What God’s Up to In You

“Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on; you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make any sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of – throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were being made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself.”
― C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

God didn’t design our lives with a good-enough-to-get-by plan. His blueprint designs are pressed-down, shaken together and running-over kind-of-designs.  I don’t know about you, but my expectations are always short-sighted compared to his. I’d rather walk out God-sized dreams than my-sized dreams. Wouldn’t you?

Photo of Chateau Chambord, taken June 2017

 

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Morning Thoughts: The Spring House

Mornings are easier now. I don’t load up a mini-van full of 5, 4, 3, 2 . . . 1 boys for a mad drop-off dash to 1, 2, 3 different schools. Half the mornings, I make a skillet full of sausage and eggs with either toast or biscuits for the ones heading off to work, college or high school. Other mornings, well, there’s chocolate chip granola bars in one of three cookie jars (One has granola bars, another chocolate chips, and the robust, yellow chef cookie jar is full of dog biscuits: know your cookie jar before grabbing and going – LOL).

“Have an exciting day,” a voice says over the phone.

“Exciting is over-rated,” I reply. With five boys, excitement conjures words like commotion (wrestling at the drop of a hat), instigation (“Mom, he touched me), drama (“If I don’t eat now, I’m going to die” drama), adventure (owls, snakes and turtles tales), passions (heart passions, emotional passions, hobby passions, temper passions), humor (note: the chances of five people in a car being in the mood for any kind of humor at the same time? Not often!), goal-tending (and I don’t mean soccer goals), dropping off, picking up and arriving fully equipped (which includes water bottles that often get left behind), finding the car keys, and general hullabaloo.

Excitement overload leaves little time for savoring the good stuff – with family, my husband or God. Surviving is not savoring. Morning grab-and-go-God-moments were standard fare for, well, ever, it seems like. The excitement is thinning out as my nest empties out.

After 32 years of mothering 5 boys, the daily is changing. The idea of getting up at 5 a.m. for an extra hour just about makes me shudder. I’d rather stay up until 1 a.m. to find the good stuff with God. But there’s been a change. One of those changes is an extra hour dropped into my daily. The grab and go is becoming sit and savor.

Not always, but more and more, I am learning how to fit into this more roomy morning hour.

This new, seemingly still hour has been refreshing to my soul.

Whether on my porch, or in a chair by the window, I settle into this quiet that feels like plain woven muslin. One of my sons recently finished the chronological bible in a year – and I thought I’d try it.

. . . . and the chaos of the daily seems held off, if just for 15, 30 or 60 minutes.

The chaos that’s held off? It’s held off by the one I invite into this space – who draws near to me because I draw near to him.

This still space in my daily has become a place of peace where I have room not to just realize contentment, but to allow this contentment to unfurl without it being crowded out.

He wraps this peace that feels like plain woven muslin close about me and gives me time . . . time to vintage the blessings he gives me daily, to sort out what he says to me in those blessings, to let the things of Him redeem my day before I’m in the midst of it, to thank him for all he’s done.

Sitting on the porch as the morning comes along – or by the window where I can see the garden, he wraps me in this peace and offers me a long, refreshing drink of his living water. This peace isn’t binding or restricting. It’s liberating yet protective, comforting yet stretching – like a plain woven muslin blanket.

When I invite him, he brings that peace with him that calms the seas,

that makes me think I can walk on water if he’s beside me,

he brings me the peace that withstands the I-don’t-have-enoughness-to-do-what-needs-doing:

like the wedding host who didn’t have enough wine,

the apostles who had nothing to eat but needed enough to feed 5,000,

or the widow who had only one jar of oil and no means for more –

He generously brings his peace, so much of it, that though I don’t have enough within me to be enough for the day  on my own – He does.  He doesn’t just provide more than enough, either. He has such an ever-lasting supply, that he overfills my soul – overfills it so much that it spills over into the space around me, into the people around me, and the chaos and excitement trying to creep upon me.

Sometimes the only thing separating us from the Spring of Living Water are those doors either we have constructed or doors others have constructed. Either way, we find ourselves separated from what our souls need to survive. The only way to take down those doors separating us from those living waters Christ offers us is to ask him to remove those doors – and he will. Once we have drunk deeply of what he offers so freely, we need to make sure we neither rebuild walls to separate us from him again and that we, ourselves, don’t use doors to God’s Spring House to keep others out ~ Blue Cotton Memory

Oh, yes! There are changes at the blue cotton house, sweet, supposed-to-be changes. It’s a part of my boys growing up. It’s a part of my growing up, too, though I’ve been at it longer than my boys. They would say I was being silly. That I was already grown up. But you and I, we know we are still children to what God knows. Yet, when I invite God into the changes, He brings grace into them and redeems the change.

