip ever even told you to come and see, I saw you. No one will ever know what it was Nathanael was doing or thinking under the fig tree, but Jesus looked into that man's eyes and told him where he was located before Philip came to get him. Nathanael had to have felt the same hopelessness as other Jewish men and women and he had to have wondered at some time, "Does this God even care?" And Jesus said to him, "I saw you."

Nathanael is like the hummingbird. God had a plan for him just as I had a plan for that hummingbird. The plan involved a relationship. God didn't intend just to redeem Israel but to bring all mankind as individuals to Himself. Just as I set out a feeder to bring the hummingbirds to my home and waited patiently for their arrival, Jesus had to have anticipated the moment when he could look into Nathanael's eyes and say, "I know you exist and I care." That tiny little portion of earth under the fig tree may have only been a few square inches, but Jesus saw it.

You'll remember the story of Hagar when she was cast out of Abraham and Sarah's home with her son Ishmael and God introduced himself as Jehovah El Roi--The God who Sees. Is that not a beautiful name for the God we worship? He is the God who sees you. And no matter how small, how insignificant and unimportant your few square inches of earth may be, it does not go unnoticed. It does not go unplanned for. It does not go uncared for. It does not go untended. It does not go unwatched. And mark my words, it DOES NOT GO UNLOVED.

He sees the miner's wife as she weeps into her pillow at night over her husband's death. He sees the young girl in the inner city whose mother lives on welfare and doesn't know who her father is. He sees the swollen belly of the baby in Angola and the boy in the mountains of Afghanistan taught to shoot long before he understands the value of life. He sees the barren woman and the unemployed man. He sees. He sees the overwhelmed student and the stroke victim. He sees the greedy man and the hungry man, the raging woman and the abused. There is no square inch space on this entire planet that Jehovah El Roi does not see.

As I sit each morning and watch that crimson feeder for the arrival of the hummingbird I can't help but consider my antics. It seems silly that I should care so much for such a little thing, but I do. And that in that moment I'm overwhelmed by the reality that the obsession I nurture is entirely and utterly minuscule in comparison to the obsession of God on my behalf. As I focus on that feeder, it is I who am watched. It is I who am tended. And it is I who am seen. By the God of the universe. And you too, are seen.

Nathanael responded to Jesus by saying, "...You are the son of God; you are the king of Israel!" He responded with belief. I don't know where you are in life, but He knows. He cares He sees you. Do you believe?

And There Before Me Lay a Chasm

2010-03-21T23:08:00.001-04:00

I remember standing what seemed like a thousand feet high above solid ground on a three foot by three foot square, harnessed and attached to a bungee. The purpose was to jump, to defy logic and bound through the air towards concrete knowing that inches before I cracked open like an egg that rolled off the counter to the floor, I'd rebound and the elastic chord would shoot back toward the heavens, a human yoyo. All of this for fun. Yet when my feet found their heels attached to the remnants of what was solid and their toes pinching only air, somehow, they weren't so sure it was going to be much fun. What human in their right mind ever chooses to drop off any cliff? Life though, is so full of cliffs. One day you are meandering through meadows, bluebirds bantering back and forth and honeybees sipping cotton covered clover. Then you turn around and there before you lays a chasm. We even know they are coming. We're taught to expect them. Jesus promised them when he matter of factly mentioned, "In this world you will have troubles." But still, like the frigid waters of some wild mountain river they suck the breath from our lungs and render our limbs numb with shock. Some are greater than others--the ones that when you dare look down to see if perhaps you might find some way across, or over, or through, you see no bottom. No floor. No end. Then there are those that at first glance appear not much broader than perhaps your most intense running stride. You can jump them. You can swing over. Somehow you manage. And once across, you wipe the nervous sweat from your palms and exhale deeply. "Shoo. That was a close one. Thank God we made it through." But those deep ones. Those long ones. They remind me of the Mediterranean Sea. When the boys and I look at that body of water on the map it seems so small. Yet to the Grecian fisherman standing on her shore, The Mediterranean does not appear to have an end. He can't see the other side. That's what the long cliffs are like. They're the ones you face when the doctors tell you she's a beautiful girl with so much hope for the future, but she'll never stand upright in her adult years--some rare disease has moved into her body and refuses to leave. I listened to a man tell this story just today. Or the orphanage that has enough food for the over 100 children who call it home for only one more week. Then next week comes. Autism. Your major supporter has dropped you. Stage 4. HIV positive. No work tomorrow. Another lay off. I don't love you anymore. The teenage child who looks into your eyes and says, "let me live my life." Alcoholism. Chasms. Deep, deep chasms. And no human in their right mind would choose to drop from one of those precipices. They wouldn't. But they come anyway. We can't stop them. Part of the curse, yes, but knowing that doesn't make navigating them any easier. When I was preparing to bungee jump a too-skinny, grey faced man in baggy blue-jeans gave me clear instructions. I thought I understood them until I reached the crest and looked down. In that moment I remembered none of them. "One. Two. Three. Ma'am? One. Two. Three." "Don't count," I told him. "I'll go when I'm ready." And I did. I jumped down into that darkness. Not because I wanted to anymore. Not because I thought it would be fun anymore. Not because I thought I'd be better for having done it. Only because I'd come that far--there was really no turning back. And only because I believed the chord would hold. It had been strong enough to hold someone twice my size just minutes before. It's that way in our lives too. We've come too far to quit, too far to stop when we see just how dangerous life can be. And The Anchor will hold. I've found that to be true. He promised, "I will never leave you nor forsake you." "I will be with you until the end of the world." So we jump. Jump head-long into the realities of our lives--the chasms, whatever they are--knowing now how things will end up, but to whom we are harnessed. And we trust that His strong right arm is enough to carry us home. And it is on these truths I stand before the cliffs in my own little world. sometimes remembering all the other stuff doesn't matter. What matters is knowing we are held-firmly--by a God who isn't in the business of dropping those whom He loves. "Because he holds fast to me in love, I will deliver him; I will protect him, because he knows my name. When he calls to me, I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble; I will rescue him and honor him. With long life I will satisfy him and show him my salvation." Psalm 91:14-16

Really, How Did God Intend Us To Eat Oatmeal?

2010-03-04T09:29:00.005-05:00

Warning: Probably Gonna Wanna Skip This One If You Aren't Into Thinking For the first time this morning, after thirty-three years, I put chocolate chips in my oatmeal. It was glorious. Why I've never done that before, I have no idea. I mean really, I put oatmeal in my chocolate chip cookies, so why not the reverse? Never occurred to me, I guess. I wasn't raised that way--who was? I mean, raisins, pecans, honey, sure, all acceptable accompaniments to the time honored, traditional stick-to-your-ribs gummy breakfast. But chocolate chips? Isn't it food heresy to include chocolate chips in your humble oatmeal? On the other hand, my first encounter with a portabella mushroom was in a grocery store in chilly Ontario. It literally begged me to eat it and with great excitement I acquiesced offering no resistance. The portabella and I were on an adventure together--to this day, we still are. I'd had no food show, no childhood notions based on the diet of my family, Fanny Farmer hadn't mentioned the portabella to my knowledge and so here I was with this hunk of beefy vegetation and the sky was literally the limit. I've cooked it dozens of ways and just last night as I was eating eggplant parmesan it occurred to me that next I would try it in that manner. Never once have I used a recipe with that mushroom. It tells me how it wants to be eaten and I obediently trust that it has NEVER let me down and eat it anyway it inspires. When we have a previous experience in life, whether intentional or not, that experience inevitably becomes a cap to what we believe can happen, a framework within which we understand the elements of that experience. When we have no previous understanding of a subject, we are free to experience facets and components of that thing from an infinite number of angles. This is why when the Mouk tribe in remote regions Papua New Guinea, a group of people who had been exposed for the first time to the chronological teachings of scripture erupted in dancing and shouts of "EE TAOW, EE TAOW! EE TAOW!!!" "It is good!" The English translation of their delirious shouts of joy speaks to their understanding of what we call the gospel--the truth that Jesus had paid the price for their sins and His eternal love and presence was theirs for the taking. No fancy prayers, no long walks up an aisle to an alter carpeted in horrible mauve or green or orange industrial carpet. No preacher saying, "Speak these words after me." And to my knowledge, none of them, when later referencing that moment in time, ever used the phrase, "I asked Jesus into my heart." Now don't start throwing your compostables at me just yet. I'm not saying either one is right. All I am saying is that the tribal response is one without any preconceived ideas of how it should look and the North American experience is framed by a history steeped in religion that offers a thousand different pictures of how an experience with God should take form--similar to my culinary efforts where oatmeal and portabellas are concerned. I have to ask myself, in how many other areas have I been missing out on the chocolate chips I could be including? How is my portrait of mothering affected by our cultures snap-shots of the task? Is my vision of marriage wet with the paint of my Heavenly Father's art or is it a low-ink photo copy of someone else's wal-mart quality print framed in wood-laminated plastic? And really, when it comes down to it, you know where I am going. On what, ON WHAT is my picture of a walk with God based? On what? Because I want to tell you that I've spent my entire life in church--thirty-three years of pictures, books, essays, flannel graphs, daily breads, conferences, Bible School, good pastors, and songs--that's an awful lot of frames of reference through which to sort. And then there's this: "Jesus said to them, "I am the bread of life. the one who comes to me will never go hungry, and the one who believes in me will never be thirsty." (John 6:35) The one who comes to me and the one who believes in me will NEVER be hungry or thirsty. Come and believe. How then do I come to Jesus? Where do I go to meet Him? Is it the same for me as it is for you? Is it really that simple? Is it? You tell me. Is it? With love, s

Life: In This Moment

2010-03-01T08:41:00.004-05:00

The weeks that have passed our church family recently have taken with them the lives of two beautiful people--human beings who somehow understood the greater things, the things that grip the heart of God. When you pour cream into a mug of ebony coffee and then stir, the brew becomes a thick muddy whirlpool around your spoon and likewise when God stirred these individuals into the landscape of earth, the shade of humanity was permanently changed. Death. The inescapable--apart from being raptured--truth of the physical body. When we interact with the separation of soul from body we inevitably experience incredible grief--how can we not? What we know has been removed to a place about which we've only heard and read. Just yesterday my husband ran into a man for whom he'd done some work last year. The two were one of those happy retired couples that you hope to be like someday. The man told him that one day he and his wife were sitting, talking together and she just fell into his arms. She never spoke again. Death. I couldn't shake the image of her physical body collapsing into the arms of her beloved while her soul freely fluttered into the arms of eternity. A billboard had been planted behind the lids of my eyes declaring the brevity of our physical existence. Maybe I think about death and illness more now that Jeff works as a firefighter and EMT. He comes home with stories and I think of the families who will race to the hospital to hold the hands of their loved ones after Jeff has finished his part of their care. I thank God it wasn't him, wasn't my babies, wasn't my mom, wasn't my dad and I plead with him for protection and safety for those whom I love. How can I not at least ask? But control is not a luxury we can really afford, is it? Ultimately? We don't control the driver who runs the stop sign or the germs whose flight pattern may choose to land on the sweet fingers of our babies, and we don't get to dictate the moment when a man's heart decides it is weary of beating. But we get to choose how we will live--in the moments we have right here and now. We don't know about tomorrow, yesterday is like a breeze that has cooled our faces for a moment and then shifted south. We get today. That's all. Not even this afternoon or tonight, but right now. Now. I read John 11 this morning ,the story of Lazarus' passing--the rather fortunate friend of Jesus whose soul was returned to a rotting corpse. Such a random thing to be released from eternity's grasp and returned to the parenthesis of physical life that hovers between the everlasting Alpha and Omega. Of which I am aware, there's no record of Lazarus' life after his return from the family tomb. Apparently, the event of his resurrection was of greater significance than the days and perhaps even years that followed. And I'm left to wonder if perhaps that is because we love the WOW moments far more than we love to hear about the days that fill the average lives of people. But I have to think that Lazarus was a changed man. I have to think that Mary and Martha were women who didn't take for granted the remaining days of their existence. How could they? As a family, they'd shaken hands with death and by the power of God been unwrapped from her inevitable grip. But then perhaps the reason his resurrection is included in John's account has less to do with the WOW factor and more to do with the reality that most of us live our lives out of tombs. Jesus told Martha, "I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live even if he dies, and the one who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?" (John 11:26) The one who lives and believes in me will never die. I love that phrase. The one who lives and believes. Do you get that? You and I get to live and believe. We get the benefit of the hindsight of saints who've gone before us. Naturally most of us will in fact greet physical death, but what is really tragic is that many of us are as good as dead right now anyway. We get to live following life, which is Jesus, or not. And when we aren't following Him, we are dead men walking. Lazarus got to come back because Jesus called him out of death into life. "Lazarus, come forth!" And His call is the same for you and I, "Come forth! Just as you have been buried with me through baptism into death, in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too may live a new life." (Romans 6:4) Come forth. The heart of our Father is that we would live now as though we had already entered eternity because He came that we would have 'life and have it to the full.' His desire for us is life, now. And He's calling us to walk in life--to leave the grave. Lazarus' sisters said he was gonna stink when he came out. I don't know if he did or not. What I do know is that when you are alive, you don't stink, unless you are hanging around near the graveyard. I wonder how long it took Lazarus to remove those grave clothes and live as though he were alive. Not long, I am sure. Perhaps you are like me, and there are a few grave clothes to which you are clinging. They have no hold on you. Take a spiritual bath in the washing of God's Word and then walk, my friends, walk in newness of life. All we have is the choice to live right now as though we are alive. Pray with me: Lord, help us to release the past into your eternal forgiveness. Help us not to assume we have tomorrow to live, but to choose today to live in the newness of life you have given us. Help us to choose life with our family, with our children, with the world around us. Holy Spirit, please illuminate the areas in our lives where we are clinging to grave clothes, to the tomb. Show us where we are insisting that we cannot have life and then explode your life in those areas so magnificently that we declare, "The Lord has done this, and it is marvelous in our eyes." May we live, Jesus, as you live and may we reflect your life to the world around us. Amen