What changes are you experiencing? How are you sharing those changes with God?

“But whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a fount of water springing up to eternal life.”  ~ John 4: 14

 

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Little Foxes in a Holy Spirit Rain

(The little foxes don’t stop tearing at us, do they! I wrote this in 2012 – and they haven’t stopped trying to ruin. It’s God’s Holy Spirit that makes the difference, why the vine of whom I am doesn’t break, doesn’t ruin. Challenges don’t go away, but faith, God and the Holy Spirit – they make the difference in how I live through those challenges. I wanted to remind myself today about letting the Holy Spirit wash over me and through me, cleaning me out and filling me up with things of Him.)

The little foxes had torn at the vines of my heart, nipping, trying to ruin the vines, to break the roots. Those little foxes, I am familiar with them. I recognize them for what they are, and though I know them, am prepared to deter them, they weary me. Yesterday evening found me battle fatigued, bruised, smudged by the dirty tactics, needing a Holy Spirit Rain to wash out these little foxes.

As I stepped outside into the Tennessee heat, the hotness touched me tangibly as though I had slipped on a fine kid merino shrug. My husband joined me to watch the sunset with its pinks, oranges hedged with billowing whiteness. Dark clouds encroached. Sunsets delight us both, drawing us close, this shared sensibility that restores much.

Lightening grew, grumbling bouncing in the North, sliding south. My jaded faith doubted it would dip our way. Usually, our rain was a southerly rain. We walked outside, talking about our crowded hydrangea, dwarfed rose bush, untangling the morning glory from the overgrown butterfly bush. Our garden had changed – and we needed to tackle those changes.

We stopped briefly, looking at the growth behind a burning bush. Surprised, my husband said, “Grape Vine.” His Dad grew grape vines – it was as though he somehow crept into our garden and planted it. But he couldn’t have, though. Another change, a sorrow change for us, during our journey, the loss of my father-in-law. Yet, there was a sweet reminder, wrapped around our bird feeder.

As the lightening bullied its way closer, we retreated inside – and inside, lightning cracked, silencing the katydids and tree frogs.  Lightening is bold where we live.

As bedtime arrived, so did the buckets of rain. “Come and smell it,” I called to the boys, the 2 little guys. The littlest showed up, giving me his 10-year-old incredulous-look followed by the “My-mom-is-nuts” look, but he stood with me sniffing the sweet scent of rain washing the dusty worn air of hotness. He decided to sleep on the floor of his room. “It would be safer,” he reasoned with 10-year-old logic.

I joined my husband on the porch, my pausing place, my favorite place to sit, to knit, to read, to grade essays when I taught, to listen, to watch, to be. . .  and the rain poured, in sheets, wave after wave of sheets.

I thought of an afternoon rain 23 years ago, during a heavy summer drought that stymied my cucumbers for my bread and butter pickles. That afternoon, it rained a downpour – and my first born, freshly 2, danced with me outside, in the rain, faces pressed upward, mouths wide open.

Today, in the darkness, my driveway shimmered like a pond, the water shifting in the breeze, in the pummeling sheets. And the lightening – it wasn’t just jagged bolts. It was like watching God draw in the sky with a thin pen over and over and over.

I thought of the Holy Spirit, the unsung member of the Trinity – and I wanted it to wash through my soul, like rainwater washed the dust, the heat from the air.

“And they waited for me as for the rain; and they opened their mouth wide as for the latter rain” (Job 29:23)

I wanted to be filled, filled like Peter with the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost, filled so much he never faltered again in his mission.

Sitting in my rocking chair, pushed toward the edge of porch, the rain misted over my legs and arms, cooling, chilling – and I laughed – relishing the moment, the blessing, the washing away.

The rain moved south, and I sighed, wanting more. Like an encore, the clouds backed up, pouring a double portion over our patch of living.

The LORD will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail.” (Isaiah 58:11)

I wanted the Holy Spirit to fill me like that, to fill me with crucifixion courage, overflowing with mountain-moving faith, drawing me closer to the Father, to hear His words to me, His comfort, His power to vanquish the little foxes.

“You care for the land and water it;
you enrich it abundantly” (9a).

I am not alone, Father. You care for me, your creation, sending me living water, The Holy Spirit, to grow me more than I think I am, that I am not what the little foxes taunt; I am precious to you, valuable to you, like land that overflows abundantly.

”The streams of God are filled with water
to provide the people with grain,
for so you have ordained it” (9b).

You provide nourishment for my spirit, The Word and The Holy Spirit, enabling me to fight off spirit colds, weaknesses and tormenting situations that wear me out like the dusty, hotness of a relentless summer day. Empower my will to seek Your Holy Spirit Provision; let it not be the little foxes nipping and tearing at me that send me running to you. I want to be stronger than that, more faithful than that.

“You drench its furrows
and level its ridges;
you soften it with showers
and bless its crops” (Psalm 65: 9-10).

Holy Spirit, rain on me, filling the hidden places, the high and lows of my soul, softening the soil of my spirit, allowing the gifts my Father planted before I was born to grow, producing abundant fruit, and sharing the seed of that fruit with others – and if that fruit is not taken as given, let it not become a wily fox to my vine.

Let the rain come. Let it come softly or in a downpour – and let me be like an eager child who runs outside, mouth wide open, to receive the living water, a Holy Spirit Rain.

“O Holy Spirit, descend plentifully into my heart. Enlighten the dark corners of this neglected dwelling and scatter there Thy cheerful beams” (St. Augustine).

 

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Pausing Places

I love rain storms. Rain storms are the pause button to my schedule. Maybe it’s baseball or football that keeps you busy – it’s soccer for me. When the rain comes, my schedule comes to a grinding halt.

“I’m bored. What can we do?” the boys always ask.

“Fill the emptiness,” I answer.

“With what?” they persist.

“With big and little thoughts,” I think. “Press in to the quietness. Let its peace be like a soothing balm rubbed into the cracked and worn feet of my soul, soothing my walk, giving me rest.”

“’This is the resting place, let the weary rest’”; and, “’This is the place of repose’”–but they would not listen” (Isaiah 28:12).

“It is important to learn how to handle nothing-ness,” I answer. I go into a great story about back in the day when I was their age, only 3 TV channels existed. On a rainy day we built card houses, watched NASCAR races, played cards or board games. . . read books. On sunny days, porch wall jump-offs, sidewalk roller skating, tree climbing, daisy chain construction, bee catching.

We never uttered the words, “I am bored.” If we gave them a mouth-full of whine, they gave us an afternoon full of chores. We wisely kept our complaints to ourselves.

“Solitude is painful when one is young, but delightful when one is more mature” (Albert Einstein).

Where do you go when nothing-ness comes? Where is your Pausing Place? Pausing Places – a place to sit and let nothingness wash through, like clear water in a rushing stream – clearing away the debris of my soul, clearing away for freshness and new growth.

My back porch, during a rain storm – that is one of my pausing places. Sometimes it is my kitchen when no one is home – and I can throw myself into the cooking and think about life without interruptions – while making something wonderful for my boys.

“Solitude is such a potential thing. We hear voices in solitude, we never hear in the hurry and turmoil of life; we receive counsels and comforts, we get under no condition”
(Amelia E. Barr).

Other times, it is wrapping myself in a blanket, curling up with a good book and my knitting. I would read a bit, knit a bit. That happened the other day. My son flung himself across the end of my bed – and just looked at me.

“There’s nothing to do,” he said, baleful eyes woefully wooing me to create “something” for him out of nothing.

“I’m having a great time,” I said. “I’m loving this. I’m sorry there is nothing you want to do – but there is plenty you can do. But – I am not going to let your frustration mar my nothing-to-do-time.

He sighed.

“One of the most important things you need to learn is how to find peace and joy in the nothingness of a day,” I gently coaxed.

He wallowed a bit more, making sure I knew he was frustrated. I wouldn’t be baited. I sent him on his way.

Filling each moment with him-centered activities does not prepare him to live a fully enriched life. If they do not learn to embrace the quiet times, in the stopping times later, they might fill those moments with harmful activities – just to fill the nothingness.

“In returning and rest you shall be saved; In quietness and confidence shall be your strength” (Isaiah 30:15)

One of the most important skills in life is to learn how to embrace those pauses. My boys, well, they need to learn how to make something out of nothing. Their day is so chocked full of activities they become bewildered when they face, what they think, is the Great Monster Nothingness – which I have discovered to be a great friend.

Learning to turn nothing into blessing – what a great life-skill. Bring on those rainy days!

 

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softening furrows in the rain

“You water its furrows abundantly,
settling its ridges,
softening it with showers,
and blessing its growth”
(Psalm 65: 9-11)

 This last year, I’ve had the privilege to speak at schools about my children’s books. Bicycling with Ava provided an opportunity to talk about the gifts we each have: not just gifts of writing or drawing, but the gifts of putting numbers together, theorizing science, fixing things or nurturing people, standing up for others, encouraging or teaching.