The Joy List

2010-01-02T21:24:00.008-05:00

As the new year falls gently like snow into our lives without slowing or hastening to fit our timetable I am left considering the reality that ready or not the second semester of schooling has arrived, the dawn of a new decade is here and the winter though frigid now will soon give way to spring. Time. We can't stop it, can't argue it out of reality, can't slow it down, and try as we might, we cannot obtain one iota more. January not only ushers in 2010. For me, it also marks the second anniversary of my homeschooling trek and so while many think long and hard as the autumn begins about where they are headed and how things are going, I find myself most intensely considering those things as I wrap in flannelly Kleenex my cranberry Christmas balls and tuck the mistletoe back into Rubbermaid bins for yet another year. Two years doesn't sound like a very long time, but I feel like I've always educated my boys at home and though I'm no veteran, I have a sense of having done this a while now. Perhaps that is because I started preparing for it 7 years ago when Nathan was only 3. Or maybe it is because the educating of my little men really began when they were snuggled cozily inside my tummy and I read to my protruding belly button and continued when they were infants and I read classics to them even then. Regardless, here I am--contemplating, considering. How is it going? Are we enjoying our journey? Have I stayed my original course? Is God directing our learning? Am I stuck in any ruts? What have I learned works well? What have I learned causes us more grief than joy? And speaking of joy--is the spirit of our school day one of joy and discovery, even awe at all God has poured into our world? In fact, it is the question of joy that, like a strobe light, flashes into my mind and heart repeatedly. Jesus did come after all so that joy might be completed in our lives. How am I, as my children's primary caregiver and teacher doing at opening the windows of my their sweet souls so that the joy of Christ can waft in like the robin's song in spring? And it is on this particular mountain--that of allowing the joy of the Lord to scent every area of our lives--that I do believe I will spend my time this year. Not that joy is something I can personally achieve; it's a fruit of the spirit after all. Scripture also insists that joy comes from following the precepts of God and that it is something we experience while in God's presence. Given those truths I am forced to examine what things just might cause me to abandon the precepts of God, to miss out on the presence of God in my life. Here are a list of a few things that the Holy Spirit has been showing me. Maybe you can relate? 1. Fear of man. It's not words of the four lettered category with which I struggle, it is just one little two letter word that seems to haunt me. Ever struggle to say NO because you are afraid of what someone will think? I can think of at least one commitment I have presently that should NOT be on my plate and yet I couldn't say the two letter word. Seems so simple here. no. NO. NO! Ultimately that stems from a fear of man and God's word is rather clear that the "fear of man brings a snare." Whether it's struggling to say no, trying to keep up with the Jones family next door, or fretting and worrying over what the rest of the world will think about your children when all is said and done, all of these things stem from an ultimate fear of man. I won't lie and pretend I don't struggle with this. I do. But this year I want to spend more time considering the thoughts my Father has towards me and less considering those of others. His are, after all, so much more pleasing to my soul. (Isaiah 51:11-13) 2. Over Scheduling. Not saying no is the precursor to the reality that most of us are convinced we have more time in each day than we really do. In fact most of us rather stubbornly persist with over scheduling our lives to the point that we are left completely unable to be still when we do in fact have a quiet evening. Before committing or renewing commitments this year for both my children and myself I am going to ask one question--can I maintain my location in the presence of God and be involved in this activity? Realistically as mothers whether we educate our children at home or work full time there simply will not be a great deal of wiggle room in our schedules if we plan to do our very best at the first stewardships God gave us--God Himself, our spouse if we are married, and our children. I have never met a pastor who told me to slow down, and I've never had someone say to me, "Sarah, you'd be great on this committee, but since you are in the mothering phase of life, I think perhaps someone else should do it." People will ask and take and request until the rapture. We have to learn to discern how much is enough. And then we must fearlessly stand our ground. Adam and Eve did not have blackberries...well, at least not the electronic kind. If the Garden of Eden was God's perfect plan for humankind then we might do well to attempt to mimic it whenever possible. (Well, not so much the naked part...at least not in public :-) 3. Daily. Joy is kind of like manna. The Israelites had to gather it daily. And since I mentioned Adam and Eve, one habit they had was walking with God in the cool of the evening. Sort of a daily kind of activity. If life is too full to get into God's Word regularly, then in reality, it won't be long before life is empty. Joy is a fruit and if it is removed from the vine it will spoil quickly. I need to be in God's word regularly. That can be SO hard for mothers who tend to give, give, give. It can be hard for all of us because frankly, we live in a world where distractions are as plentiful as the dust in my husbands workshop. We won't go too long without food, but sometimes we'll go days, weeks, even months without spiritual food. 4. Keeping my eyes on Jesus. It's tricky. The whole mothering, parenting, wifing, teaching side of things can be a sort of tight rope act. We as women are so relational--we want to interact and discuss and mull over every aspect of our lives with someone. And though I do love talking to God, a chat over tea with a sister face to face can be SO gratifying. But here's the thing about those conversations--they need to point us to Jesus and His heart for our families. If those conversations leave us wanting to be more like another individual or comparing ourselves to another, then they were futile and will suck the joy out of our home quicker than a hoover vacuum. God doesn't do templates. Our families are not cookie cutter images of Leave it to Beaver or Married with Children for that matter. They are unique reflections of our heavenly Father's vast creativity. 5. Computer. SHUT DOWN. Yeah. I know. That's a hard one when you are home all day long or even when you are at work--the little ding indicating email is awaiting is like a shot of espresso. Woo Hoo! Something of interest besides 2 + 2 = 4 and E=MC (how do you make the squared symbol on the computer?) I love to post my status on facebook--it's how I stay connected to my sisters and my extended family in the states and in Canada. Photos have always been a passion of mine and posting them regularly keeps Nannie and Poppa in Ontario daily involved in my boys' lives. That's a gift I give them because I can't imagine how hard it would be to have my children live far away. BUT...realistically, I don't need to spend more than five or ten minutes MAX a day doing those things. Really. Do I want my relationships to be completely virtual? The thing about email and facebook and all those other sites is that they remove part of our attention. We think we are multi-tasking--teaching the kids, paying the bills online, talking on the phone, but who are we kidding? This year my computer will be off more. I can post my status, upload my new photos and pay my bills in ten minutes flat and then, unless we need it for school, I can turn my little old HP off. Sorry Hewlett! 6. Plan. I did this already and WOW! I took about two days and literally planned every single day for the rest of the year. It is NOT selfish to take time for planning. I am the kind of person who loves being with my kids. While others scream for a break and complain that they are overwhelmed and must have "me time" in order to thrive, I adore every waking moment in the presence of my sweet boys. After a busy holiday season with loads of wonderful company I turned and looked at my husband and said, "All I want to do is play with the boys." It was very hard for me to take even more time to plan, but I knew God was calling me to get organized. So, I did take time to play and then I took time to plan. I always know where we're going and lay lessons out at least a week or more in advance, but to actually sit down and take the time to map out the remainder of our school year is the most freeing and liberating feeling. Some people might say, "Well, if I planned that far in advance I'd just end up changing everything." I understand. I'm not talking about carving the lesson plans in stone. What I'm talking about is getting a really solid game plan, a framework on which to stand, so that when hectic days and weeks come along I've got some solid footing and quick references to where we need to be. Take time to plan. You'll be better for it. 7. Space. Moving into our new home I have found myself wanting to fill it with less and leave more room for the air and light to flow freely. I think my life is that way too. I need to leave some wiggle room. I am creative and I like to "go with it" when the boys take an interest in something. In December, Corton decided he wanted to learn to carve. It wasn't in my plans. And frankly, I had no idea how to go about that, nor did I have any real interest in it myself. BUT...he WAS interested. Hello? This isn't rocket science! This is why I home school. This is the beauty of homeschooling. When they say, "Mom, I want to learn to carve." We say, "Sounds great! Let's see what resources we can come up with as soon as possible." And that's what we did. The neat thing is that he carved three different Christmas presents, the most special of which was a beautiful fireman's boot for Jeff. Now he is saying that after he retires from his football career he will probably want to become a "whittler." Plan, yes. But leave gaps--leave breathing room for the things that capture the hearts of your children. And if nothing captures for a month or two, then use that wiggle room to jump on the trampoline or read a great novel that is entirely unrelated to anything else you are learning, or to just paint for painting's sake. Wiggle room is to your family experience like grace is to your spiritual experience. 8. Play We don't get tomorrow. We don't even get the promise of another minute. We have now. And our precious children will not take with them what we intended to do but never got around to. And our spouses, whom we promised to cherish deserve so much more than the mundane day to day responsibilities most of us share. We get so wrapped up in remembering to pay the mortgage, cut the grass and to pick up a gallon of milk that we forget to have fun. I am going to have fun on purpose. And I'm going to check it off my to do list every single week. Sounds cheesy, I know. But I want my kids to look back on these years and remember them as full of laughter, full of giggling, and full of fun. How it must grieve the heart of God when we forget to smile and share our smiles with the very people who live nearest us! If there's no time for fun, then I better revisit number 1 and 2 on my list this year. There are more, but for now these are the things I'd like to share with each of you. Maybe your list is different or maybe it is identical. Tomorrow I begin a new year, a new chapter, a fresh start. It's not that I was looking for a fresh start or even that things were in horrible disarray in 2009. On the contrary, for the most part, the kids and I are having a blast. But still, in the quiet of the evening God has pressed these things on my heart and I'm listening. What good am I as a mother if I ignore the voice of my heavenly Father? I'll leave you with the words of Jesus when he said, "These things I have told you so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be full." (John 15:11) We're half way through this academic year and I know many of you are like me in that you want to do so many things. Marthas. And yet it was Mary who chose the most excellent thing--the presence of Jesus. It is there, in the living waters of the heart of Jesus that we take in incredible fullness of joy and it is the joy of the Lord that will be our strength as we continue to mother our children and love our families. Be encouraged, my friends, in the truth that for every moment you persevere, for every whispered prayer, for every trying day, you are laying up treasure in heaven. And even more important, you are laying foundations on earth in the heart of your children. Fullness of joy. Complete joy. May it be yours in 2010. Amen.

Inertia of the Soul

2009-12-09T21:44:00.008-05:00

So the boys and I are studying science and inevitably my youngest asks me to explain inertia--like that's just something that I should know without needing to google it. If there's one thing I've learned teaching the boys it's that I'll never have all the answers to their questions, but google will. And naturally, I google it because any explanation I give will be sketchy at best. Inertia is the resistance of any object to a change in its state of motion. As I sat there--flanked by two dusty-haired boys --discussing with them how if something is still, it wants to stay that way. Take a rock for example--it doesn't really want to move. It's kind of lazy. In the same way though, when that rock gets pushed down a hill, it doesn't want to stop either. Motivation for change is apparently rather hard to come by in the world of inanimate objects. Then again, perhaps inertia is not exclusive. Perhaps mankind too suffers from a form of inertia--inertia of the soul. Look how long it took humans to recognize slavery as an abuse of our fellow man? I'm not talking slaves that came from Africa here to the United States. We didn't write that book--slavery was around since the earliest of civilizations. There were Spartan slaves and Chinese slaves, there were slaves in Rome and frankly, there are still slaves to this day. Thousands of years and we can't seem to quit moving in that direction. Inertia. Consider the heart of Pharaoh--a man whom Egyptians considered a god. Surely he could change his mind and free the Israelite people. Yet he was steadily moving towards massive pyramids and he needed those Israelites to make bricks. It didn't matter what plague hammered his country, he was moving in the direction of bricks. That my friends, is inertia personified. So I am holding this concept of inertia in my heart, mulling over it, and I can't help but consider how I may be affected by it. I'm a task oriented person, so there's that--don't interrupt me when I'm in the middle of washing the dishes or I may need to take a pill. But I'm talking deeper than epidermal personality type stuff. I'm talking about the organs of my soul--the core of who I am. Do I resist the prodding of the Holy Spirit without even realizing that I'm doing it? Do I insist on mobility when He's whispering Stop, Sarah? What areas are there in my life where I've become completely still and yet God wishes me to move? What areas are there in my life where determined not to stop, I've run for so long while God longs for me to be still? My eldest son has this thing with being teachable. Though tender and generally very amiable and compliant, when it comes to doing something differently from how he has already started to do it, be ready. You'll encounter resistance. Take lay-ups for example. I saw he was struggling with making them consistently. So, like any other mother would do, I got a DVD on the fundamentals of layups and watched the entire thing. Then, I went outside and tried my hand at the new set of skills. And presto! Momma's making lay-ups in her thirties! Then I walked Nate through the process, step by step. He understood, but felt like he was doing just fine the other way. After all, his real problem wasn't his fundamentals, it was that he was doing them on a gravel driveway. Well, that's the way he saw it anyway. He took one or two shots and then just went right back to what he was doing before. I'll spare you the two weeks of teaching details, but eventually with lots more help from dad and some real encouragement, he figured out he wasn't listening to us. And he realized that as soon as he actually stopped and listened to what we were saying and then changed his state of motion, he could hit those shots. Now he's still got some inertia going on, but it's in the right direction and he's making lay-ups in the process. I don't think inertia itself is the problem, I think the problem we encounter is when we find ourselves going one way and God's heart for our lives is another. Consider Jonah--he headed the opposite direction from Nineveh because he did not want to be where God sent him. Sometimes it's as simple as sharing the love of Christ with our neighbor by bringing them some muffins, but our favorite cooking show is on and who wants to leave during Rachel Ray? Sometimes it's an addiction we can't even admit out in the open and we've stayed in the direction of that addiction for so long. We are intert...in the wrong way. And how that must break the heart of our Father. Not because we are not doing what we were created to do, but because we are not experiencing the joy of being who He created us to be. I find it encouraging to consider the definition of inertia. I think we naturally resist change. The devil we know is better than the one we don't. We'd rather keep eating ice cream by the bucketfuls and get fat than we would change that behavior and get onto the treadmill. The treadmill is hard, it's difficult and it's foreign to our muscle memory. We'd rather keep spending out of control than stop spending and start dealing with our debt. We tell ourselves we'll make changes next week, next month, next year. Those are the natural tendencies or the proclivities of a man's heart. We tend toward negative inertia. So, we're not alone. Adam and Eve kind of had the same thing going on. It's an ancient dilemma. Newton's first law of motion says that every object will continue in that state of motion unless acted on by an outside force. I like that. I really like that. In fact, I think this is where it really gets good. This is what I just absolutely love about God. He gets that we are very, very human and He does not leave us in that state of motion. He makes a way. He always has. Pharaoh changed his mind about the Israelites when God softened his heart. If you are like me and can readily identify some areas where you have become inert, then perhaps you'll join me in asking God to change the course of your life. Invite Him to soften the determination of your heart and provide the gentle force necessary to alter its course. We bring Him glory when we are yielding to His directions. We bring Him glory when we are surrendered to His course for our lives. Alternatively I am considering the ramifications of one right step. Then another. And another. Before long we have momentum built up--the whole thirty days to develop a new habit could in fact be true when you factor in the idea of inertia. What would the my world be like if I took just one or two areas and said I'm going to take one small step for thirty days in a row? Because once that momentum starts, I'm going to resist a reversal of my new motion. Only days away from a New Year, isn't it a perfect time to open our hands and release the reins? Isn't today, when we are celebrating the season of His birth, a great time to take hold of the peace He sent Jesus to bring into our lives? If we are holding tightly to our present state of motion we are not free to hold tightly to joy, to peace, to hope--the things that Christ came to give. I don't write to discourage. If you live the rest of your life in a muddy rut your Heavenly Father will love you no less. What we do doesn't make God love us more, but when we yield to His ways, the quality of our life drastically improves. Pray with me: Lord, thank you for the spiritual truths that lie in nature, in science. Thank you for the joy and peace you came to give. Please give me eyes to see where I am resisting a change and give me a heart that is soft in your hands. Replace my heart of stone, Father, with your heart. Overcome me that I might bring you glory and that I may fully enjoy the life you have given me. Amen. Read with me: Psalm 95 Luke 22:42 Colossians 1:9-14

When Dawn is Delayed

2009-10-08T06:04:00.005-04:00

I awoke yesterday, and the trees were a thousand fingers stretching from the hands of the hills, their fingernails painted yellow,red, and orange. Mostly they are dogwoods--red like sunburned salmon--whose leaves are dyed to declare the glory and existence of their Creator. Today though, I awoke and the sun had not yet climbed above the hills, the dogwoods and sourwoods slept silent, and the sheet of night still covered them. Not normally very cogniscent at pre-dawn hours, I was surprised to find myself considering the stark difference of my two mornings. One, like a rooster crowing or a trumpet announcing the greatness of our God, had captivated my heart with the vivid reminder that God must exist,that creation could in no way have just happened. The other was a dark and silent morning where the only light came from switches I turned on. Where on this second morning was God? Naturally my heart considered the two extremes--the mountain top experience when the hills are alive with the music of their Creator and the black hour before dawn when the absence of light somehow causes one to ask where is their maker? We're all so different,our lives so varied, that it is hard to say what will be darkness for each of us. Something as insignificant as a burnt souffle or as magnificent as the loss of our spouse can both bring a darkness of soul upon us. Yesterday my eldest son, Nathan was working on a difficult assignment for school. Off to a good start, his instructions were clear and he seemed to understand fully what his work held for him. I had gone downstairs to begin lunch preparation while he finished up. When I called for lunchtime he didn't respond. I poured the boys' milk, and still, he did not come. I called a second time. When finally he crested the stairs, I knew he had met a darkness of the soul. The assignment had been overwhelming to him. Normally a diligent, persevering student, I was surpsied to see his eyes swollen and face polka dotted with pink splotches. He had been crying. "You're going to be mad at me. I didn't get it done at all," he gurgled out between sobs. And I thought, No. No. I'll not be mad. I'll hold and comfort you, and then we'll tackle that assignment because I know you can do it. But first you must know you aren't alone. Though I was just downstairs--still present and ready to help--somehow he had assumed he was entirely on his own, and he felt helpless. That, my friends, is a darkness of the soul. We come to that point don't we? As Christians? We do. Just this week I've talked with four beautiful women whom I love, all of whom are walking through the pre-dawn hours of life. Divorce. Bankruptcy. Children wandering far from home. Overwhelming circumstances. Struggling with feelings of inadequacy for the demands of their lives, these beautiful, incredibly talented women are walking through the dark. And though they may not have faces puffed from sobbing, their hearts are swollen with grief. I wonder if they, like my son, feel as though they've been abandoned to a task far too hard when in fact their Creator is near. When Nate felt entirely alone, I was only feet away. In the same way, when we feel completely abandoned, our Savior has never left, never forsaken. We are not alone when darkness lingers. We are not. I sat with Nathan--held him in my arms and read to him from Galatians 6. Reminding him of Paul's encouragement to the people of Galatia to not grow weary in well-doing, I told him that in life there will be lots of assignments that are hard, that in those moments we can give in to our own fears and feelings of inadequacy, or we can persevere. Then I took him to Romans where Paul reminds us of something so important. While we feel unable to meet the task at hand, Jesus is praying for us. "Nate, while you were upstairs crying and feeling completely unable to do this assignment, your Savior was literally sitting beside God pleading for you. He reminded God that you are His child, that you need help. He's still praying now. He never stops." I couldn't help but think how we adults need to hear those words sometimes. Romans 8 begins with some of the most potent encouragement in all of scripture, "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." When Nate came down those stairs he was already condemning himself; he certainly didn't need my condemnation. He was convinced I would be furious with him for not finishing the task, when in fact I was filled with compassion for him and reminded that he is just a child. And aren't we just the same sometimes? We condemn ourselves when Jesus has already paid the price for our sins. There is no longer any condemnation no matter how much we feel like failures. We need to know our Father is no longer slinging the gavel declaring our guilt. His compassion for us as His children is new every single morning. Paul goes on to address what is happening in the spiritual world when we are in the dark. "In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God's will. And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword... ...No, in all these things we have complete victory through him who loved us! For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor heavenly rulers, nor things that are present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Romans 8:26-36, 37-39) Spiritually speaking sometimes we wake up only to discover the lights have gone out. In those moments we need to know that we are not alone; we are not condemned to struggle through the apparent blackness of our lives. Our Savior lives to intercede for us, to plead before the Father on our behalf. Though we may not see the tangible evidence of His presence--the splendor of the autumn leaves alight with the rise of the sun--He remains near. Ever present. The ironic thing is that Nathan had everything he needed to complete that assignment. It wasn't that I had not equipped him practically. His problem was that he doubted himself and what I had already taught him. He panicked. We're reading Pilgrim's Progress right now and at one point in the story Christian,the main character, finds himself locked in the recesses of Doubting Castle. Despair has begun to overtake him when he remembers he has been given a key called Promise. Promise will unlock any room in the Castle of Doubt. He had the key all along and failed to use it because he had forgotten about Promise. We too have the promises of God to open the doors of doubt. Among my favorite is, "His divine power has given us everything we need pertaining to life and godliness." (II Peter 1:3) There is nothing we will face for which we have not been given everything we need to pass through it. Remembering the promise keys of God's Word is so critical to walking through the valleys where the shadows have darkened the skies of our lives. Christian, weary from a rugged and dangerous mountain climb, also finds himself before a castle where he wishes to rest. He sees it in the distance and longs for some peace and a place to lay his battle-worn body. But in the path there are two great lions and he is fearful that they will overtake him. I've thought long about those lions. There's a passage in Proverbs that says the sluggard will not attempt a task because there are "lions in the street." (Pr. 26:13) Just as he is ready to run for his life a voice stops him and says, "Do not fear the lions! They are chained. They are there to turn back those who have no faith. Stay in the middle of the path, and you will not be harmed." Christian made his way past the lions and though their roars echoed through the valley, they could not harm him. Darkness is on a leash. Our Father holds that leash, and there will come a day when darkness will no longer cloud our view. Until that day we walk not by what we see, but by the promises of God's Word. After hugs, comfort, reminders of truth, prayer and a little lunch--food never hurts a situation--Nathan finished his assignment with surprising haste. It wasn't simple. He was stretched, but he finished. I wouldn't give him something he couldn't do. Your Father won't do that to you either. If perhaps you've awoken to a dark time in life, it's my prayer that you'll continue in the truth that your Savior is praying for you, that the Holy Spirit is interceding on your behalf, your Father has leashed the darkness, and you are not alone as you pass from black of despair to dawn. And if you are awakening to a time in your life when the sun has revealed the splendor of your King then I pray you will record those images into the recesses of your heart so that when darkness comes you will have them to remind you that your Father exists, your Savior prays and your Holy Spirit intercedes. Pray with Me: Jesus, thank you for sitting beside my Father reminding Him of my needs. Thank you for intervening on my behalf over and over and over. Thank you for your Promises God. Remind me, Holy Spirit of those promises when my heart wants to doubt. Teach me to walk in darkness as though it were light because Your word says that even the darkness is not dark to you, Father. In the name of my Savior and intercessor, Jesus, Amen.