I talked about how the writer and illustrator sometimes work together to trick readers into learning by counting cattails on a creek bed and goose feathers for pillows, learning colors through red, yellow, green and blue sheep. They learned new words for fun, too.  As Ava struggles to make a decision on which hat to pick to hide her suddenly orange nose, she purses her lips, furrows her brow, and scowls. Did you know that a lip-purse + a furrowed brow = a scowl? My favorite children’s books are the ones that invite interaction in an unstated way. I wanted my books to me like that, too. LIke life, the details in the illustrations were not their by coincidence. There was a plan and purpose to the detail.

These Kindergarteners through 4th graders and I talked etymology, though they didn’t realize they were learning about word origins and history. For example, we talked about furrows on their grandparents’ farms, nestled next to mounds where seeds are planted. The furrows can be paths or narrow grooves, so big rains don’t wash away seeds or roots. Furrows, though, just aren’t in gardens and fields. Furrows can be on our brows when smiles turn upside down because of sadness, frustration, heavy or unpleasant thoughts. Try it – furrow your brown, making the space between your eyebrows crinkle and wrinkle. Now look at your neighbor and furrow your brow at them. Did you? Kindergarteners through 4th graders did – and had fun being tricked into learning something new.

Furrows are deep places – on our faces and in our hearts. Sometimes without the low places, the storm waters wouldn’t have places to go – and we would find ourselves washed away because of it.

Soil, furrows and hearts are a lot like you and me. When the soil is saturated, the furrow’s deepness provides an outlet, so as not to permanently damage the plant – or maybe the soul of you and me.

There’s been a steady stream of highs and lows this year. I used to think that when I mastered life, a steady, humming-along-the-highway kind-of-living would result.  If I were only good enough, pure enough, Godly enough . . . . I would be able to manage the daily into just humming along. Right?

Sadly – because I wish I’d realized much sooner before I’d invested so much energy and time into a project destined to fail – there’s error in that kind of thinking – error born out of inappropriate expectations.

If I’d never furrowed my brow, I’d never have reached deep to realize my need for God. I wasn’t designed for a self-fueled humming-along-the-highway kind-of-living. I was designed to need God – to be filled up by God.

The inappropriate expectation is being replaced, awkwardly at first, becoming more dexterous day-by-day, to the expectation that, yes, there is joy in the highs, but there something just as valuable in the lows, something souly nurturing in the steady drizzle, sometimes torrential downfall of the challenges in the daily.

I might have been designed for heaven, but without challenges that fall like a soft rain, I don’t know that I would realize that. You see, experience is the best teacher I know.

Maybe I needed a Hannah-unconditionally-loved-by-Elkanah marriage,

or a Jacob-wrestling confrontation in which to surrender,

a Doubting Thomas faith failure humbled and won through Salvation standing before him – hands open, wounds revealed,

a mother-of-the-prodigal revelation waiting in faith for her son’s homeward walk,

a faith-is-the-substance-hoped for woman-with-the-issue-of-blood journey,

a crippled man standing-on-his-faith encounter

Billy Graham said if you want to change someone’s life, tell a story – share the experience of your faith. The experience that changes lives is found in the hard and soft of our challenges.

The soft and hard rains of this year have indeed softened the hard edge of the mound, softening into the dip of the furrow and because of it, I move with more grace from the highs into the lows and back up again.

Through the soft raindrops like challenges, from the mounds to the furrows and the muddy mess of of it all – because challenges just leaves degrees of muddy messes, I have discovered goodness in both – a soul-preserving nutrient that without both, my growth would be limited or stunted. The challenge without him leaves me shivering to the bone in a cold rain. The challenge with him, seeps inside this softened soul or runs off into the furrows, leaving my roots stronger, my growth more than I imagined possible.

A little sweet with the sour.

A little low with the high.

A bit of raindrop to soften the soul

and out of that, the blessings grow.

It’s been awhile since I’ve written, and I’m glad you haven’t forgotten your way here. This has been a year of big changes – leaving a 3-year-old job and launching 4 children’s books, a son marrying a beautiful inside-and-out girl, another son and sweet daughter-in-law’s second baby girl, one son steadying his step, a new high-schooler, a junior who is taking more college classes than high school classes, me teaching again since 2009 and, while loving teaching students how to strengthen their writing – and maybe discover wonderful things about themselves in the process, I am left wondering if God didn’t want me to walk through the classroom just one last time before walking through a door to a different way to fill my daily. All this has been drizzled with big and little challenges, expected and unexpected. To someone who likes a fairly regimented daily with time planned for the unexpected, I’m finding that every hour possibly contains unplanned tasks and adventures – meaning I’ve thrown the schedule out the window and am possibly free-falling into something unplanned and unexpected at any moment. I’m not quite sure I’m managing this with grace yet, but, at least, I’m not screaming (mostly figuratively) in terror at the chaos anymore. Right here at Blue Cotton Memory, it’s one of the places I come to just sit with God, talk over what’s going on, and tighten my grip on his hand, reminding myself that he is right here beside me, right now.

Dear Father,

During this Christmas season, I pray that we feel your Holy Spirit wash over us, mingling with the challenges that fall like rain, settling to softening the hard planes of our soul ridges. I pray that we see these challenges as softeners that make hearts more tender, understanding deeply dimensional, and grow a love taller, with beautiful blooms that re-seed in the mounds and furrows all around us, and that maybe, just maybe, some of those seeds just might be carried in a Holy Spirit rain down the furrowed path into a place that needs your kind of love seed – and that more will be blessed by the growth in us than we ever imagined. Thank you sending us a savior, your son, to show us the amazing grace that can come out of a hard challenge.

Amen

(Illustration by Lynda Farrington Wilson in the January release of Where the Wild Winds Blow Fall and Winter).

 

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The Story of the 3 Graces

(I feel like telling a story again. If you haven’t heard it, grab a cup of just-right coffee, sit a spell and read a bit).

When Hope Grace was born, great expectations were cast forth, hearts leaping in expectation. Much was expected of Hope.

Her sister Faith Grace took to teaching her the facts of their Father and his Kingdom, and her other sister Charity Grace taught her about love.

You could find them in the cottage’s orchard: Hope looking to the goodness of God, grew strong, standing on the shoulders of her sister Faith, hands reaching to grasp hold of her other sister, Charity dangling upside down in the fruit tree.

These 3 Graces, Faith, Hope and Charity were born powerful, beautiful, full of potential, and were never seen one without the other.  They set about their Father’s business, ministering to their people. Their community welcomed them, knew them well, some more intimately than others.

Together, they cared for people who faced big and little challenges. No person was too insignificant, no problem too little for their ministering hands and feet. One reason was because of their Father who provided unlimited resources. The people knew their Father, the King, through the Graces.

But as the days grew in number, and as Faith, Hope and Charity went out into the world, the world snapped and snarled at them, wearing away at them, trying to diminish them, to topple them.

Hope wobbled, on the shoulders of Faith, threatening to let go of Charity.

Year after Year, the community who had relied on the 3 Graces, started taking them for granted, stopped visiting with them, refused welcome in their homes. Some no longer believed in the Father because they couldn’t see Him.

Where Faith had strengthened them with the promises of their Father through hard times, people now wanted evidence. They no longer wanted to believe without seeing first. The words of the Father held nothing for them, and so Faith faded.

As their belief in the Faith waned, so, too, did their Hope wane.

Hope’s belief in the provision and protection of her Father during life’s challenges was discredited by some people who said things like, “I hope the water comes for the green beans, the potatoes and the wheat, but I don’t believe it” they’d say in a hope-isn’t-really-real way, scoffing.

Some would say, “I’d like to hope his fever will break and all will be well – but, well, that isn’t how I believe.”

Sometimes, they would slander Hope saying, “Hope? If you believe in fairies – but that isn’t real life – they have no Father that can help me.”

And, in many hearts, Hope was cast out.

Without Faith and Hope, the spontaneous goodness of Charity’s unconditional love and kindness was no longer trusted – and they stopped inviting her into their homes, tried to put a price on her, to sell her.

Though many cast aside Faith, Hope and Charity – the 3 Graces did not leave them or abandon them.

They continually returned, calling to the people in the streets, knocking on doors, whispering on the night winds.

Faith would call out, “Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the LORD our God” (Psalm 20:7).

For you see, Faith, Hope and Charity are “not frail and perishable” but live “perennially” (O.E.D., 1 Peter 1:3). Rejection is just a starting place.

Charity’s heart so loved the world, that she could not give up pursuing The Father’s people.

Ever steadfast and determined, many invited them back into the cottage of their hearts, sat with them to know them. Faith taught truth about the Father and what He wanted to do in their lives. Hope focused their minds and hearts on the goodness of God, and Charity showed God’s abundant love and the need to share that love with others.

When the rains didn’t come, or sickness fell, or financial famine came, Faith said, “The Father will take care of you. He said so” reminding them with His words:

 ”The streams of God are filled with water
to provide the people with grain,
for so you have ordained it” (Psalm 65: 9b).

And Hope showed them how to trust, to wait with hearts leaping in expectation:

“May the God of your hope so fill you with all joy and peace in believing [through the experience of your faith] that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound and be overflowing (bubbling over) with hope” (Romans 15: 13)

Charity loved them with the Father’s love, showing them how to love during challenges:

“Love[Charity] never stops being patient, never stops believing, never stops hoping, never gives up” (1 Cor. 13:7)

If you look closely into the garden of a neighbor’s cottage, you might just see the 3 Graces: Hope standing on the shoulders of Faith, hands reaching up to grasp Charity’s bounty and pass it down.