What Time Is It?

2009-09-28T08:53:00.006-04:00

He was two when he began to ask with incessant persistence, "Momma what time is it?" By three we had taught him how to decipher the numbers on a digital clock face and not much more than three and a half years had passed before he could read the face of any time telling device with mastery. My eldest son was desperate to know exactly what time it was and precisely what we would be doing at that exact time. Affectionately I refer to him as my palm pilot and still six years later he can tell you to the minute when the Georgia Bulldogs will play their next game and what exact hour and minute he awoke on any given day. To him, life is a series of appointments and he doesn't want to miss a single one. Never one to linger longer than the next appointment will allow, he watches the clock like my chocolate lab watches my hand when a treat hangs in the balance. Just last week I had scheduled a necessary doctor's visit--one I had of course put off longer than I should. On Tuesday I panicked. It was 11:30 and I thought surely I had missed my appointment which was at 10:30. The boys and I were snuggled on the couch pouring over some incredible book about civilizations thousands of years past this calendar day. "Nathan," I instinctively yelped. "My appointment. I missed it." How in the world could I have done something so reckless? The appointment I had procrastinated in making I had now completely missed. The boxing gloves were on and I was pummeling myself in the face and over the head. Why can't I keep my appointments and responsibilities straight? Why am I not a better multi-tasker? Naturally and calmly he grabbed the calendar from a stack of papers and on closer examination we realized I had two more days. The appointment was Thursday. I made it to the appointment. See I tend to be the polar opposite of my son the digital agenda book in human form. I tend to multiple book myself and then wonder why I'm late for everything. And the truth be told if I only book one thing, well, I'm still probably going to be late. I rarely arrive early and I rarely leave early once I've arrived. There are self-help books written for people like me. I've read a few. The next book I plan to read is called, "Balancing Life, Arriving on Time, Looking Great, Eating Great, Being Great, Staying in Shape, Eating Healthy, Saving Your Family Money, Having Girl Time, Having Date Nights, Having Mommy-Son Time, Having God Time, You Too Can Achieve The Balanced Life." But I can't find it in the library search engine. I'll just say from the get-go here that I've met people who are pretty close to qualified to write a book like that. I have. But they are few and they are far between, and I've never looked deeply inside their lives to comment on how it's really going for them while they juggle ten thousand plates. I don't know if any of their plates have come crashing down in a thousands shreds of ironstone about their wrestless feet. It may in fact be very well with their soul. But I think it's pretty safe to say that the vast majority of us may instead find ourselves wondering how in the world do I achieve balance in a world where the demands are incredibly overwhelming and loud? Ecclesiastes 3 says, "For everything there is an appointed time, and an appropriate time for every activity on earth." This past summer while watching as my little men splashed in the county's L-shaped concrete pool my mother said she'd heard a novel message about balance in the Christian life. I wish I could offer credit here to the guy with the new idea, but I don't think she told me his name. And if she did share it with me it is entirely possible that I cursed and spit it out before letting it sink into the long-term memory of my little brain because what busy mother of two boys and wife and sister and daughter and well, you know what I mean, what person wants to hear more about balance? The whole Proverbs 31 evangelicalistic notion that women can do and be everything for everyone can be wearisome to those of us who are natural Martha's as it is. Frankly, there are times when those messages leave us utterly defeated in a heap before our heavenly Father confessing our inadequacies and failures to Him once again. (Hey, I didn't really curse, guys...that was a joke.) "Rhythms," my mom informed me "are what the Christian life is all about. Not balance." Now, I was listening. This was something new to me. As a homeschooling mom, I'd been pondering the idea of the natural rhythm of our family--learning the rhythm, dancing the rhythm, but I'd never consider it's application outside of that arena. She mentioned the passage in Ecclesiastes 3: "For everything there is an appointed time, and an appropriate time for every activity on earth." She talked about how this man said that the idea of achieving perfect balance wasn't even biblical. Where in the Bible did Jesus exercise balance on earth? He preached to exhaustion and then recuperated in mountainside prayer retreats. He preached until long after the noon hour when the crowd was famished and then, he fed them 'til they were stuffed and there were baskets of food left over. He didn't politely instruct the marketeers defiling the temple that he'd like them to please leave quietly through the left side exit. He turned their money-changing tables upside down and kicked them out on their little hinies. He called stinking dead people from tombs and raised them to new life and He prayed not a little while, but all night at times. Then, he praised Mary for sitting on her duff the entire time He visited saying she chose the more excellent way. Balance? Is it possible that balance is another legalistic man-made attempt at trying to attain perfection and even dare I say it, rightness before God and man when in fact what we are reaching for is unattainable by those of us limited by a human body? (That's all of us.) I'm just asking. Could balance be Satan's newest serpent slithering about the fruit trees of our lives saying, "Are you sure you can't have it all?" And I'm asking because I have to tell you that I've run on the treadmill of the Christian life for many years and I'm watching others run on it now. The problem with running on treadmills is that you don't really get anywhere and if you quit running, you end out moving rapidly backwards until you fall. I'm not into treadmill spirituality. Not anymore. In Christian circles the treadmill runners are often praised for their endurance and commitment, but if they dare stop moving their entire life comes crashing down. I don't know if that's the right idea. I really don't. And I have to wonder what the heart of God is feeling when He gazes at His beautiful creations in heaps before His feet feeling defeated and like failures. Surely He is grieved. So going back to that small verse in Ecclesiastes penned by the inspiration of God, apparently there's an appointment for everything in our lives. And if there's one thing I have learned it's that you when you double-book yourself, you end out missing one appointment or the other. So, is it possible that God's intention for mankind was to dance the rhythm of life--at times fast, at times slow making one appointment at a time? An appointment for healing, an appointment for planting an appointment for uprooting? Was it perhaps God's intention that we live in the freedom of ceasing the juggling act and instead picking up one plate at a time--two if our hands will hold them and that's all? What would it look like if Christians everywhere quit running the treadmill of balance and instead said without apology, "I'm a mother and wife for the next several years so if you want to make it into my palm pilot you'll need to get in line and be ready for a wait because it's going to be a while before I can get to you too." What if Father's said, "I'm a daddy and a husband and so if you want me you'll have to line up behind my wife and kids." Ministries would end. But then maybe we wouldn't need the ministries because we would be making the appointments God already set for us. The face of churches would change. The face of neighborhoods would too though. Because when have you ever looked at a person panting their last breaths on a treadmill and thought that's exactly where I want to be? That's no great advertisement for following the way of Jesus. But when a neighbor sees a family in the backyard throwing the football together, laughing and enjoying their appointment to be a family, well, that is something utterly enticing, now isn't it? Listen. I'm not saying I've gotten anything figured out. I'm just asking the question--is balance biblical? And I don't want pat, pre-fab unthought out answers. This is an invitation to climb out of the "this is what a Christian looks like" box and allow God to speak. Let's just ask Him together, shall we, and see where we land? Pray with me: Lord, show us your heart. Show me what exactly it is that you desire for my life and the lives of those around me. Show us Lord, the appointments for which we were created and empower us to walk away from ideas that are not contained in your heart. Amen.

Are You Striving?

2009-09-07T09:24:00.005-04:00

The school year and a full season of family getting together, apples bobbed and birthday songs sung, curriculum and gardens,--they've all left me with little time for recording here the words God speaks to my heart. And today is as full as all the rest so I'll only tell you briefly the outline of a melody I pray God is setting to music within me. The book of Zephaniah is a short one--short enough for me to read each day for a while now. And a beloved sister in Christ shared a verse recently in her own blog that turned me onto the book. (http://jewelsightings.blogspot.com/2009/08/ache-of-love.html) There's this third verse in the second chapter that gives me pause when I pass through. "Seek the Lord's favor, all you humble people of the land who have obeyed his commands! Strive to do what is right! Strive to be humble! Maybe you will be protected on the day of the Lord's angry judgment." And I can't help but wonder how many of us are committing our lives to seeking God's favor. I can't help but ask how many of us are waking up each day insisting it is a fresh start and that today, on this new day, we will strive to do the right thing. Today we will strive for humility and pray for God's protection. I can't help but consider how many of my greatest efforts include striving and seeking after God. And I can't help but picture Jesus, hands pierced, side scarred at the right side of God uttering prayers so intense, so full of pleadings and grief saying, "Father, Father let them cease. It was already finished so long ago. I paid for this already, Father. I ended the striving. God, open their eyes that they might see the truth. Father, was my death in vain? Father, was the suffering in vain that they would walk still as uncertain, unloved people seeking the favor that was already bought with my life? God make them see." So often when we read old testament passages we take them to mean we too should follow their advice. In context though, they are generally the reality of the Israelites and if we continue on we will discover as is the case in Zephaniah, that God knew all along humanity would never attain his favor, would never measure up. We will discover that He had a plan to restore all mankind to himself that didn't include human effort. Towards the end of Zephaniah God starts talking about the bigger picture when he tells the Israelites that "they will find safety in the Lord's presence...they will graze peacefully like sheep and lie down; no one will terrify them." What a beautiful picture of peace--a sheep who grazes to fullness and lays himself down on a bed of sweet swaying grass! Sheep don't strive, they don't stress, they don't attempt and work. They eat, and they rest. Do I? Is that my life's chief purpose when I rise? To drink in the goodness and sweetness of my Father and to rest in His capable, powerful, loving, perfect character would appear to be all that He ever intended for me. Let me just say, Satan may not know you, but apparently he knows me well. He is very clear on one point with me--I tend to like to buy the striving material and ignore the resting stuff. I tend to love to work, to do, to aim for, to seek after and that is his golden ticket with me. It goes a little something like this: Sarah, why aren't you teaching Sunday School? Sarah, shouldn't you volunteer for the nursery? Sarah, shouldn't you make a cake for the ministry staff and drop it off at the church office? Sarah, shouldn't you pray longer? Sarah, why aren't you getting up even earlier--reading more scripture? Let me just be clear on this: acts birthed from guilt or obligation have not found their origin in a loving, living relationship with our Savior. It's as though he's literally saying, Sarah, God doesn't love you because He created you, He loves you when you do the right things. And that, my friends is a lie from the very pits of hell. He LOVES us because we are his fearfully and wonderfully made creation. He loves us because He invented LOVE, because to not love us would mean He was no longer God because GOD IS LOVE. We have His eternal favor because Jesus said one evening in a garden of surrender, "If it's possible, let this cup pass from me, nevertheless not my will but thine be done." And then only hours later while breathing his last He said, "It is finished." In those moments the curtain in a temple that signified the holiness and righteousness of God and the pathetic attempts at reaching and appeasing Him, was literally shredded in half forever removing the barrier between us and our Father. Long ago, it was finished. Why in the world would we continue then, to bring modern day sheep and lamb and doves as offerings to a God who is no longer waiting in the holy of holies, but is literally walking beside us as we carry our ridiculous cages filled with atonement offerings to present before Him. He's not waiting at the alter for our efforts. He's just not there. He's not hungry for the aroma of burnt lamb, his nostrils are full of the fragrance of His Son and that is all he smells when we stand before Him clothed in the garments of our Savior. Zephaniah goes on to say, "Shout for joy, Daughter Zion! Shout out, Israel! Be happy and boast with all your heart, Daughter Jerusalem! The Lord has removed the judgment against you; he has turned back your enemy. Israel's king, The LORD, is in your midst! You no longer need to fear disaster." To live as a sheep involves some serious release--release of our preconceived ideas of religion, of Christianity, of God. It also involves some letting go of our own personal pride--we'll never be good enough. We need to just decide that now. Never. We'll always come up short. So, we might as well stop trying. Here's the beauty though--a life that has ceased to try is free to be the new creation it already is in Christ. Yesterday the boys and I were bouncing on the trampoline. Up and down we bounced and bounced never really getting anywhere, just bouncing. Eventually I bounced myself into complete exhaustion and I lay down on that big stretchy black circle. I looked up and the leaves were floating in the sky, their green backs saturated with the sun. I thought what would it be like to hang from the branch with my only job being to take in The Son? There's something to be said for exhaustion--it forces us to lay down and look up. Pray with me: Lord, you already earned our favor before God. I'm so sorry for trying to continue to get what you already paid for. Show me where I'm striving and teach me to cease. Teach me to graze and rest in who you are. Let the rest be an overflow of that grazing and resting. Amen. Read with me: Romans 5:18-21 II Corinthians 5:17

Openning Wide

2009-08-10T07:24:00.005-04:00

We had a guest pastor at church yesterday--a sovereignly appointed end to the summer for our congregation and for me personally. God impressed on our spirits to offer Bible Camp for free this year to all children who register. Normally the cost had been around $100 per camper. This year we decided at God's direct leading to make it $0. I'm not going to pretend that I was confident in this economy of the outcome. I knew the kids would come--and come they did--each week was full. But where would the money come from. Immediately I pursued state and federal funding and aid. Hours on hours on hours I spent pursuing this help. Wanting to do my part I filled out stacks of paperwork higher than my desk itself and even went to a ridiculously lengthy training session in hopes of obtaining help with food costs. And it fell through. We estimated we'd need around $30,000 and we were depending on an already depleted congregation and well, God. Here's the first passage the pastor preached from yesterday. "I am the Lord, your God, the one who brought you out of the land of Egypt. Open your mouth wide and I will fill it." Psalm 81:10 I AM. The first two words are enough to give me pause--I AM the WAY. I AM the TRUTH. I AM the LIFE. I AM the FUNDING. I AM the God who is ABLE. I AM the Lord, YOUR GOD. I'm your God--not the state government, I AM Jehovah Jireh. As soon as the funding fell through I realized that my entire efforts had been futile and yet perhaps God had wanted to show me something. This camp was His heart, His plan, His purpose and He didn't need my help or the state's help to give it to children for free. God is so much bigger than what we see or understand. It's as though He were saying, "Sarah, I asked you guys to offer this camp for free and I intend to help you do that. I am able. I want to do this to show my glory. To show my power. To show my strength and so that you and all that congregation may know that THERE IS A GOD AT THE HOUSE OF PRAYER." The last sentence of that passage--Open your mouth wide and I will fill it!--is so powerful. I remember when Nate was a baby and I would make airplane noises and swirl the baby spoon filled with mooshed chicken and rice at perilous heights in an effort to get him to open his mouth. I wanted to just rationalize with him; to tell him it was good for him, that he should just eat it. But somehow the airplane routine seemed more effective than my effort to convince him of the nutritional value of that gooey conglomeration. Sometimes I think we stand before God, hands clasped over our mouths, eyes squinted and lips pursed insisting we'll not open our mouths no matter what He's offering. And what a tragedy that is because His very word insists His plans are for our good. (Jer. 29:11) I remember when I was little I had a dentist who used to have this pair of pliers. They may have been a dental tool, but I'm convinced they were seriously a pair of yellow handled pliers he picked up at the hardware store for kids like me who couldn't keep their mouth open wide enough. Every time I saw him he'd pull those ridiculous things out of his drawer and there I'd sit like a 57 Chevy with my hood propped open. When God says open your mouth, we need to go to the garage and get out the biggest pair of pliers we can find--because He will fill to overflowing that which is open and waiting for filling. So I sat and listened to this pastor as he expounded on the passage and all I could think is that we are a congregation who has had our mouths filled this summer by a God who not only provided for the cost of camp but left us with a ten thousand dollar surplus! Ten thousand dollars! One thousand dollars for every child who came to know Christ at camp this summer. It was as though he left baskets full of money overflowing to represent the eternal value of each of the children who came to know Him for the first time. "I WILL fill it." Truly we have been filled. And then I ask myself, where am I still clasping my hand over my mouth like a young child? In what areas in my life am I still saying, "No way, God. I'm not about to trust you there." And I look forward to the autumn, the start of a new school year, of new disciplines, new projects and plans and I say, with arms open and mouth wide, "Lord, You are my God. You are the one who has been faithful in the past--Fill my life with your plans and your will and your desires and your purposes. Fill me, Lord." Amen. Read with me: Psalm 81 Jeremiah 32:17,26

Two Patches of Earth

2009-06-30T09:15:00.003-04:00

I have these two lovely hydrangeas with beautiful puffs of lilac blue blossoms on which the butterflies dance and I have a pot of lily of the valley all of which are awaiting a garden patch shaded from the burning rays of the Georgia sun. My problem is I don't have a shade garden prepared for them. The sunny patches have been prepared--their soil turned, the weeds removed. But the shaded areas are so overgrown with wild plants, saw briers, and rocks that I can't even turn the soil let alone place a plant and watch it grow. Two gardens, one prepared and the other not ready. The book of Titus offers a great deal of comparisons between the healthy soul and the unhealthy--the spirit who has heeded healthy, sound teaching and the one who has not yet absorbed truth into their inner being. Here are two lists--as you read, will you as I am, ask God to reveal which of these things may be growing in the garden of your soul. Just take a moment before you read these to genuinely invite the Holy Spirit to show you how these words of truth might relate to your own life. He is faithful to honor those kinds of requests. First List Slave of God Apostle of Jesus Christ chosen ones sons in the common faith blameless faithful children not arrogant not prone to anger not a drunkard not violent not greedy for gain hospitable devoted to what is good sensible upright devout self-controlled hold firmly to the faithful message of truth give exhortation in healthy teaching correct those who speak against truth healthy in the faith not pay attention to myths or people who reject the truth communicating behavior that goes with sound teaching temperate dignified self-controlled sound in faith in love in endurance behavior that is holy not slandering not slaves to excessive drinking teaching what is good love husbands love children self-controlled pure fulfilling duties at home kind being subject to husbands self-controlled examples of good works in every way in teaching shows integrity dignity sound message subject to masters not talking back not pilfering showing all good faith bring credit to teaching of God in everything rejecting godless ways and worldly desires live self-controlled upright godly subject to rulers and authorities obedient ready for every good work not slander anyone peaceable gentle showing courtesy to all people heirs with expectation of eternal life insist on truth intent on engaging in good works engage in good works meet pressing needs Second List chargeable with dissipation chargeable with rebellion arrogant prone to anger drunkard violent greedy for gain rebellious idle talker deceiver misleading people teach for dishonest gain reject the truth listen to myths minds and consciences are corrupted profess to know God, but deeds deny him detestable disobedient unfit for any good deed godless ways worldly desires lawless slander foolish disobedient misled enslaved to various passions enslaved to various desires spending life on evil and envy hateful hating one another involved in foolish controversies quarrels fights about the law divisive twisted by sin conscious of their twisted nature unfruitful The things on these lists are not necessarily going to describe all of us. In fact most of us will probably discover there are some things from both lists in our lives--we're works in progress--straining toward what is ahead. But so often we accept status quo. We assume that if there is some good fruit, it's good enough. If we are relatively moral and decent than we are miles ahead of the other people in the world. And the thing is--that's not why Jesus died. "He gave himself for us to set us free from every kind of lawlessness and to purify for himself a people who are truly his, who are eager to do good." (Titus 2:14) Truly His. Are you? Am I? Am I identifiable as a daughter of Jesus Christ? Or do I "profess to know God but with my deeds, I deny him..." (Titus 1:16) No matter where we find ourselves today I want to end reminding us all that "It is God who works in your both to will and to do His good pleasure." (Phillipians 2:13) It's so tempting to think we need to get out to our gardens and start pulling weeds and tossing rocks. But my squash plants have not once used their tendrils to pull the crab grass that insists on sprouting beside them. They've patiently waited for me to pull them. Likewise my friends if you are reading this post, God is already at work in the garden of you spirit--all you need to do is allow Him to work and respond in agreement. We are the branches, not the gardeners. Pray with me: Father help us to yield to your revealing truth. Help us to see who we are and agree with you. Help us not to strive but to surrender to Your hand at work in our lives. May we be truly yours. Amen.

Every Garden Communicates

2009-06-29T10:13:00.004-04:00

I just got back from a weekend trip to Maine where I walked the misty gardens of the Mount Battie Inn. http://www.mountbattie.com/ In a place where the sea's haze is too lazy to leave early and so social it lingers long past the morning's dew, the gardens are lush and green. The plants tell their story--they're the variety that know how to thrive when the sun is overpowered by fog and moisture and still offer blossoms plump and delicate. The gardens there spoke clearly of their purpose--to offer pleasure and peace to the Inn's guests and to stretch across the hill like a Sunday napper on an ample hammock. They communicated well. Titus 2:1 says, "But as for you, communicate the behavior that goes with sound teaching." This passage is largely pointing to our words--the things that come from our mouths should reflect sound teaching. Too though, the NET translation of the Bible takes the Greek phrasing a step farther and uses the word behavior here indicating that our actions are part of our communication. So our word and deed will either speak soundly or they will not, but they will speak. If the gardens at the Mount Battie had been overrun in weeds they would not have spoken peace and respit to the travelers whose feet padded their pathways. They would not have said someone has taken care to tend to us and we are here to display beauty in a world overrun with chaos. Had their stems and stalks been strangled by unpulled weeds left to grow and spread at will I would not have even desired to walk through them. But they were not. They were healthy and their blossoms were free to flourish despite a rainy spring and wet summer. It's the same with our lives--if we don't pull the weeds by the root our lives will not communicate the behavior that goes with sound teaching. What then is the measure of a weed? First and foremost, it is anything that does not line up with sound teaching. Anything. I'm tempted then to offer you a list of things that would be classified as weeds. I'm even more tempted to share with you the weeds God showed me in my own life this weekend--some of which I had grown very fond. But since we're all blessed with the presence of the Holy Spirit and He has the power to speak truth into our hearts, for today let's just ask Him to cause His light to shine on the weeds that are perhaps sprouting next to true plants in our lives. Will you pause with me to ask Him to reveal those things before we dig further? Pray with me: Spirit of truth would you shine on the weeds in my life--make them evident to me that I would allow you to remove them. I desire to be a garden that communicates sound teaching--Help me to yield to your gentle hand. Amen.

Pulling Weeds--Fleshing it out over the Summer

2009-06-25T09:42:00.005-04:00

II Timothy 1:7 "For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power of love and of sound mind." Nineteen relatively short and simple words and I suspect that if I eat them, they will change my life. Today I began to slice the two words which in Greek are actually one--sound mind. Some translations say self-discipline and others self-control. Actually, this exact Greek word is only used this one time in the entire Bible. Once. So this spirit which God has given us is apparently somewhat unique in that no other time is the same word used for any other purpose. Here's what I really like about this word. If you are into believing that God doesn't make mistakes and that every phrase of the Bible in it's original languages is specifically chosen and inspired by God, which I am in the habit of believing, then you'll like this too. The Greek word here is a noun. It's not a verb, adjective or adverb. It's a noun. Okay, grammar review--nouns are persons, places or things. Verbs denote action. Adjectives describe. Nouns can be acted upon, but they do not act themselves. Simply put, a noun just is. If a dog is a dog, then a dog is a dog. The dog cannot make itself a cat. If a car is a car, then a car is a car and it cannot make itself a boat. So, while there are other instances in the New Testament where variations of this same Greek word are used as verbs, adverbs and adjectives, this is the only time where it is used as a noun. What's the big deal? God has given us a spirit of sound mind. Period. He didn't give us a "sound mind spirit" which would be using an adjective to describe our spirit...like a red spirit or a green spirit. The author could have said, God has given us a sober spirit using the adjective variation of the same greek word. But he did not. And he did not use an adverb saying that the spirit can behave soundly or soberly. He also did not say that the spirit is the verb. Dogs can sit, they can run, they can play, they can sleep--all actions. But the fact that they are a dog does not change. That's the thing about our spirit given to us by God at salvation--it is SOUND. That does not change. It's a noun. It's a thing. It's a fact--we have a sound mind. We have a sober mind. We have a self-disciplined mind. That fact is not in question according to God's Word. And man oh man, do I need to KNOW that. What we believe about ourselves, our minds, our spirits, our entire inner being will directly affect every single facet of our lives. I'm afraid some of us don't believe we have a sound mind. I'm afraid some of us have bought into the mentality that our foundations are poor and therefore we need to fix them when in fact, if we are in Christ, we are a new creation and our foundation is built on the rock of ages. If there are problems in our lives they are not foundational. According to God's word--the foundation is SOUND. So I'm getting into the garden of my soul this summer and I'm pulling some weeds. God started me here because for a moment or two I've begun to question whether the garden was any good at all. When you start to get overtaken by weeds you feel pretty quickly that you are the weed when in fact that is not true at all--we are fearfully and wonderfully made and at the moment we chose to become a follower of Christ we were also given a spirit of soundness. My stalks and leaves and even fruit may be choked out by any manner of weed, but I am still a creation of God chosen before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless in His sight. And so are you, my friends. So are you. So don't pull yourself from the garden. Identify who you are and then let's get to the weeds. There's more here--but for today, let's look at the garden of our soul with the peace that comes from knowing that the soundness, the saneness, the quality of our spirit is not in question according to the Words of our great God. Amen.

Pulling Weeds

2009-06-24T09:32:00.003-04:00

I planted a garden this spring--48 small square feet of carefully planned and arranged seeds in a pattern fashioned for pest deterring and optimal growth. We've been enjoying spinach and baby lettuce salads with scallions and radish in fresh basil vinaigrette--I'm salivating at the thought of the goose neck squash, zucchini and cucumbers who will span the surface of my plate by week's end. Worth every ounce of effort I am reaping the rewards of some genuine work and planning earlier in the spring. We were afraid we'd never get the garden in this year--it was the worst possible time. In the middle of finishing building our house, moving in, moving out, winding down our school year, testing and, well, you get the picture. But I knew if I didn't do it then, we wouldn't yield fruit later. (It's never a good time to do spiritual gardening--always other things will scream out for us to take care of them first) Then there were the weeds--no surprise in a standard row garden, but since we had brought in all the soil and created raised beds, I hadn't anticipated the level of weeds that popped through the soil before our precious seeds had a chance to grow. The problem with the weeds was that with each tiny green leaf that seemed to be in the very spot I planted a seed there came confusion--was it oregano or some other horrible impersonator? Was that a carrot leaf popping up or had they all washed away in the heavy rains? I didn't know how to verify the identity of many of my veggies in their infant stages. I ended up tasting almost every single green item that began to grow in an attempt to see if it was good. (Reminds me of the passage, "Taste and see that the Lord is good..." A good rule of thumb--if it isn't good in your life, it probably isn't from God.) Finally there were the failed seeds--the ones that seemed so promising and looked so lovely on the package--and then failed to produce. Their squares of soil remained empty for several weeks before I knew for certain they were duds and I should replant. (If we leave empty patches in our spirit and fail to replant healthy things from the word of God, I can promise you weeds will happily plant themselves in those spots. There is no portion of our soul in which the Word of God doesn't need to be planted.) Everybody does garden analogies, and I don't want to bore you. What I do want to say is simply this. As I've been doing some gardening outside, I can't help but see the same pictures others have seen and written about so beautifully. Spiritually speaking, right now, I'm pulling some weeds. They're larger than I'd like and unfortunately, their root systems have spread into many portions of my life. Where there are the roots of weeds the fruit of the Spirit are limited. Joy and peace are stunted where strife and criticism have taken root. Gentleness is stifled where anger has been given full vent to grow. I don't want to give you a misleading picture--I'm not headed for the loony bin...yet :-) The other day I drove up to my mom's house and she's got this large bank where we ripped out all manner of weed and wild plants a couple years back. Since then she'd done a great job of keeping it cleaned up, covered in wood chips and planted in annuals. There's no place for a weed on that picturesque bank and yet when I pulled into her laneway there stood a four foot tall wild flower...aka, weed. How in the world had that weed taken root on her bank? How had it gotten so big? Well, that's probably a more accurate picture in my life. A few rather large weeds seem to be flourishing and God knows I don't want them to flower and go to seed. Have you ever seen a plant that flowers and goes to seed? Think dandelion! Those seeds flitter and float and flank themselves about every possible area of domesticated beauty and choke out what is supposed to flourish leaving spotty yards and blossomless flowers. So, this summer I'm going to do some weed pulling. I've never been one to put on a perfect face and act as though I have it all together so, I'll bare my soul through the journey as I get time to share. For now, let me offer this passage: "For God has not given us a Spirit of fear, but of power and love and self-control (sound mind, self discipline)." II Tim. 1:7 God gave us a Spirit of self control and sound mind--we do not have to live in a garden of the enemies' weeds. We can claim power, we can claim love and we can claim self-control. Today, I claim self-control and ask you to join me in my gardening venture. Perhaps you can identify a few weeds now that they've gotten large enough to differentiate. Is that righteous anger or is that rage that has erupted in your spirit? Is that constructive advice or a spirit of criticism flourishing over there in that relationship? Is that freedom in Christ or gluttony? Is that gossip or truth sharing? Is that materialism or simply enjoying the blessings God has given? Is that complete and utter selfishness or is that just 'me time'? Only you can answer these kind of questions for yourselves, but as for me, I'm going to start naming weeds in my life and I invite you to join me as I watch the weeds wilt. Here's to reclaiming the gardens of our souls.

The Ballad of Peachtree Street

2009-05-19T09:23:00.004-04:00

Peachtree Street with her tall trees skirted in emerald ivy, strings itself through Atlanta's downtown as if she were a secret kept only for those parched and weary of concrete and glass buildings. I walked her way last week and knew I was amidst the sacred, the preserved part of a city whose towers no longer remember their roots. And as I ambled past cafes and patios polka dotted with black bistro sets I marveled in the culture, the variety, the vastness, the couture of God's creation. Then I saw them--spaced apart like park benches--they lay here and there, unnoticed. A part of the landscape to the buzzing administrative assistants, the graphic designers and marketing researches, they went unnoticed and unregarded. Homeless. Without a place to go, without money to get there, without purpose, they dozed at noon while others hurried past to grab a bite to eat before returning to the business hub. Broken lives wasted--this is the ballad of the homeless man on Peachtree Street. When Jesus had fed the masses--a miracle to all who witnessed this act--he made a statement that always penetrates my spirit. "Gather up the broken pieces that are left over, so that nothing is wasted." (John 6:12) Of course he's talking about bread and fish here, but to me it says so much more. When I think of those men and women, hair long, faces brown with weather and lives void of purpose, I can't help but think when were they broken? Once they were whole and somewhere along the way things happened and they were left discarded as useless, no longer worth picking up and taking home. And then I consider the lives of those who I know and love. I think of the broken pieces of a life torn by abortion, the remnants of a life torn by death. I recall the shreds remaining when marriages end and children and wives are left to sift through the rubble. I'm nauseous at the reality of alcoholism and drug addictions that leave in their wake only debris, debris and more debris. Broken pieces. And there are moments when I want to shake my fist and swear and ask, why? Why? WHY? I want to shout out, "This isn't fair." And Jesus says, "Gather up the broken pieces...so that nothing is wasted." Nothing is wasted. I have not lived out the greatest heartaches. I'm certain there are those that measure far deeper than my own, but of those that I have seen there is one thing I am certain: God does not waste our pain. He does not discard our grief. He does not cast off our hurt or our confusion or our sorrow. He gathers with hands that are skilled and gentle healers. He binds. He knits together. He multiplies. He soothes. He redeems. He renews. He brings a light into the darkest recesses of our pain and causes life to emerge from the places that have suffocated our spirits and left us for dead. Our God never leaves those places. He does not. I know when His Spirit passes the path of Peachtree Street He calls out to those sunken frames that huddle on sidewalk and corner, "You are mine and you have purpose. You have value and you have My Love." And when His Spirit passes the deep places of our own hearts He sings the song of restoration, "I heal the brokenhearted and bandage their wounds." (Psalm 147:3) Pray with Me: Father, You are the binder of the broken and the healer of the hurting. You are the restorer. Will you take the pieces, Lord, that I see before me and restore life to them. Return to them your original purpose that they would again have use in a world where hope seems an intangible theory. You are the God of hope. You are hope, Lord. I believe you will restore and I ask that you would grant me faith and patience as I wait to see your plan unfold. Amen. Read with me: Isaiah 61 Psalm 147

Song of the Whip-Poor-Will

2009-05-18T07:38:00.004-04:00

It's a relentless call--that of the whip-poor-will--a lullaby that blankets the dusk as she fades into night. I've known her song since I was old enough to remember she was a bird whose face wouldn't be seen in the daytime. And I've loved her. Who wouldn't? Her voice almost speaks into the darkness insisting that her lover join her on some distant tree's limb. Her call continues long past other nighttime voices repeating the same words over and over and over again. She won't quit her song until it has accomplished it's goal. From the jam-froth pink bedroom of the cabin my father crafted to the bayou-mist of the bedroom my mother let me paint and then finally the slumbering hues of these walls where I now lay down my head, I have always heard a whip-poor-will's call. Just last week it was some time after 3 in the morning and still she sang. I had cracked the window to hear her more clearly and let her song shush my heart back to sleep when God whispered, "That's how I pursue you, Sarah." And just like that I saw Him differently that I had before. I imagined His own words to me, "Sarah, I love you. I love you. I love you. " Over and over and over again. They never stop. He never stops. His love never fails. It's like a cliche and because it is like a cliche our ears get to the point where they don't hear the words anymore. Growing up in a Christian family I heard those words my entire life. When that's the case, their meaning becomes diluted with the passing of time until one day the fact that God's love never fails, never ends doesn't alter our outlook on life. We no longer see life through His love, we see His love as a faded childhood photo somewhere on a distant wall. And yet He calls still. Again and again. In speaking of the restoration of Israel, Jeremiah 31:3 holds one of my favorite passages in scripture. "In a far-off land the Lord will manifest himself to them. He will say to them, 'I have loved you with an everlasting love. That is why I have continued to be faithful to you." It didn't matter what the Israelites had done--how many times they sold out to the nearest bidder--God's love for them continued. He pursued them across deserts, He called them across seas, He sang to them when they were in distant lands and He loved them no matter where they were. The beauty of His song is that it is for all mankind--He sings for you and He sings for me. He sings for our children and for our families. He sings for those who do not hear and for those who choose not to hear. He sings for those who will not listen and He'll never quit; never. And I can't help but think of the times in my own life when His call has gone unanswered. How many times have His words floated beyond my heart and scattered amidst the debris of my life while I chose instead to cling to worldly wisdom, to whatever was clear and right in front of me. How many times have I chosen to accept the things that are seen instead of believing in His love? And I can't help but think of the people in my life now who I wish could hear His song. I want to grip their hearts and pry them open making room for this tender love song, and yet I cannot. You know people like that too. You have children for whom you've prayed and prayed. You have Fathers and grandmothers and sisters for whom you've interceded, and yet they do not hear. May I just say to you He still sings--even in places far off. When our voices have grown hoarse with our own attempts to share the truth, His has only grown stronger. Sometimes I think Christians get so caught up in the newest book or theology or new approaches to having church that we drown out our Father's song. We make so much of our own noise that we can't even hear His call let alone those we love and want to reach. There are the great theologians and the lofty thinkers, but I resolve to remain a simple follower--a follower of my Savior's song. As long as I hear His song, I know I am near Him, following Him, in the right place. I know I am home. May our own response to His song be so vivid that those around want to join in the chorus. The whip-poor-will sang long that night. I lost my wakefulness while still she sang. Our heavenly Father's pursuit continues too. May we have ears to hear. Pray with me: Father, thank you for your pursuit of my heart. Thank you that you call to me long into the nightimes in my life. Thank you that you sing when I listen and you sing when I join in and you sing when I hold my hands over my ears in stubborn rebellion. Forgive me for ignoring you. Teach me to believe that your love is greater than the sum of my life and that somehow in relaxing into your unfailing love, I will find rest. Amen. Read with me: I Cor. 13 Psalm 89