Maybe you have discredited Hope, Faith and Charity. Said you don’t believe them about their Father. Maybe you need a heart-to-heart with the 3 Graces. Invite them into the cottage of your heart to live perennially.

Maybe they are already in the cottage garden of your heart, Hope standing on the shoulders of walking Faith. Hope encouraging your Faith to keep on walking, keep on standing, to not give up, Faith keeping hope grounded in truth, while hope reachings toward a comforting, God filled with His kind of loving Charity.

I Believe
I trust
My heart leaps in expectation
of His Great love

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Socks for 5; Prayer for 9

I drive my boys nuts telling them stories they’ve heard and heard – and I thought, well, I want to tell this story again. I want somebody to hear it – because it meant so much to me to live it. That’s what friends do! Right? Listen to the same story over and over because they know their friend needed to tell it, needed to be reminded. Wrapping you in a big, heart-felt thank you for listening (reading) it again – if you’ve heard (read) it before.

“Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done”
(Luke 22:42)

Jesus let go . . . to do His Father’s work

He let go so that the Father, whose arms were open wide, could wrap them around more of His children.

Jesus opened his arms wide on the cross, to suffer a mother’s terrifying, heart-wrenching nightmare, so a world of me’s could find their way into the wide open embrace of His father.

Jesus let go . . . for me

“Love your neighbor as I have loved you,” (John 13:34)

Loving our neighbors somehow seems a little distant. Maybe because neighbors today do not know your mama, your granddaddy, your great-aunt Ruby. There’s no history, no connection . . . no real-time cause to create a love effect.

. . . but it’s a choice – this loving. Chose to live it this way; Love people like you love your children: fiercely, uncompromisingly, self-sacrificingly.

I hold my children, encircled in the love of my heart, wrapping that love around them like hugging arms. Yeah, sometimes that love might feel like a vice-grip to them. Maybe I’ll learn to love more gently, but I need to love them the best I can – and in the loving of them, I need to stretch this heart, to let others inside, wrapping that love around them like God does, like Jesus did, arms wide open, ready, waiting.

Letting go means loving more, like being broken in Him makes us whole.

Are you ready, willing to give that father love or mother love, or even daughter/son love to those outside your home, both those easy and uneasy to love?

5 sons. 1 daughter-in-law. 1 husband. 1 scardy cat. That makes 8 different ways for me to communicate. 8 different schedules. 8 different moods. 8 different needs. 8 different responses.  There are 5 love languages that need mastering and 7 Spiritual Gifts to interpret.

Prayer for 8. Dinner for 6. Clean socks for 5.

I can get absorbed in my family. In my reactions to my family. Into the mysteries of my family. My. My. My. My.

 “If anyone would come after me, they must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. Whoever tries to save his life will lose it, but whoever will lose his life for me will save it” (Luke 9:23-24)

Yes, sometimes, I need to let go of my to embrace His . . .His children, His love, His spirit, His word, His Fatherness, His schedule.

Letting Go of my to be His laborer

Today, in the grocery store with my cart  filled with Mama Rosa’s cheese pizzas for my littlest guy, I hummed, focused on feeding the my’s in my life. Shrieking noises wafted over the aisles. My cart and I continued on. High-pitched squeals moved closer, not happy squeals – out-of-control squeals. Chicken to make soup for my biggest teen. Futile mother shouts encroached. Salsa for my Joyful one, mechanical pencils for my fire-and-power son. Running feet closed in, noise moving  passionately invading my reverie. Pelegrino for my thirst.

As I was just reaching for enchilada sauce, a little boy appeared with the shrieking voice. You know the kind of sound – the sound a little 4 year old makes when he thinks he is playing a game of tag and keeps slipping from your touch, evading. At least, I think he was 4.

Racing down the aisle, weaving between customers, he stopped in front of  my cart. Grabbing hold, he stepped to stand on the end, just like my boys did when they were little, wanting to ride. But he was not my boy.

I could just see the headlines, “Boy flips cart, critically injured.” Or maybe, “Woman accused of imminent child-theft” all because he was suddenly wanting to ride my cart.

Treading carefully – because he wasn’t mine to scold, I told him he needed to step off the cart. He did. I kept looking for his mother, expecting her to call him. Nothing. In a quandary, I calmly pushed the cart forward.  He decided to go with me like he was my boy.

“You need to go back to your mom. You shouldn’t be here with me,” I suggested.

“Do you think I’m going to hell?” he asked, making eye contact, stopped still in front of me.