Missing His Face

2009-05-12T08:27:00.005-04:00

It's not new news--we undertook a little project last April. We decided to build our own house as opposed to having one built or buying one already finished. Those of you who know us well are probably keenly aware of this endeavor since many of you assisted along the way. The reason we wanted to build was because we've lived in houses built by other people 's hands for other people's needs before. We've renovated those homes to make them fit into our lives; we've suffered through closets big enough for mice and toilets that never felt like flushing when guests came over. We've coated pepto-bismol colored walls with more palatable hues and we've attempted to infuse character and charm into standard issue pre-fab boring designs more than once. So this time, we designed the entire thing; we put ourselves into every single two by four and nail in this home. There is no room untouched by our choices and vision. There is not a closet or a cupboard or a corner that we did not think through and choose exactly the way it would look and what function it would serve. None. Nada. In fact the more we got into building the more we wanted to infuse into every shred of the home our personality, our mark, our plan. And in the end, it's like we are omnipresent in this home. We're everywhere. And here's the interesting part, if you know us--really know Jeff and Sarah--you see us in every detail of the home. But if you don't know us well, you'd walk through this house and completely miss our faces and our hearts in the bead board, the antiqued cabinets, the vintage pieces, the wooden counters. You'd walk right through and completely miss us. Here's what gets me--I think it's really easy for me to do that with God--entirely miss His face and heart in my life. There's a passage in Jeremiah 23 that reminds me of this: "Do you people think that I am some local deity and not the transcendent God?" the Lord asks..."Do you not know that I am everywhere?" the Lord asks." The transcendent God. Isn't that beautiful? When the morning's first rays of light transcend into a room it almost glows--it's not invasive light, it's a light that speaks gently, "I am here. Do you not know that I am everywhere? " When the darkness of life seems to hide the light of God can't you just hear your Father asking you that question? He is here. Now. While you read this blog, He is speaking into your heart, "Don't miss me. Don't miss my face. I'm with you. I'm in the circumstances you face. I'm in the predicaments you are in. I'm in the faces of your children and I'm in your job. I'm in your schooling and I'm in your friendships. I'm in your marriage. I will never leave. Never." But so often we don't see Him because we don't know, I mean really know Him or worse, we've forgotten what the face of God is like. When we lose the man we married to a disease that took him far too young we struggle to find the face of God in the ripping apart of our heart. When the child we raised begins to make destructive decisions the heart of our Father becomes a haze of disappointment and disillusionment as our offspring walk a path we'd never have chosen. And He weeps. Our heavenly Father weeps for us, that we could see Him amidst pain, amidst loss. And He whispers to our spirits, "You can't see me because I'm holding you in my arms. I'm not in front of you, I'm beneath you, carrying you. I'm not somewhere in the distance; I am here gripping you with my everlasting love." Acts 17:28 says, "for in him we live and move about and exist..." Our very lives are in Him. The great moments --when marriages are formed and babies sing their first cry, when homes are finished and jobs are gotten and promotions are given, when our children obey and spring surrenders her first blossoms--they're all the splendor of our Father on display. And the times when we trudge through the long dark valleys too are held in the palm of His eternal hand. Psalms promises He is a very present help in times of trouble. Very present. Near. This is our God. Do you see His face? Do you sense His presence even when you can't see His face? If our lives are houses and God is the designer, the decorater, the builder, the Creator then may we make it our goal to look for His face, to discover His heart in every detail. May we not walk through one single moment and miss Him. Open the eyes of our Heart, Lord. Open the eyes of our heart. Pray with me: Father, I know you are here, but help me to see You. Help me to believe that it is you that carries me, it is You that enables me, it is You that remains when all else fades away. May I never rob You of honor when good enters my life and may I never deny You your glory when I am sustained in troubled times. Thank you for your omnipresence in the marrow of my life. Amen. Read with me: Isaiah 55:6 Psalm 139

Saving Grace My Journey Back to Weight Watchers

2009-03-13T20:56:00.003-04:00

Dear Friends, I'd love to tell you that it was I who crafted this poignant, raw and hilariously honest piece, but in fact this is the writing of my Aunt Anne. With her permission I am posting this because I know there are many who will find this of huge encouragement. In my adult years I have discovered my Aunt to be one of the wittiest, most genuine people I've ever met. I know you too will fall in love with her after reading this. Please if you have friends who would find this inspirational, will you send them the link? Two weeks ago the young nurse practitioner at my office handed me a glossy catalog of cookie dough.The inevitable fund raiser for her son's day care center. I have always managed to pass on these handouts. This time the idea of my own personal three pound bucket of frozen glistening chocolate chip cookie dough was more than I could resist. My ears buzzed with the whir of out of control negative stinking thinking as I handed her my fifteen dollars and placed my order. I joked to all my coworkers in the heart center that I was getting it with a spoon. It seemed to me a splendid idea. In the following days as I waited for delivery I dreamed about it. I imagined how much fun it would be. Just me, my bucket of dough and my ever faithful companion, my dog Angie. I figured she would want in on some of the action or at least a ring side seat.As the days went by the dreams began to erode my otherwise normal daily routine of racking up CDOP's (complete days on program for you non WW'ers), journaling, and walking Angie. It did seem a bit pointless after all to be CDOP when any fool with an ounce of wits knew the bucket was coming and all would be lost. I stopped counting, journaling fell into a limited scrawl of daily events and foods consumed and then withered away entirely. My meals and snacks were still made of the healthy, simply filling foods that WW expounds on when they aren't trying to sell me 1 point snack cakes. I'd smirk at the luncheon size plates in the cupboard and reach past them for a big old dinner plate and load it up with my simply filling foods and eat them until I was stuffed. That buzzing in my ears got louder and I knew I was headed for a serious breakdown. When my mind stops talking in complete sentences and starts to just whir and thrum and hum like a funnel cloud I am really on the skids. My sweet bucket- ridden dreams of cookie dough began to be interrupted with thoughts of a crisis. What was I going to do with three pounds of dough? My very supportive husband is diabetic. I knew he would help shovel with a spoon, but he has his limits and then there is that issue of his health. My freezer is too small to refreeze he dough - it would have to sit on a shelf in the refrigerator next to yesterday's brown rice and tomorrow's limp romaine. I spent the night before last awake. The arrival date was fast approaching and I was having second thoughts. I needed help. I prayed. God why do I have these temptations? I walked the floor late at night and ate two bowls of cheerios. It struck me that I could give it away to the needy. My mother always wanted me to give to the needy. The needy lived in little wooden shacks down the hill from us when we were growing up. She liked to point them out to my brothers and me when we went to the grain store. They were wedged up against the train tracks that my Dad travelled on his way into Boston to work at Zorigan's Studio everyday. Good Deeds. As three am approached I wondered where I could take my bucket here in Florida. I could bake cookies and hand them out to the homeless who wander the waterfront in Sarasota. But they would smell so good baking and I knew if I opened the lid even once I would be doomed. That just wouldn't work. I could send them to Angelina and Brad - they are skinny and don't have problems with buckets of dough. Maybe they could take them to Africa and do some more Good Deeds for George Clooney to grin over.It was an exhausting night, but by morning I'd had a brain storm. I would give the unopened unseen bucket away to a nurse at work. She has a free day care center at her church. They could have the bucket of dough. I even resolved that since this is the last week to go to WW and sign back up without paying all your missed meetings fees that I would rush to a meeting right after work. It was a relief to tell my friend she could have the whole enchilada when it came in. I promptly went off by myself and ate some freshly made cookies that another earnest coworker had made. I needed some consoling. I was still full from the cereal so what the heck, let's have some of these peanut butter cookies with the cute little fork marks criss-crossed on their tops. Soon enough I would be at a meeting and signing my life away. Oh my dangerous mind. The long work day wore on and I ran into every available food item with an open mouth and an out stretched greedy hand.Now my dear husband knew I'd had a sleepless night. He called during the afternoon to say he'd take me out to dinner. That was very nice, but I told him I was determined to go and sign up at WW first and then we could go and eat. He picked me up just before 6pm and off we drove. Angie grinning in the backseat is always ready for a road trip with food involved. Well, we went right out of the office parking lot and WW was to the left. Oh, the fickle finger of fate I thought. He has forgotten my meeting... well never mind... no harm will come... I'll just go to dinner and then go sign up at the meeting tomorrow night. Oh see how easy it is to redirect my best intentions. I had prayed over this. Help was on the way. I had done my Good Deed and given the bucket away unseen. It would just be a small delay and I was so full from my day of indulgence that I would just get a bowl of soup at our local diner. Angie thumped her tail from the back seat and grinned out the window in perfect agreement with me.I really was full so it was just my luck that they had nine bean and ham soup on the menu. They make a new soup everyday. Nine beans that would qualify as a simply filling meal. It wouldn't have much ham in it. My husband tucked into his salad and I had the first bite of creamy smokey soup. You know how sometimes ham will have just that little plastic bit of dark brown rind on the edge? Well my bite of ham had that and I didn't care for it so I delicately removed the little tidbit from my mouth and spooned up my second bite of creamy beans and broth. Mindless now that I was eating, the third bite came on autopilot to my mouth. With my peripheral vision I noticed another bit of that glossy brown rind on my spoon and took another look at my spoon before closing my lips around it. Now you may remember I mentioned I had prayed to God for help. Well have you ever wondered what is God really thinking? Why did he make all manner of creatures to share our planet? What possible use does a horseshoe crab still have. I mean they are ancient and they just seem to wash up on beaches, tentacles and feet flapping uselessly into the air. Why are they still here? Why did God make so many bugs and things that slither around and frighten us? What kind of a mind dreams these things up and to what end? You just never know. Until you look a second time at your spoonful of nine bean and ham soup and there on the brim are two long delicate antennae waving at me from the stewed body of a gleaming brown cockroach. Suddenly you stop eating, spoon in mid- air and the riddles of God's precious world become crystal clear to you. There is Saving Grace. It is bigger than Good Deeds. It is God working in the details to answer a late night prayer. A Florida cockroach has been kept crawling on this good earth, the spitting image of a horseshoe crab, it crawls and does what roaches do. It gets into places you don't want. With that you stop your orgy of overeating and come face to face with the dose of reality you were so blindly seeking for two long weeks. There it is, you have the ability to stop and put the spoon down. So simple. Just stop and put the spoon onto the table. I got up and went out to the car for a heart to heart with my dog Angie. My husband sorted out what was left of our bill and tipped the poor waitress. My prayer was answered. I got help. Tonight I did go to my meeting and sign up. I sat in the back and thought about how lucky I am to get another chance. WW has given me all the tools I need. From my prayer I got some extra Grace. A little more time to make this work. Anne Pierce

Sailing into the storm (part 4)

2009-03-11T07:52:00.009-04:00

"I am a man who has experienced affliction..." Lamentations 3:1 It had been seven years since his lips and mine had met for the first time in front of a couple hundred witnesses--our wedding day. Some people call it the seven year itch, but when you are right in the middle of it with toddling baby boys nipping at your ankles while you stare into each other's eyes and confess that you don't really know if you want to be married anymore, it feels very different from an itch. Neither of us had changed really, but somehow everything was different. As we sat their disappointed, disillusioned and tired, so tired of trying, we both knew we had run aground. I think the passengers aboard the sinking ship with Paul knew those feelings well when Paul tells them to keep up their courage because God told him he would make it out alive. Paul ended his encouragement with a sentence that has refreshed itself in mind day after day since I first read it. "Therefore keep up your courage, men for I have faith in God that it will be just as I have been told. But we must run aground on some island." These sailors had foolishly ignored Paul's good advice and now they find themselves suffocating under the dark swells of a storm, literally driven across first the Mediterranean and now the Adriatic Sea. Paul says to them, 'Look you screwed up big time. But hold onto your courage because my God, the one true God is delivering me to Caesar and you get to arrive with me, but...But! We're going to experience some turbulence along the way. We have to run aground." Paul was well qualified to write the words "And we know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose." (Rom 8:28) God always moves and works in our lives, but most of the time He does not remove the natural consequences of our decisions. That is critical because if we miss it we will end up disappointed with God and wondering why He didn't move amidst our storm. Those sailors chose to sail on the open sea late in the season and they bore the result of that risky decision. Run aground they did. Literally. They were caught probably on what would have been a sandbar in some cross currents. In the end the stern of their ship was splintered by the waves like fire logs by an ax. This is so significant to me because God told them they'd make it to shore and yet they watched helplessly as their ship--the only mode they had for getting to the shore--was pummeled by wave after wave like a wrecking ball to a high rise. I have watched as the vehicles I planned to use to get to shore were torn apart more than once in my life. Have you? A mom who planned to spend her children's lives running and playing with them is plagued with chronic illness. A marriage we thought was the happily ever after story ends in divorce and with it a family once involved in church no longer feels worthy to darken the door. A precious person I know was blindsided when her husband lost their family business. Another watched as their million dollar investment portfolio dropped like an arctic barometer in a matter of days after Enron. Another couldn't have a biological child. Another had five and each one walked away from God. And yet another sat in horror as her husband revealed his pornography and prostitute addiction. Real people. Real human lives that I know and love. Run aground. Their lives literally beaten to tiny pieces. And you tell me God is good? We say He works everything out for our good,but when you are in the middle of the wreckage it does not feel good. When we are left with fragments of the lives we build, it is then we have a choice to believe as Paul did that "it will be just as we have been told." (Acts 27:25) It is in the moment when the sterns have been broken and darkness chants "all hope is gone" that we decide whether we will believe the promises of God are true and real. You know how those sailors made it to land? It's incredible to me. Some of them just swam. Those who were strong enough and able, swam to land. The others followed either on planks for pieces from the ship. That's it. No incarnate Jesus walking on water to carry them to shore, no big flapping fish offering it's fins to bring them ashore. Just some pieces of broken boards and their own arms and legs. So often we miss God because we don't give Him credit for the strength He has given us--the ability to swim in an ocean of doubt and fear, for example. And I wonder if any of them stopped and praised Him for the splintered wreckage of that ship. So often I have everything figured out for God, the mode, the means and the method of getting me to shore. But more often than not, God takes those preconceived ideas of Himself and explodes them into a thousand fragments. His ways are just plain higher. It's so beautiful to me that God didn't remove the consequence of their choice, but from that wreckage he gave them just enough to float to shore. Just enough. When Jeff and I looked into each other's eyes that day we knew we had a decision to make--would we trust God and obey His plan or give into the storm? We chose God. And he literally gave us just enough. Just enough to make a choice to get some counselling. That was all. I remember driving to our first counselling session, lips pressed firmly together in relative silence thinking to myself, 'the fact that we are in this car driving in the direction of this counselor is a miracle because I do not want to be here and neither does he.' But we were and that was just enough. Six months later it was just enough to start falling in love again. There was never a moment when we trusted Him that He didn't provide that plank of hope--just enough to bring us to shore. And now we are a testimony not to the strength of our marriage, but to the strength of our God. There are seasons in our lives when we've just run aground. Ships were meant for water just as we were meant for hope. If you've run aground I pray you can hear my heart. Hold on. Your Father will not let you drown amidst the circumstances of your life. He will NOT. You have to know that as long as there is a God (and that's forever) you have hope. He does not abandon. He does not quit. He does not give up. He does not leave you in the consequences of your choices. He carries you through them, gives you just enough strength to stay afloat until you are safely to shore. That is the God whom I love, and that, my friends is the God who loves you. Do you believe it will be to you "just as He said?" Pray with me: Jesus, the God of hope--You came to earth to show that You will supply our greatest need for relationship with You. For that, I praise and thank you. When our lives are aground teach us to trust You. Teach us to swim with expectant hearts knowing that when our strength fails You are stronger still. Teach us that all life is in you and that our lives do not consist of the wreckage of the physical but in the peace of knowing who You are. Help us to see that we don't need a ship to get to shore--teach us to release all the 'ships' in our lives to you. Show us the planks, God. Help us to embrace the ways YOU want to work in our lives and the lives of those we love and to surrender all our preconceived ideas into Your capable hands. Help us to hold on, Father. Amen. Read with me: Lamentations 3 (especially 22-24, 55-58)

Sailing into the Storm (part 3)