My world stopped. Letting Go of my concerns, I looked at him squarely in the eye. Wanting to say so much, wanting to say it so right, but only having grocery-store aisle time. I finally said, looking back at him straight in the eye, “You can go to heaven if you want to.”

“Can I go home with you?” he asked. If my spirit had arms, which in this case, I think it did, well those spirit arms pulled him into my heart, into the circle of my family. Prayer for 9 now. Still 5 pairs of socks for matching, but prayer for 9.

That little boy, standing in front of my cart, in sudden stillness, revealed his brokenness, revealed a cry to be made whole – at little years old.

“Then little children were brought to Him that He might put His hands on them and pray, but the disciples rebuked them. But Jesus said, “Let the little children come to Me,
and do not forbid them; for of such is the kingdom of heaven.” (Matt. 19: 13-14)

His mother and grandmother came around the corner then. He took off, lots of noise, lots of energy followed by lots of parental hollering.

“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit” (John 12:24)

Letting go of my thoughts, my reverie, my concerns, my challenges. I prayed. That God would send laborers across this little boy’s path. That his eyes would be opened to the truth – that he is a child of God. That heaven is his for the asking. That angels would encamp about him and protect him. That healthy boundaries would be set for him. No matter how much little boys balk at having healthy boundaries set, they cry out for someone to love them enough to set them.

Letting go of my

To wrap God’s love around His

All because Jesus let go first for me.

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Blessing for a Granddaughter: Welcoming Norah

My second granddaughter was born early last week. It’s a time of celebration in our family. I wrote this prayer when her sister was born, this prayer for my granddaughter. I’m praying it – with much rejoicing and cheering again. For Ava and Norah:  “A Seed Bag, Water Bucket and Harvest Basket” was written for my granddaughter to share at a Blessing Shower. I wanted to share it with you in celebration.
Open your heart and hear
Sweet little girl
The voice of the Father
calling to
the Harvest Field
far and near.

Gather you
your water bucket,
seed bags
and harvest basket
gather and carry them
to the field,
Ripe
for harvest,

Little feet walking between
the furrows
Toes digging in,
breaking through the soul
With a laborer’s prayers

Little hands growing,
Working in opened-handed sowing,
releasing
Faith,
Hope,
and Love
seeds

Pouring out God’s
Holy Spirit Water
Sometimes awkward, sometimes grace-filled
sometimes rushing like a river
othertimes like the slow drip off a leaf
your water bucket pouring God
into thirsty seeds

Little feet at home in the field
Sometimes falling
But lifted up
By labor-field companions.
Little girl,
Raise your voice, growing praise
Singing, praying, encouraging
Bringing down a Holy Spirit Rain
To Miracle Grow the Harvest

Fill the Father’s baskets
Fill them to over-flowing
Neglect not a seed planted,
A vine reaching, a soul crying
To be gathered into the Harvest basket.

Little girl
With a bare, open-handed spirit,
Praising a Loving God
Calling your brothers and sisters
To the Harvest Field

Don’t forget to
Sit in the shade
Drinking your fill of living water
Finding refreshment, peace and contentment
At the feet of the Father who
created you,
Fitted you
For carrying your water bucket, seed bag and harvest basket.

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The Power of One: The Secret Ingredient to an Enduring Marriage

There are moments when my husband dazzles me, moments when the sun just dog-gone shines brighter because he walked in the room. When I feel slimed by the world, it all washes away with one word, one smile from him.  It’s as though someone sprinkled me with. . . pixie dust.

“All the world [marriage] needs is faith and trust. . . and a little pixie dust” (Peter Pan)

An enchanted marriage? Where there is more to our marriage then two people? More than the strength in our 2 pairs of hands, 2 pairs of feet. Where my guy doesn’t ride a horse – and I don’t have hair as long or as sturdy as a rope ladder – but we survive the challenges that threaten us, yet still retain that dazzle, that enchantment, that love. Retain it despite life’s roughness, imperfection, graceless moments, conflict and self.

I’ve always heard about marriage turning two into one – at every single wedding: “Did he not make them one” (Malachi 2:15).

Yeah – there’s a heap of him and an armful of me (Granny’s measurements) – but it is a secret ingredient that mixes us into one, breaks down the individual ingredients for marriage one-ness – one-ness God’s way. We are a mixture with many things dissolved between us: sweetness, saltiness, spice.  According to Chem4Kids some mixtures are better combined “than any of the metals would be alone.”

But nobody every told me about the other ingredient, the secret ingredient, the more-than-pixie dust ingredient, the not-talked-about part of this transformation into one. I never heard the second part of Malachi 2:15:

“Did he not make them one, with a portion of the Spirit in their union?” (Malachi 2:15)

The Father gives an amazing wedding gift: A portion of the Holy Spirit. The same powerful gift He gave on the day of Pentecost, the gift that enabled Peter the courage to never deny Christ again, the power to overcome adversity, for love to grow big enough that to lay down one’s life for another, faithfulness that never turned away, wisdom to say the right word at the right time, insight to love completely and unconditionally, grace for forgiveness.