2009-03-09T08:10:00.008-04:00

I'm way too much of a perfectionist to live without regret. I've always admired people who without hesitation insist they have walked through the past to the present with no regrets. You may be one of them--the kind of person who looks at every mistake as an opportunity to learn and embraces them for what they are. Now don't misunderstand me, I do learn from my mistakes and I believe readily that God is sovereign amidst every misstep in my life. But I'm not going to lie to you--there are a thousand things I'd do differently if ever given a do-over card. It's interesting though because in God's economy there is a perfect way to live, albeit rather narrow, but perfect nonetheless. And yet "there is none righteous, no not one." (Rom. 3:10) No man's soul has ever slipped into eternity without first having missed the mark of God in some way. And God holds us to that standard which is why He can say about a good man or woman--maybe Mother Theresa, "Even you fall short." (Rom. 3:23) But though He holds us to that standard, He also miraculously and completely releases us from every shortcoming. I'm not talking about a license to do whatever we want, (Rom. 6:1) but I am talking about a God who somehow demands complete holiness and yet forgives and repairs every failure and poor decision we will ever make. Just yesterday I read a quip on a local country church: God doesn't measure us using the curve; He uses the cross. Somehow amidst our mess ups in life the miracle of grace is allowed to bloom like the first crocus of spring budding in a bed of winter snow. When Paul stood up to encourage the sailors, prisoners, soldiers and captain on a ship whose end was certain destruction, he knew the reason they were in this mess was a result of poor choices. Certainly they regretted ignoring Paul's sound advice with everything in them. After all, Paul had warned them that setting out to sea was dangerous and he knew that pushing forward into the Autumn Mediterranean would result in loss of life. They hadn't listened. Sound advice was given to them and for reasons unknown to us, they left Paul's advice in the wake of the ship as they set sail. How many times have I been given sound advice, been warned about a decision and pushed on because the current of my own agenda was stronger than that of the counsel I received? My guess is those men on that ship wanted to deliver those prisoners as quickly as possible. Perhaps the centurion responsible for Paul had a wife waiting back home for him with a belly full and ready to deliver his first child. Maybe the owner of the ship would receive some additional remuneration for seeing to it that every prisoner arrived by spring. Perhaps they genuinely believed it was the best thing to do despite what Paul had told them. Now Paul says something that I think is worth pausing to take in. Paul reveals some of his humanity here. I can't get over his inability to resist saying, "I told you so." Here we have a man who is responsible for spreading the message of Jesus all over the New Testament landscape and the guy who penned the very words we commit to memory from book after book of our scripture. When he stands up to a slew of desperate and depressed men I can't help but notice that he couldn't resist reminding them of the advice he gave. "Men, you should have listened to me and not put out to sea from Crete, thus avoiding this damage and loss." (Acts 27:21) He just had to say I told you so. Did it really matter that he had given them advice and they hadn't listened? I only point this out because I think it's important that we see our heroes of the faith in their humanity. They, just like us are mere humans following Jesus. Just knowing that Paul, the man who was confident enough in other passages to tell people to emulate him, live like he lived, had the occasional human tendency gives me a little hope. Let's go on. He says to these men who have gone beyond looking into the horizon with worry and fear to a resignation that their lives are on a slow-motion journey to the bottom of the ocean's floor, "And now I advise you to keep up your courage, for there will be no loss of life among you, but only the ship will be lost. For last night an angel of the God to whom I belong and whom I serve came to me and said, 'Do not be afraid, Paul! You must stand before Caesar, and God has graciously granted you the safety of all who are sailing with you.' Therefore keep up your courage, men for I have faith in God that it will be just as I have been told." (Acts 27: 24) I think it's worth mentioning that these men worshipped gods like Zeus, god of thunder and lightning and Poseidon, god of the sea. Can you imagine worshipping gods like this your entire life and finding yourself collapsed on the deck of a ship, water sloshing around your wet ankles resigned to the belief that those gods must not care enough for you to calm the storm and quiet the sea? Surely they prayed to their gods, begged them for mercy. Remember when Elijah had the contest with the prophets of Baal and they called out to Baal for an entire day pleading with him to light their sacrifice? "They invoked the name of Ball from morning until noon, saying, "Baal, answer us." But there was no sound and no answer...Throughout the afternoon they were in an ecstatic frenzy, but there was no sound, no answer, and no response." (I Kings 18:26,29) It is no wonder these men literally gave up hope--they would have pleaded and begged their gods to intervene only to discover their cries for help fell like the waves around them into a sea of unanswered and misguided prayers. Their gods were silent. Silent. My heart has always broken for these men and I have to marvel at how similar I am to them. How often do I put my hope in my husband's job only to find it disappoint? When he loses his job we discover who the true God is. How often do I put my hope in that of a friend only to discover they cannot fulfill my needs? When they don't have time for us anymore we discover who the true God is. How often do we put our hope in our savings account or our retirement funds? When the stock markets falls like anchor of a ship we discover the true God. How often do we put our hope in great men and women of the faith? When they fail in some human way we discover they are not the true God. How often do we place hope in education or in doctors? When our children aren't getting well, we know the true God again. And here's one I constantly have to catch myself on--how often do I put my hope for our children in the way we are raising them? If we do everything right, surely they'll turn out okay. Wrong. Just ask the mother or father who prayed daily, raised them well, loved them well, taught them about God and then watched their child walk away. There are no guarantees. None. My children have free will and that truth forces me to confront the reality that only God can truly grip their hearts. Though most followers of Jesus would say they are monotheistic--worshipping only the one true God, I have to wonder if God himself wouldn't say, "You have become like the Israelites worshipping the gods of the world around you." Usually we don't realize we have formed idols from worldly ideas until we count on them and their complete silence break out hearts when we've cried out. It's then we realize we were crying out the name of our idols and not the name of our Father who loves us desperately. The other thing I love about this passage is this: these sailors made a grave error in judgment and God still moved in their situation. Paul looks them square in the face and says, 'you messed up but there will be no loss of life because the God that I worship? He wasn't silent. He sent an angel to speak to me last night and told me that He still had a plan. His plan is for me to go before Caesar and nothing, not even this storm will stop Him from accomplishing His purpose.' God will not allow any other God to get His glory--He always shows up. Always. He always shows himself strong. Always. Because his love does not depend on our perfection. And though these people made a significant mistake, He still reigned. His purposes for Paul's life would still be carried out. Period. This is such an incredible truth--God is sovereign even when we screw up. He knows we are human and He allows us to be exactly that, but that is the exact definition of mercy. He sees our needs and meets them. He doesn't change us so that we have no needs--that He's reserved for eternity--but He meets them over and over and over again. His grace says, 'Behold I love you with an everlasting love,' and His mercy says, 'And I see you messed up, but I knew you would and I have charted the purpose of your life with this in mind. I'll not be thwarted. I'll reign amidst the chaos.' This is our God--the one true God. So would I change some of my decisions in the past? Do I regret them? Sure I do. I've been tossed by the storms of poor choices and I'd have far preferred avoid those storms, but has God proven Himself faithful and worked each of those poor choices out for my ultimate good in the end? Absolutely. Without question He has never left me disappointed, never left me in the muck of my humanity. He has a strong right arm and He has never withheld His hand from me. Never. Paul had hope because when he gazed into the black of the storm He saw the light of the face of Jesus and remembered His words, "I'll never leave you. I'll never forsake you." Oh that we could know those words in the deepest marrow of our bones, the very fiber of our hearts when we stand hopeless amidst the storms that rip our spirits apart. I'll close with words Paul wrote to the Roman church, "Now may the god of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you believe in him, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit." (Romans 15:13) Do you believe in the God of hope? Pray with me: Father, God who is literally hope, teach us amidst the storm to believe in who you are. Your word says you are the God who is hope. Your word says hope does not disappoint us. Lord, teach us to anchor ourselves so deeply in your character that when storms come we see that though they rage around us they do not change our position in You. Spirit of God may your fruit of hope overflow from the branches of our lives. In Jesus name, amen. Read with me: I Kings 18 Romans 8:6

Sailing into the Storm (part 2)

2009-03-06T08:19:00.004-05:00

They said it was the wind that caused the accident, that it happened in an instant--his motorcycle vacuumed into the path of that tractor trailer. The life of a young, healthy father ripped from his sweet children and wife and not a moment to say goodbye. One morning he left on his bike and all was calm, normal. And then the storm. I will never know the ravage that ripped at this family from the moment they heard their daddy wasn't coming home. I will never fathom the depths of grief that wife and mother felt when she lay that first night in a bed empty of the man who loved her all those years. But I bore witness to their tears. We picture how our lives will be--whether we mean to or not. And most of us don't picture the storms. Acts 27:14 tells us that not long after the flutters of south wind passed by "a hurricane-force wind called the northeaster blew down from the island. When the ship was caught in it and could not head into the wind, we gave way to it and were driven along." I've never been on a ship in a storm, but I have given way to the powerful rapids of a river. I've been carried unwillingly to the place of the water's whims. What is incredible in this passage to me is that word driven. The Greek word indicates that they were no longer in control--the storm was now driving that ship. I can see that captain just as he releases the controls, hangs his head and turns his back on all human attempts to navigate that ship surrendered to the thrashing will of winds and waves. He had to come to the point of realizing he couldn't control where they were going or what would happen. Sometimes the storms in our lives are so intense, so powerful that we realize we are not in control. Driven by the force of the storm, we have no idea where we will end up. We need to know in those moments that though we are no longer in control it isn't the storm that dictates where we will land. It is our Father God who controls the winds and the rains of those storms. It is our Father who says to the wind "You may blow." and then later "Quiet. Peace be still." And it is our Father to whom those winds and rains always submit. We need to know in those moments that there is nothing that can thwart the purposes of our Heavenly Father in our lives and that He will accomplish all that He intends. (Is. 14:27) In that understanding comes a sense of release. A sense that when we've done all we can do, when we've prayed all we can pray, when we've done all things responsible, and when we've wept every tear left in our heart we can be still and know our Father reigns. Still. He reigns. (Ps. 46:10, Is. 52:7) Verse 18 says that they were "battered by the storm." The Greek word means that they were violently beaten by that storm and then verse 20 goes on to say something that just rips my heart up. "When neither sun nor stars appeared for many days and a violent storm continued to batter us, we finally abandoned all hope of being saved." Those sailors needed the stars and the sun to navigate. They spent nearly fourteen days without seeing the light of day and you and I need to know when we are in the midst of dark hours of the soul that there are those who have gone before us. We're among a company of many who have passed through the black of night to see the Spirit of God reach down and rescue a heart that is without hope. Here's the thing--those sailors thought they needed the stars to navigate where they were going. But God does not need human mechanisms to bring about His plans for our lives and often He removes them to help us see that it is God who is at work within us. (Eph. 3:20) Scripture says they through their cargo overboard. They did everything they could to lighten the load. We do that too, don't we? When we sense the magnitude of the storm we begin to lighten our loads. We'll do whatever it takes to stay afloat. Suddenly superficial things become insignificant--the things we thought we couldn't live without are cast over the ships of our lives without a second thought. Financial ruin? We don't need satellite TV. We don't need that second and third vehicle. We can live without going out to eat. In fact we can live without going shopping for anything but essential food. Marriages being ripped apart? Maybe I didn't need all that "me time" after all. Maybe all I really need is face to face time with the man I committed to marry. Maybe I really didn't need to win all those fights. Maybe I just needed to love him. Children struggling? Nothing else matters. We'll fast. We'll pray. We'll cancel every appointment, we'll leave work early and we'll call in every family member and counselor and pastor we know to give us advice. Because when a storm comes we see instantly all that really matters in our lives. In my opinion, that's a wonderful place to be. These sailors actually abandoned every shred of hope that they would be rescued. They were so convinced of their death that they actually quit eating. What, after all was the point of fueling a body doomed to be consumed by the ravenous jaws of the Mediterranean? Have you ever been through something so intense that you just really couldn't keep doing the things required for living? I mean there are griefs that can grip the heart of a man so deeply he no longer showers, he no longer cleans his house, he no longer gets out of bed. I've seen that grief in my days. And there are shocks that wave through families so powerful that they no longer go to church and they no longer get together with their friends. Who of us would be honest if we said we've never felt utterly without hope? And here's the funny thing--it doesn't take a tragedy to bring us to a place without hope. Sometimes the drudgery and constant gnawing of the day to day requirements of our lives brings us to the point of being so down that we just can't get up. It's at this point that Paul stands up--can you see them all there, faces in hands, numb, cold, wet and cavernous and empty without hope? There, strung about loosely along the deck of that ship no longer gazing into the charcoal horizon, they know the sun isn't going to break through before they are swallowed by the sea. It is to this group of sailors and fellow prisoners that Paul speaks these words: "Men, you should have listened to me and not put out to sea from Crete, thus avoiding this damage and loss. And now I advise you to keep up your courage, for there will be no loss of life among you, but only the ship will be lost. For last night an angel of the God to whom I belong and whom I serve came to me and said, 'Do not be afraid, Paul! You must stand before Caesar, and God has graciously granted you the safety of all who are sailing with you. Therefore keep up your courage, men for I have faith in God that it will be just as I have been told." On this day, in this hour in your life I don't know what situation through which you may be journeying, but I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that the promises in God's Word remain true. I love that Paul said he was confident it would be just as he had been told. In other words he was insisting that whatever God said would come to pass. This is the truth of our lives too--what God says is true. Period. No matter what waves are standing higher than the sun in our lives, no matter what rain has ripped at our faces until we are blinded by the impact. "Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence not seen." (Heb. 11:1) We stand not on what is before us, but on the guarantees of the God who promises to never leave, to never forsake, to be with us through the valley of the shadows of death, to be an ever present help in times of trouble, to be near the broken hearted, to comfort, to love. You'll never find me dancing a jig of joy in the face of a storm, but I pray that you'll find me believing still in the pure and perfect goodness of my Father. Pray with me: God, you have taken through storms. You've brought me to the other side. You have proven that you will not leave me or abandon me to the ravages and disappointments of this life. Help me Lord to believe when my heart doesn't want to, doesn't have the strength to anymore. Lord, help me to honor you with my belief--to proclaim to a world that you remain the hope of all nations. Jesus, it is you that lives through me. Help me to surrender to the power of your life within. Amen. Read with me: Psalm 42

Sailing into the Storm

2009-03-05T08:05:00.006-05:00

What human who has cast a glance seaward has not forever been impacted by the liquid-gems poured out for miles that surpass the sight line? The sea. My forefathers crafted wooden ships that would navigate the prism waters and sailed the seas with skill. I suppose it is in my blood though I've never sailed. So the story recorded in Acts 27 and 28 holds particular appeal to me because of the setting--The Mediterranean Sea. Guilty only of loving his Jesus, Paul finds himself a prisoner on a journey across the Sea to plead his case before Caesar. It's late in the year and Julius the Centurion in charge of Paul along with the sailors knew that though they had orders to deliver this and other prisoners to Caesar, embarking on a journey this long was dangerous. And yet, they set sail. If you will, walk with me through this passage a while. The first few verses use phrases like, "sailed slowly,"or "sailed under the lee" and "sailed along the coast." These skilled sailors were scared. They knew the dangers that surrounded them and they hovered along the coastlines of various islands and cities in hope of being sheltered from vicious winds. I love that they played it safe. We are so similar aren't we? We make sure we have 401k's and we take our multi-vitamins. We carry life insurance and look for jobs that provide benefit packages. Sure, it's common sense to do those things, but it's also playing it safe. Wouldn't you agree? If there is a natural shelter available, we're gonna sail the ships of our lives pretty near it aren't we? And there's nothing wrong with that at all--in fact I'd probably call it being wise stewards of our lives. When my husband and I moved from Ontario back to Georgia to be nearer my family one of the things that we gave up was the shelter of health insurance. We purchased it for our children, but not for ourselves. And I'd be lying if I said I didn't feel completely vulnerable. There isn't a morning that passes that I don't pray for God's protection over Jeff and that I don't look forward to the day when we again will have the harbor of insurance. But here's the thing--I know of so many people without health insurance for whom God has provided their medical needs. Hundreds of thousands of dollars worth. In God's economy He just provides. Whether He provides through Bluecross/Blueshield or through an agency that helps people with cancer the bottom line is that it is still God who has provided. "And my God shall supply all your needs according to His glorious riches in Christ Jesus." (Phil. 4:19) As humans we like to compartmentalize provision and say that out of the ordinary provision is from God and the rest is just us taking care of ourselves. Surely God laughs at our audacity to actually think that anything we have could have found its source in anything other than His gracious hand. Scripture says that their sailing became difficult along the coast of Crete as they headed into the beginning of October. Paul knew that their lives were in danger and though he was a prisoner, he wasn't afraid to mention his concerns. "Men, I can see the voyage is going to end in disaster and great loss not only of the cargo and the ship, but also of our lives." (Acts 27:10) Proverbs 22:3 says, "A prudent man sees danger and takes refuge, but a simple man keeps going and suffers for it." It's ironic that the captain and owner of the ship--the individuals who should have known better--both insisted that they should continue on this voyage. The greatest expert in our lives is the Spirit of God and yet so often we ignore his still small voice and listen to the voices of those around us. Spiritually speaking any course we take that poses even one iota of threat to our walk with God is a dangerous sea on which to sail. I'm talking about buying that one item on credit because next year we think we'll have the money to pay for it. I'm talking about gossiping just that one time because that morsel of news is just eating a hole in our tongue and we're dying to share it. While taking that course may not have immediate implications, we are opening the door to loss not necessarily of physical life, but definitely of abundant life. So they continue on their journey and "when a gentle south wind sprang up, they thought they could carry out their purpose, so they weighed anchor and sailed close along the coast of Crete." (Acts 27:13) Here they are sailing and what relief they must have felt when that south wind began to cool their faces as they stood on deck--that reassuring calm that gave them confidence they'd be okay despite the facts they knew to be true about sailing this late in the season. We all know the expression "it's the calm before the storm." It was. Here in the mountains of northern Georgia, the wings of Appalachia, we enjoyed several years of economic calm--houses going up, construction booming, new restaurants opening, people buying bigger trucks, more equipment, more, more, more. It wasn't sustainable growth and surely people knew the facts. It doesn't take a genius to realize that houses can't double in value every three years forever. Yet so few saw danger and took any sort of preparatory refuge. Often in our families we have prolonged periods of calm--everything seems wonderful--the kids are doing well in school, they're doing well with friends. Or in our marriages--we've been getting along well, we enjoy each other's company. Or in our churches--the new building is going up, offerings are coming in regularly, people like the new youth pastor. Calm. But are we prepared for the storm? The reality is that storms come. They do. We may have relative quiet for years, but in our lifetime we will face storms. This passage is so powerful because Paul faced the storm and lived to tell his story and somehow amidst all that he goes through, His faith in God remains the anchor that holds. We'll continue this story, but for now, let me just ask in what harbor do you seek refuge? Because here's the thing--there is shelter in the God who has loved you with an everlasting love. His arms will not fail in times of trouble. On this you can stand. Pray with me: Father, show me the areas in my life where I am enjoying relative calm and need to prepare for what may lie ahead. I know you told me in your Word that in this world I would have trouble, but to be of good cheer for You have overcome the world. Teach me to take refuge in the shelter of your wings. Teach me to seek harbor not in the coastline of worldly protection but in the shadow of You, the Most High God. Thank you that your Word promises you are with me always even in the shadow of death. Amen. Read with me: Psalm 91:1 Jeremiah 31:3 We'll continue to sail...I hope you'll join me again for part 2.

Stepping In the Footprints of Jesus

2009-02-27T08:11:00.003-05:00

Loving Jesus, I mean really loving Jesus is a lot harder than I'd sometimes like to accept. The disciples themselves told Jesus His teachings were "hard" and many of them defected. That's a pretty big thing considering that anyone who devoted themselves to becoming a disciple had literally given up everything else--career, home, family--to become like this man. The Bible says in John 6 that Jesus was aware that some of his disciples were complaining that His teachings were too demanding and He specifically asked them, "Does this cause you to be offended?" Jesus knew they were offended--his message can be offensive to our personal agendas and bents. When it is, then we know we've encountered an area in our lives where we haven't released ourselves fully to Him. He went on to tell them, "The words I have spoken to you are spirit and are life." The Greek in that passage means that Jesus words are literally life-producing. Just yesterday the boys and I were cracking open rocks and marveling at the dark brown lines and layers passing through the hard stones. Here in the center of these rough chunks of our earth were minerals and elements like iron--ingredients completely and utterly necessary for the production of life. My eldest son--an avid ingredient label reader--exclaimed, "Mom, those are in the food we eat!" Exactly right. The very element that courses through our blood giving us energy and saving us from severe lethargy is found within the hardest stones. The truths of the Spirit of God are often layers of nutrients embedded in the difficult ways of Jesus. And they produce life. Now let me give you an example of what this looks like in my life. Paul in Philippians wrote a verse that God often uses to...well, to haunt me, if you will. "Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is worthy of respect, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if something is excellent or praiseworthy, think about these things." (4:8) I know it's a commonly quoted passage and for good reason--it's full of iron-rich nutrients of the Spirit of God. The problem is that often it means I've got to quit focusing on something that doesn't meet that criteria. For example one of my absolute favorite authors of all-time falls short of this criteria. His writing is flawless. His stories are like long hot cups of coffee and lazy Saturday afternoons. And yet each of his books contain images and phrasing that I know grieve the heart of God. Every time I begin one of his books I am hopeful that it will be different and every time God passes that verse through my heart and whispers, "It's not commendable, Sarah. He took the incredible ability I gave him to write and allowed it to become something I never intended." And some of you might say, but it's art. And to that all I can tell you is the truth. Only a short distance into the book I was already aware that I'd need to return it to the library when my husband picked it up. I cringed. My entire body tensed as he began to look at the book because all I could think is how embarrassed I'd be if he read a few pages. Well, obviously it wasn't "praiseworthy" or I'd of been insisting he read the entire thing. So the book sits unread and waiting patiently to be returned. Hard. Maybe not hard for everyone, but for a literature lover it's hard to accept. We all cling to different things--struggle to hold onto different parts of our old life. Just this morning while pulling out an old shoe box for the boys to place some of their newly cracked open rocks in I noticed a slogan on the inside of the box. There was a large shoe print and the words "What kind of footprint will you leave?" Paul in verse 9 of Philippians 4 said, "And what you learned and received and heard and saw in me, do these things. And the God of peace will be with you." Do you not find it incredible that this man had such confidence in his obedience to Christ that He actually had the boldness to say, "Hey guys, mimic me. Be like me. Practise what I practise. Preach what I preach. Live how I live and the God of peace will be with you." That's amazing to me. Frankly, there are times when I have to sit my little boys down and say, "Boys, what you just saw mommy do? That wasn't what Jesus would do. I have to ask Jesus to forgive me and I need to tell you it was wrong. Will you forgive me too?" But Paul knew exactly what kind of footprint he was leaving and he wanted others to follow in it. After all, that's what a disciple is, isn't it? A follower? So, my question is, are we really following? Really? Listen, I know it's tough sometimes. Sometimes I feel like I'm giving up everything...but then Jesus asks us for what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul? See I'd rather keep my soul and lose the world. Jesus said in Luke 6:46-48, "Why do you call me 'Lord, Lord, and don't do what I tell you? Everyone who comes to me and listens to my words and puts them into practice I will show you what he is like: He is like a man building a house who dug down deep, and laid the foundation on bedrock. When a flood came, the river burst against that house but could not shake it because it had been well built." A foundation on bedrock. I had a friend who recently built a house and they ended up having to blast into the earth with dynamite because they discovered her house location was solid rock. It cost her an extra fifteen thousand dollars, but she's got a foundation built on rock. Her house is going nowhere. It is permanently embedded in the rock. If I take Jesus at His word and obey it--follow it as closely as I understand it, I am digging down deep and leaving a footprint that I can be confident I want my own children to follow in. You know that passage in John when the disciples said it was too difficult to follow Jesus' teachings? My Bible says, "After this many of his disciples quit following him and did not accompany him any longer." The literal Greek translation of that means "Many of his disciples went back to what lay behind." What lay behind. I can't help but think of the Israelites' repeated claims that they were better off as slaves in Egypt. For the follower of Jesus what lays behind is always shaky ground. It's always less than what lies ahead. Imagine a house that actually shifts it's position from the solid foundation on which it lays to the sandy soil behind it? A house can't sit on two foundations and remain stable. That's not the footprint I want to leave. When we lived in Ontario sometimes we'd get a big snow overnight. If Jeff didn't have time to shovel before he left for work I'd go out and try to step directly in his big booted footprints in order to get the shovel. But when I missed even slightly, I always got snow down my boot or up my pants leg. Following in the footprints of Jesus takes every ounce of effort--it takes our all. He'll leave nothing untouched, but the payoff is a foundation built on rock so full of nutrients that we get a life only the spirit of God can give. Most of all, what I love is the promise that when we put these words and deeds into action, "The God of peace will be with you." (Phil. 4:9) We're not promised a trouble free life. We're not promised an easy life, but when we give all of ourselves to all we know of Jesus we are walking in the company of the God of peace. The peace to sing with the Horatio Spafford's great hymn, "It is well with my soul." It may not be easy, but it will be well. Of this, I am sure. Pray with me: God of peace, Spirit of God, Jesus, teach me to take your yoke. Teach me to follow in your footprints. Show me that the life you give is far greater than the life I release to follow you. God I miss the mark so often and I thank you for your forgiveness. Help me to love the peace that you give more than the temporary fulfillment I'm offered by those things to which I want to cling. Jesus may my life honor you and may my children find a solid footprint in which to follow. Amen."

When Boxes Are Empty and Diamonds are Lost.

2009-01-17T10:15:00.007-05:00

You're not going to believe this--the diamond in my engagement ring is gone! Yep. You heard me! Gone. I still remember when Jeff and I were looking at rings. We had seen every style imaginable and given my affinity for old things, I'd really admired several estate diamonds. Jeff and I both figured we'd end up buying a vintage ring but then I saw it--a princess cut solitaire and apparently I literally squeaked out loud. Needless to say the evening Jeff proposed--a hot summer night under the blanket of the moon on the end of a dock spread like an arm dangling into the sweet Michigan lake--he placed on my finger the princess diamond. Now, ten years later I look down at my hand and it is gone. Four vacant and somewhat dirty prongs stand like an empty pitchfork on the golden band and my diamond is not there. The shock of realizing the valuable part of my engagement ring was MIA was quickly replaced by retracing of my footsteps. Where had I lost it? Talk about a needle in a haystack! Still, we haven't found it. It's just not there. When I told Jeff I really wasn't sure how he'd respond. "I wanted you to have that forever," was all he said. I looked at him and said, "I know. Me too." But then I got to thinking, our love isn't in that diamond. Sure it represented ten years of marriage, but my real treasure was sitting right there beside me on that couch. "I'd rather have you than that diamond any day. And I've got you forever," I told him. And that's the truth. Sometimes the places we believe our treasure to be turn up empty and we discover the truth that they never contained them in the first place. Several years ago when Alzheimer's began to stake its claim on my grandmother I remember receiving a Christmas parcel from her in the mail. On Christmas morning we opened the packages from her. Inside one was a gift for our eldest son, Nathan. When we opened the other--labeled for our newborn Corton--it was empty. We all laughed out loud. Thankfully Corty was just a couple months old and didn't have to experience the disappointment of an empty Christmas box. Grandma had forgotten to put the gift for Corton inside the box before she wrapped it. Nothing inside that box. And nothing inside the prongs of my engagement ring. Nothing. You know I can't help but think about how this relates to my view of Jesus. Without ever intending to do it, I often try to find Him in boxes and He too just isn't there. We hear it said all the time, "Don't put God in a box." And I've always tried hard not to do that. But we are born with boxes so big we don't even realize that's what they are. It's like that movie with Jim Carrey--The Truman Show--where a man lived his entire life on a television set so large he had no idea his life wasn't real. We can have boxes for God so big that we have no clue that we're actually living within an entire framework that limits who God is. I've been reading the gospels since the new year began and what stands out to me is how Jesus constantly blue the walls off the boxes of the people with whom he interacted. I love in Luke chapter five when a paralyzed man gets lowered through the roof of a house in hopes of physical healing and Jesus says, "Friend, your sins are forgiven." (Luke 5:21) It's as though he was saying, "Buddy, you think I can heal you physically and that's true, but you've got no idea the extent of what I can do for you and the ramifications of the power of God that rests on me, at work in your life." The more I look for Jesus and search for who He is, the more I discover He's just not in the places where I think I'll find Him. Every box I look in turns up to be empty as though He's whispering in my ear, "Sarah, I'm not there--I'm more. I'm bigger. I'm greater. I'm simpler. I'm deeper. I'm wider. " Sometimes I even stop and ponder whether it's a great form of pride to assume we can discover and understand one tiny iota of who God is. He's God, for goodness sake! God. GOD ALMIGHTY. GOD CREATOR. GOD REDEEMER. As a human, is that something I can even begin to fathom? Though there are Messianic Jewish people, consider the vast majority of Jewish people who still look for the Messiah. They are looking in a box that is empty--their Messiah has come, He has lived, He has died and He has risen to the right hand of the very God they worship--Elohim Himself! Consider the disciples and followers of Jesus--they believed He would usher in the kingdom of God during their life and had no idea that He would literally die and rise again. He blew the doors off of what they thought they completely understood. And get this--he LIVED WITH THEM! He was right there under their nose telling them of His plan all along and yet they could not understand it. How much more then is it likely that the very parameters in which we view Jesus are probably our feeble attempts to understand a concept so vast and broad that we are merely building walls which will at some point collapse like a house of cards? I love how Paul puts it in Colossians 3:11, "Christ is all and in all." And in chapter 2 verse 9 he says, "For in Him (Jesus) dwells all the fullness of God bodily." To begin to intellectually grasp the magnitude of those passages is I believe humanly impossible. How can I even know what all is? Christ is all. All. Everything. What I can begin to grasp is this: Is He ALL to me? Now that is something I can wrap my head around. Is He the beginning of life for me? Is He the source of joy for me? Is He comfort to me? Is He peace to me? Is He love to me? Is He provider to me? Is He redeemer to me? Is He satisfaction to me? Is He contentment to me? I'm not one for making New Year's Resolutions--never have been. I like New Year's themes though, and this year I've asked God to blow the walls out of my vision of Him. When I read His Word this year, I'm desperate to view it in as pure an understanding as is possible. I want Him to erase my previous conclusions and help me to see Him for who He is--who He wants to be to me. Like a kaleidoscope I want Him to shift my vantage point from what I've been told to what He reveals. I've been raised in boxes--not because anyone tried to put me in them but because that's our human tendency. Oprah Winfrey has coined the phrase--what do you know to be true? I'm not a raging Oprah fan, but I like that question. It's my prayer that this year I will stand on the simplest of truths--that God is all. I pray I'll hold loosely to the idea that I can figure Him out and tightly to the reality that my job isn't to figure Him out but to love every part of Him that He chooses to reveal to me. In the end, every time I think I've got God figured out it's like I'm looking down at a golden band with empty prongs. The treasure--the face of God and the heart of Jesus exist, but not in the bands we've melted down to fit the fingers of our lives. He is infinitely more. And above all, He is love. May we live as though we know that to be true and may we cast down the walls about us and breath afresh and anew the presence of God in 2009. Amen. Pray with me: Jesus, I am honored that you would grace my heart with your presence. May I never miss who you are and what you stand for. May I not look for you where I think you are, but may I wait for you to take me where you are going. Show me your heart and soften my own. Jesus you deserve my awe and my amazement at all that you are and I honor you for being far more than anything I'll ever fully comprehend. May I walk in you--the way, the truth and the life. Amen.

Speechless

2008-12-18T07:42:00.004-05:00

Speechless. Without audible uttering. Unable to form communicable words with one's tongue. Though for some it may be difficult to believe, I have found myself in this predicament a time or two. The birth of my sons--their slow motion arms and legs stretching skyward and their lifesaver red lips forming tiny ohs as they made their entrance into the world--left me utterly overwhelmed and without words. A yellow topaz ring I had admired for over a year presented in the hands of my husband to me when I thought he hadn't realized how much I loved it also found me unable to form verbal expression. A friend just yesterday told me how her husband had left her sleeping while he crawled from bed blurry eyed and dazed and headed to Wal-Mart for their 5 AM Black Friday sale to pick up their children's Christmas gift. When she realized she had overslept she dashed from bed clamoring to get dressed in hopes there might be a few of the prized items left when her husband casually said, "It's okay. I already got it." Speechless! A husband who braved the insanity of Wal-Mart on black Friday...alone! Wow. My question today is have you ever been left speechless by God? Poor Zechariah and Elizabeth don't get a lot of air time what with Mary and the baby Jesus' story only verses after their own tale of miraculous pregnancy and birth. Here were two righteous and obedient children of God who found themselves unable to bare a child. Scripture doesn't tell us of their emotions about the lack of children, but as a mom, I know that at some point in her life Elizabeth must have groaned and wept into her pillow with the longing for a child. And I wonder if anyone shared with her in her pain. I wonder if at some point she and Zechariah came to the understanding that God was sovereign and remained good despite the reality that He had not blessed them with a child of their own. So often the things withheld from us are not for our pain but for God's later glory and if we can hold onto that truth during the barren season we somehow position ourselves to fully grasp and enjoy the blessings of God when they are poured into our lives. I wonder if Zechariah and Elizabeth understood that. Now Gabriel appeared to Zechariah while he was in the holy place and tells him he is going to have a son. Naturally Zechariah is not a little surprised and certainly has some questions. My pastor pointed out that unlike Mary who when told she will give birth to the prophesied Messiah of her nation simply asked, "How can this be since I've not been with a man," Zechariah asks for some sort of a sign to prove its truth. Interesting comparison. Mary accepted what the angel said as true and simply wondered about the practical "how" God would accomplish this. Zechariah on the other hand wanted proof that what the angel said was in fact true--a sign. So often I still want to ask God for confirmation signs. I won't go there today theologically, but I do want to say that sometimes when I notice a pattern of asking God for confirmation signs it's an indicator that I'm struggling with weak faith. God's Word is clear that living out belief in what we do not tangibly see is a part of the follower of Christ's daily life. "Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence not seen." (Hebrews11:1) "The righteous shall walk by faith." (Habakkuk 2:4) Jumping ahead a moment, while Zechariah is chatting with Gabriel Luke 2 says "Now the people were waiting for Zechariah, and they began to wonder why he was delayed in the holy place." I love that little sentence. So often when we are meeting our destiny, when we are discovering the greatness of God's plan for our life--people on the outside looking in have no idea what is going on. It's never convenient when God drops in and changes everything, but it's always right. Zechariah was busy doing what he was supposed to do. So often I get caught up in thinking perhaps I need to do something different for God to speak to me. Listen, when God wants to interrupt our daily routine to have a little chat, I can without hesitation promise you He'll have no problem getting our attention. Remember the writing on the wall? The burning bush? The baby floating in a basket down a river? The talking donkey? For busy moms and dads who are just thankful to get ten minutes of quiet time before the Lord a day, the idea of spending a sacred hour or two before the Lord each morning prostrate before Him is almost laughable at times. If you are able to do that regularly, then I commend you. But if you aren't I pray that you know that your God loves you so intensely, so radically, so emphatically that when He's ready to do something major in your life, you'll know it. Our job is to remain faithful with the stewardships God has given us--to obey. And when we do feed our spirits, then we need to make sure that we feed them with the milk and honey of God's Word and not other things. Now backing up again to verses 19 and 20, Gabriel answers Zechariah's request for a sign like this, "I am Gabriel, who stands in the presence of God..." It's as though he's saying, "Hello! You may not have noticed I'm an angel! You know that God you are making offerings to right here in the Holy Place? Well, I stand in his presence everyday! Trust me, when I tell you you are going to have a baby. You're gonna have a baby!" Here's the thing--when we do get the burning bush experience we need to respond in faith. Everything that angel told Zechariah lined up with the prophecy of God's Word and Zechariah being of priestly lineage definitely would have known God's Word. We should always test things against the truth of God's Word and when it lines up, we need to line up too and obey in faith. Then Gabriel says to Zechariah, "because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time, you will be silent, unable to speak, until the day these things take place." And there you have it. God sends an angel to tell Zechariah his life is fixing to be changed forever and Zechariah is so shocked he wants proof that God's really going to do this great thing. I can almost hear God saying, "Zechariah, buddy, I'm God. I can do ALL THINGS. When I move in your life, when I act, it'll leave you speechless." Most theologians agree that he was probably also left deaf because of the fact that later on when asking for the name of the baby, the people made signs to Jon to ask the question. I can't help but wonder if God's whole point in leaving Zechariah deaf and mute was simply this: if we don't listen to the message of God delivered by his servants our hearing is of no use to us. And when our lips utter words of unbelief, they too are of no value. But more than anything, I think Zechariah was left speechless by the power of God at work in his life. Zechariah was a good man. He obeyed God. He served God. And he struggled with believing the unbelievable. I can relate to that. What prayer or petition of your heart is something so impossible that it is difficult to believe God will work in that situation? The answer to that question my friend is likely the very situation where God desires greatly to leave you speechless. Speechless not because you couldn't believe He'd work, but speechless at His power and His might and His faithfulness when He does move. I have a list of barrens--the situations and circumstances in the lives of my friends and family that seem impossible. Trust me, I've got some doosies on that list. I bet you do too. And I am specifically taking those before God and saying, "Lord, leave me speechless. Show your power. Show your might. I don't see how, but I believe, Lord. I believe." Will you pray that with me? "God of wonder, Lord of the barren wastelands in our lives, you see all of these situations. You already know they exist and have a plan that incorporates them in our lives for your glory. God we believe you can work. We believe you are able. Lord, we're not kidding when we say that we believe some of these circumstances are literally impossible, but God with you all things are possible. We stand on that truth today. We line up behind it and we beg of you, leave us speechless. In Jesus' name we ask. Amen."

In The Hill Country

2008-12-13T08:25:00.005-05:00

"Are you overwhelmed, Sarah?" It was my sister's question and I answered like any self-respecting prideful human being would answer. "No." Liar. Of course I'm overwhelmed, but who ever wants to admit that? Thankfully, my sister is in tune enough to know the truth and kind enough to let me phrase it anyway I want. "It's not that I'm overwhelmed, I just know I have a lot to do." Translation--I'm overwhelmed. All of us have seasons when there are significant time consuming things that we must accomplish. There aren't any real choices--they are largely non-negotiable items. I'm not talking about little things like whether or not we should attend the staff Christmas party or whether or not we should go to the tree lighting ceremony--we have them too. But throughout life there are seasons when our day is literally filled from the moment we pull the duvet out from under our chins to the moment we place it, wearily, back again an the pillow cradles our heads. Generally, though, my seasons like this do not come at Christmas. I've always tried very hard to guard against that. This year however, I have four major things happening simultaneously, none of which have anything to do with Christmas and all of which are life impacting situations. And there's probably no magazine article on how to have a stress free Christmas that will help at this point--I've cut out, reduced and minimized where I can. Painful reductions too, I might add. There are friends and even family I haven't had time to call and a co-op we had to pull the kids from for the next semester and ministries we've said, not now to. It's a delicate balance between admitting, yes, I'm overwhelmed, and asking someone to play the violin while I sing my carol of Christmas woe for any who will lend their ears. The latter is not my intention. Trust me! But the line between being honest, transparent even and pulling up my boots, pointing my nose into the air and denying any need at all seems blurry at times. After all, aren't the good Christians never overwhelmed or dare I say stressed out? I hesitate even to use that word because we are told to be "anxious for nothing." Then too there is the line of thinking that travels along the vein of looking around at the others in my life. They have so many more things with which to deal. And they do. I look around at my family and friends, my church and our community and then beyond to places like Africa where a child is orphaned every fourteen seconds and I ask myself how I could dare use the word overwhelmed in relation to my own life. But then I read the words of Psalm 121, "I lift my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come," and the heat of wet tears insist on filling my eyes. Admittedly there are hills in other people's lives that are greater, higher than those in my own. But to deny there are any hills?Well, my tears seem to say what my mouth is too proud to utter. I have some hills and I'm a little afraid they're bigger than I can handle. I don't know if i should dig deeper and keep going or if perhaps I've somehow taken a wrong turn. Are these hills present because of a poor decision or are they softly lain in my path to strengthen my legs for the next mountain in the distance? Someone asked me, "How are you doing everything?" I responded, "I'm just putting one foot in front of the other." I wanted to say something marvelously spiritual like, "Well, God has just infused me with this abundance of energy and everyday I wake up in fast forward and just go go go! Praise the Lord!" But I'm just not that good of a story spinner. I already tried to tell my own sister I wasn't overwhelmed. Let's just be honest--there's no abundance of energy at my house this season. I do however, have enough. Enough for each day. Enough for each new task--each new requirement. And I'm reminded of the Israelites and their manna; always enough for that day. Never anymore. And I'm thankful for that because somehow there is security and beauty in knowing that God is so in love with me that He is determined to affix and fuse my heart to His in a trusting relationship. As though He has been whispering to my spirit, "I am enough, Sarah. El Shaddai. Trust me. I will be enough tomorrow too. I will because I AM." The second verse of Psalm 121 says, "My help comes from the Lord, the Creator of heaven and earth!" It goes on to say, "The Lord is your protector; the Lord is the shade at your right hand. The Lord will protect you from all harm; he will protect your life. The lord will protect you in all you do, now and forevermore." When I look around I'm tempted to compare my situation to the circumstances of many around me--measure my hills and their hills. I always come up short. That's a slippery slope I can assure you. I always walk away from a comparison session feeling as though all the other Christians are more worthy. Somehow they manage to handle everything and I get a little speed bump in the pathway and want to throw a hissy fit. That's why the author of Hebrews says, "Therefore since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, we must get rid of every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and run with endurance the race set out for US, keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith." (Hebrews 12:1) We all have our hills at some point and God's direction is that we keep our eyes on the face of the man who climbed Golgotha's hill. We hold our hands to the sides of our face and force tunnel vision upon ourselves. We insist that the face of Jesus is all we need to see because He already endured and conquered and everyone's hills pale in comparison to His. We look into His eyes and we do exactly what I said to my friend--put one foot in front of the other. Again and again. I'm like Paul when he said, "I'm not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned (in my case, am learning) to be content in any circumstance." (Phil. 4:10) I'm content in this hill country--not because I'm into mountain climbing per se but because I know that the presence of El Shaddai is in these hills and where He is, there I want to be also. I say these things because I know there have to be a few of you who can relate. Most of you I know are probably far more together than I. And that's okay. But for those who find themselves in the hill country for a season or perhaps have a loved one making a solo trek through an Everest in their life, may you know that for a believer we have an "ever present help in times of trouble." We have a God who will "supply all our needs" and we "shall not want." Those are the truths on which we must walk. Just after Paul instructed the believers of Philippi not to be anxious about anything he says, "And the peace of God that surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus." That's the very peace Jesus said He came to give, "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you; I do not give it to you as the world does. Do not let your hearts be distressed or lacking in courage." (John 14:27) I'm determining in my spirit that I'll not deny Jesus His purpose in coming--especially at this Christmas season. Paul must have known that there were a few like myself back then that needed a little practical help in this area because he goes on to explain just exactly what they should do. First of all in every situation we find the time--scratch that--make the time to pray and petition God. Then we thank Him ahead of time for what we know based on His word He is able to do and make all of our requests to Him. I'm okay with that part. I'm pretty good about starting my day off with prayer--some face to face time with my Father. But then Paul continues, and this, I believe is the kicker for some of us ornery followers. "Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is worthy of respect, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if something is excellent or praiseworthy, think about these things...And the God of peace will be with you." (Phil. 4:8) That passage brings us full circle. The only person worthy, true, pure, lovely, excellent and praiseworthy is Jesus. Fix our eyes on Jesus. A WAY in a manger. Jesus. The WAY in a manger. THE WAY through the hills of our lives. If you are climbing this season when you'd rather be sitting by the fire sipping cider and nibbling gingersnaps may you know that there is a way through and you are not alone. Pray with me: Jesus, You are the way. I acknowledge that in you there is a path for my life, in you there is hope, in you there is peace. Jesus I honor you this season not because you took trouble from my life but because you understand it and walk with me through it. Jesus I honor you because You are worth trusting. If like the wisemen, I could lay a gift at your feet, it would be my trust. Help me to fix my gaze on who You are and not where I am. Amen.

Thankful for the Meat of Things: The I AM

2008-11-27T09:07:00.005-05:00

If Thanksgiving had fallen on the day Christ hung lifeless from the trunk of a tree driven into the hill of Golgotha I wonder for what Mary would have given thanks. If 9--11 had delivered it's death jets on Thanksgiving Day I can't help but ask what we would have thanked God for. But upon Thanksgiving's arrival today there are fresh winds and blueberry frosh skies. The sausage rice stuffing is prepared and the sweet potato souffle is waiting for it's turn in the oven. Coffee is brewed and the news seems somehow void of any major events--for this one day. Thanksgiving. For centuries we've honored this day as a day to stop, just stop, and be thankful. I've always been one that likes to look beneath all the fixings, the trimmings, the fluff if you will. Show me the roots, the meat, the core, the crux. Get to the bottom line. Often when my husband has something to share with me I'll stop him and request that he tell me the end of his story first so I know exactly where we're going--then he can fill it in with all the details and dare I say bunny trails that make his stories so unique. And I find myself this morning in the same place--just saying, Lord, if everything and everyone I know and love were gone, what then would I be thankful for? What Lord, are those who awake today in barren lands or with barren hearts to give thanks for? This morning in my quiet time I was reading Isaiah 40 and like an anthem God's Word heralded the core of my Thanksgiving Offering. (Follow along in Isaiah 40) For what, Sarah can you always be grateful though flowers wither and grass turns brown with autumns parching wind? For what, Sarah can you say thank you when people die and holidays are spent alone, when stomachs are empty and dreams are unthinkable? This, Sarah, be thankful for this. I AM Comfort. I AM the God who comforts my people. I speak kindly to my people. There will come a day when I will end their time of warfare, when punishment will cease. Clear a way for me, for my comfort. Out of the desert regions within your souls will you open a road for me? I AM Adonai. I will elevate the valleys and I will level the mountains and hills. I will take the rugged, ravaged places and make them a smooth plain on which you will stand. I will reveal my splendor and everyone will see it. Don't doubt this because of what you see. Believe it because I have decreed it. Don't you realize that people are no different than grass yet you cling to them? Imagine clinging to a blade of grass when the winds rise and the rains rail against the shell of your souls? You are clinging to nothing if you cling to people. And dare you cling to their promises? You might as well cling to the fragrant petals of a wild Cherokee Rose. Hold on tight, now. Your grass will become brittle and flake within your grasp, and your flower will wilt and melt into nothing more than its perfume. What then will you cling to? When you cling to my decrees, then you are clinging to hope. When I, the Lord decree something it is forever. Go now to the nearest mountain and cry out. Don't be afraid or embarrassed or ashamed to shout out my introduction. "Here is your God." Here is your God! I will tell you who I AM. I AM a victorious warrior. I AM sovereign--don't miss this. I AM sovereign--there is not a thing, NOT ONE SINGLE thing in your life that somehow slipped beyond my grasp. And I am a warrior whose military power is greater than every nuclear bomb and hidden stronghold in the world. Greater. And I AM a shepherd who does not neglect his flock. Do you understand me? I'll never neglect you. I will tend, I will gather, I will carry and I will lead, but I will never ever neglect my flock. I AM your Shepherd when you need me and when you don't. I'm still there. It is I who measured out the waters of earth in the very hollow of my hand and it was I who measured the sky with precision. I weighed the soil of the earth on which you toil and I hold the mountains and the hills in balance. Do you think gravity is merely a scientific term? You need to know that I invented, formed, created gravity--it is nothing more than the inhaling and exhaling of my power. Can you internalize what I am telling you? These are the decrees, the truths you hold to when skies are clear and when they are grey, and these truths will not change. No one teaches me. No one instructs me. I am never in need of assistance or directions. You will never find an accurate earthly comparison to me because there is NONE like me. No. Not even one! There will be those who seek the golden faces of some idol but in time they will discover it is silent when they cry out. In time they will discover it is still when they plead for help. In time they will discover it's heart is stone when their grief overwhelms them. But, I am the one who stretched out the sky like a curtain and it is I who pitched it like a tent above you. Can you see that I gave it to you like a picture of how my sovereignty covers your very life? I reduce rulers to nothing. There is no country or ruler that bares any significance apart from me. Don't you see that when you fear who will rule your nation I am calmly orchestrating the events on earth as they play out in the timeline of eternity? And if you thought for a brief moment that you could compare me to someone--maybe just some small resemblance I would call out to you, "Not even close. I am HOLY. I am set apart, different and unlike any other." It was I who created and named every heavenly light and there is not one that is missing though you may not see them. Now, tell me, created one, why is it that you say, "The Lord is not concerned with me?" Allow me now to tell you with emphatic intensity, "I AM concerned. I AM the eternal God, the Creator of the entire earth and I AM not tired. I AM not weary. There is no limit to my wisdom. And I AM concerned with you. I will give strength to those who are tired and I will renew the energy of the man who has become weak. There is no man or woman who will not one day find themselves weary or stumbling and I AM there. I AM present. I AM ready to give strength to those who wait for me. When you wait for my intervention it will be as if you were swept up into the heavens on the wingspan of the mighty eagle. Those who wait on the Holy God of Israel will run through the mountains and the hills and the valleys. They will walk without falling. This, child, this, is who I AM. And this, child, will not change. For this you can be grateful both today and tomorrow no matter what that day brings. And so when scripture exclaims, "This is your God" I respond with "Yes, this is my God. The I AM. And it is for Him that I offer thanks today." Amen. (And Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours--may you offer thanks today for the meat of things.)

Sometimes we just can't help but wonder...Who IS in charge?

2008-11-20T18:08:00.004-05:00

Many years ago during a summer when my sister and I swapped the babysitting responsibilities of our younger siblings each day, my two year old sister was found on the opposite side of our subdivision. Not only was she completely alone, she was also completely naked. She had wandered from the house and begun her toddler-streaking stroll about the neighborhood unnoticed. Our house though lacking any adult supervision was always brimming with neighborhood kids and our other siblings. We were probably too young for the responsibility—okay, obviously too young. Nonetheless it was one given us because of extreme circumstances and we did our best. But on this day we did not know until we looked up from our playing in the back bedroom to see the crooked frame of Mrs. Sylvester and her white plume of hair. Like a dandelion gone to seed she stood gripping my baby sister’s sticky fingers with a grasp surprisingly strong for someone so overtaken by arthritis. “Who is in charge here?” She demanded. Who is in charge here? A fair question considering she did find a two year old very unattended and very naked wandering the rural streets of northern Georgia. There’s no telling what moonshine drinking, overall wearing, toothless old man might have come along and snagged her for permanent servitude in the corn distilling industry of the hills. But really, who was in charge? Where were our momma and daddy on that day? Where was a responsible babysitter on that day? Those are questions that merit their asking. And I can answer. My mother was working. Hard. And I’ll not criticize the decisions she made for had I been in her shoes I don’t know how I ever would have survived. Life is not always full of white picket fences and fairy tale endings and my mother’s story at that time was not any of those things. She was up long before us and to bed long after us. She worked. She went to school. She cooked. She cleaned. She chauffeured. She washed laundry. She cared for five girls. Like I said, my mom was working. Of course to say my poor sister and I had a wake up call that day would be an obvious understatement. From then on we knew we needed to be more vigilant—especially with our youngest siblings who were still such babies. When I remember that day though, what still strikes me is that very first question—Who’s in charge here? Sometimes when we look at our lives they are disturbingly, shockingly not the way they should be. No little girl should be found roaming the streets because nobody noticed her tiny naked bottom as it shuffled out the door and down the driveway. Should marriages break up because nobody noticed a naked heart roaming out the door from years of neglect? Should bodies bulge because nobody noticed the ridiculous amount of unhealthy food being consumed to comfort emotional distress? Should relationships become strained like tires whose tread has worn to the metal because nobody noticed the feelings that were trampled on carelessly and then left to rot like wet autumn leaves on a mountain trail? When I look across the faces of the people in my world and see hunger, disease, bankruptcy, foreclosure, divorce, bitterness, fear, pain, disappointment, loss, death, hurt, confusion, unforgiveness, and baggage, baggage and more baggage I want to scream out to the heavens, “Who is in charge?” These are good people who have tried their best. These are people who have obeyed, have followed God, have surrendered and still their lives are falling apart like dollar store Christmas stockings. There have been moments when I’ve held my arms up to the heavens and called out, “Tell me, God, WHO is in charge? Because from where I’m standing this isn’t right. This is not how it was supposed to be, God.” He always listens and catches my tears before He whispers, “Of course it isn’t.” We all know our world is a far cry from God’s intention when He placed Adam and Eve amidst a garden who’s valleys were covered in blue bonnets not divorce and whose mountains were red with Autumn maples not the bloodshed of unborn babies and war ravaged nations. Do we not realize that were we to count every drop of rain that fell from the heavens we would not yet reach the total of the tears I am sure God has wept on our behalf. We were and still remain His creation—a people made not just in love but in His very image. But we have not been watching. And in the meantime, there is nakedness and shame roaming the streets of our lives. On that day when my sister and I faced the accusing pointing finger of Mrs. Sylvester we knew we had failed. Of that there was no question and we didn’t even offer a defense. I’ll be truthful—it was her day to be in charge and the very first words from my mouth were my sister’s full name. I called out her name and pointed directly at her with bold accusation. No way was I going to take responsibility for this when it wasn’t my day to be in charge! If I could go back I would do it differently. I’d have walked up to my baby sister and grabbed her hand. I’d have thanked Mrs. Sylvester and told her it wouldn’t happen again, and I’d have sat down with a stack of books a mile high and begun to read to that sweet little girl. But I don’t get a do over and the truth is that I pinned the blame on my sister because it was her official day to be in charge. Aren’t we like that? When the walls crumble and the facades are all seen through, when the truth of our lives finally rears it’s ugly face we are so quick to point a finger at someone else. It isn’t my fault this happened. If he or she had done this or that we’d never have been in this situation. It’s never our fault. We always want to shift the blame to someone else. But here’s the thing—it’s not about fault or blame. It’s about who will take responsibility from here on out to see that they conduct themselves in a manner worthy of the image of our Creator. That’s what it’s about. When we ask who failed, we ask the wrong question. What we need to ask is “Who is willing now to stand up and get it right?” When you and I die we will not answer for the person who was supposed to be in charge, we’ll not answer for our sisters, our brothers or our spouses. We’ll not answer for our employers, employees, negligent banks, friends, parents or anyone else. We will answer only for ourselves. But the thing is that when we’re confronted with the sometimes harsh truths of our lives we don’t like accepting responsibility. Maybe that’s because we’re filled with pride and don’t like admitting that we bombed. Just today my boys were outside playing football. They were utterly engrossed in their game and one of them just couldn’t bare the thought of stopping to use the restroom. You know how this tale ends—we had a little accident. And here’s the funny part—that little man immediately blamed it on his other brother. He insisted that had the other brother not been playing football with him he never would have had the accident! I about laughed out loud. We just hate accepting responsibility for our choices and decisions when they go awry. The thing about that kind of pride is that it fails to recognize that apart from God we can do nothing. Of course we bomb when we are not functioning under the umbrella of God’s Word. Of course we experience mayhem when we’re in a marriage where one partner lives outside of God’s will. It’s never fun for the partner who is obeying God, but the reality is that anytime we are in a relationship or situation where one person fails to obey God or operate their life within the framework of God’s standards we will experience fallout whether or not we are the offending party. My little sister at two years of age was in no way responsible for opening that door and walking into harms way. But the two older sisters who were not carrying out our responsibility certainly were on the hook for what happened. The sad reality is that had some predator been in our neighborhood that day our little sister would have experienced a dreadful consequence of our failure to keep our eyes on her at all times. Unfortunately that happens to obedient Christians all the time. And every single time it is tragic. Every single time it happens we want to know again and again who IS in charge? And if Jesus could with nail-scarred hands pry back the sun like paper and peer out from behind that yellow ball I believe He’d say, “Dad’s in charge. And He’s working.” He’s working. Oh how we need to hear that. How we need to believe those two simple words and repeat them over and over every single time we are plagued with questions and doubts. Philippians 1:6 says “He who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it.” God began a work in our lives and He will not quit, will not falter, will not slumber, will not retire, will not give up or give in. His promise is that He WILL complete the very work He began in our lives. Psalm 115 says “Not to us, O Lord, not to us! But to your name bring honor, for the sake of your loyal love and faithfulness. Why should the nations say, “Where is their God? Our God is in heaven!” I love the idea that it’s God’s reputation at stake when we face daunting storms in our lives. When we are the little girl being returned to our home completely vulnerable and afraid and someone asks who in the world is responsible for this? Without hesitation or question we can boldly proclaim, “God Almighty is in charge and He is already at work to restore to us those things that were lost.” The only difference between a believer and a non believer in this life is that the believer can say with complete confidence, “My God is in heaven! He lives and He is working in my life all things for my good.” We may not be able to see any good that can come from circumstances in our lives, but if good is promised in God’s word then we WILL experience that goodness. We will. And we must live like we believe our God has eyes to see and ears to hear the situations and circumstances of our lives. Psalm 115 goes on to say, “You loyal followers of the Lord, trust in the Lord! He is their deliverer and protector. The Lord takes notice of us, he will bless—he will bless the family of Israel, he will bless the family of Aaron. He will bless his loyal followers, both young and old.” These are words we can stand on, cling to, breath and live by when we want desperately to question whether God is really in control of our lives. He is, a thousand times over, He is. And if God is in control then without question the outcome will be for our eternal good. May we learn that truth in our life is God. So often we get confused and think that the present reality of our lives is the end. If it is reality, then it is truth we assume. But actually the truth is God amidst every single facet of our lives. And that truth is good—all the time. Lord, help us to stand on truth. Help us to stand on you God, knowing that you are good. Knowing that you are faithful. Knowing that your love for us is everlasting. Knowing that in the very center of the greatest trials of our lives, You stand calm and speaking peace into our spirits. Thank you for being an “ever-present help in times of trouble.” Help us to accept responsibility for our actions and trust that You are greater than all of our mistakes and You are even greater still than the mistakes that befall us at the hands of others. Amen. (P.S. I changed Mrs. Sylvester's name)