I love how The Message translation says Malachi 2:15:  “His Spirit inhabits even the smallest details of marriage.”

“The smallest details of marriage” – How small can you think? As small as a tear drop? As small as the penny in the bottom of your purse when that’s all you have?  As small as the alone-time with your husband when everybody’s need is so big?  As small as the letting out of the cat at 4 a.m.? As small as the lining of your kitchen drawers? Or the sliver of soap in the shower? As small as the energy left at the end of the day? As small as your confidence in the face of a mighty challenge? As small as your affection in a moment of big anger?

Sadly, this is often the wedding gift most often left unopened. When it is opened, it is a gift no one ever quite knows how to use, so it is shoved to the back of a closet.

It is a gift most successfull when used by both  husband and the wife –  in equal measure. Like cooking, familiarity, skill increases with use. Like spices, the more you use them, the more you understand just how powerful each is. The Holy Spirit is to marriage what yeast is to flour. It enables your relationship to be more than it was. It is the ingredient that dissolves two into one with the strength to maintain that mixture of oneness.

It is a gift that requires interaction. It won’t act until activated – until you mix it into your relationship through prayer, through asking. The Holy Spirit is like a spice in your cupboard. You might have it, but it cannot do anything until you pull it out and mix it in.

It is a gift that requires belief. When both believe  “the Holy Spirit inhabits even the smallest details of marriage.”  The power of 2 married believers (Matt. 18:20) + the Holy Spirit = a blessed marriage.

I tell my sons to pray, ask God to show you the girl He made for you, to pray about it – and to both have God in your marriage. If the Trinity is in it, you can face and overcome anything, your oneness intact.

That special something in your marriage? Not a sprinkle of Pixie Dust. Not that old black magic. Just a powerful portion of the Holy Spirit.  Pull it out of the pantry of your soul and use today! Embrace the Power of One.

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When I Cannot. . . He Does

We just returned from vacation – week of refreshing, of contented family time, an aaaaAAAAHHHH soaking R&R – to return to unexpected challenges, challenges I thought long taken care of. Is it a life lesson – that every refreshing moment is followed by a challenge? It is moments like these, that the blessings outside myself soothe my soul – but I am left wondering why? Why cannot I be consistently strong inside?

Why exists the need to find the blessings outside of ourselves?

Why sometimes cannot my soul provide the song that lifts, instead of the cardinals, the robins, the fluttery creatures that nest in the pear and oak trees?

Why sometimes cannot my spirit rest as easily as a cat upon a favorite cushion when storms brew about?

Why sometimes cannot my spirit bloom beauty like the orange, deep fuschias and yellow zinnias in my garden?

Or my spirit give off the sweet aroma of the roses, the fresh cut grass or a fistful of violets, lemon balm and lavender?

Why sometimes cannot I reseed myself, burrow deeply into the black earth or red clay for winter – and just be comforted that now is not the time to bloom but to grow roots, to grow strong – and not feel behind, out of place or insufficient?

Why sometimes cannot my spirit find not only fulfillment in those moments when everything goes right, like the burst of dazzling bloom, but why must my heart struggle when, the new stage is a journey is like when the petals fade to replace the seed that falls – and it all starts back over again, the growth to bloom, why do I feel like I’ve failed because I couldn’t maintain the bloom – when the whole process, the falling, burrowing and regrowing are just as important, just as vital, just as fulfilling.

Why sometimes cannot my spirit weave things hoped for when all I am hangs by a thread of hope, why can I not innately weave something beautiful out of the thread it hangs by but must be reminded by the web of a spider’s thread in a forgotten corner that much can be made of that thread?

Why sometimes must I be reminded of the charity of all these, reminded through the blessings outside myself?

These blessings outside myself are the half-time rallying cries, illustrated disquisitions, a chorus of communiqués, love letters from the Father reminding me not to give up in those faltering moments when life happens in unpleasant, unwanted, unplanned for ways – and that is why I search them out, count them thank Him for giving me them.

In these outside-myself blessings, He tells me,
“Remember when I opened up the hollow place in Lehi for Samson – and water came out to rebuild his strength and revive him? (Judges 15:10) – so also I do with you with the bird song, the squirrels outside your window, the spider webs – these are messages and gifts I send to give you strength and revive you in midst of the challenge.”
“‘You’re my servant, serving on my side.
Don’t panic. I’m with you.
There’s no need to fear for I’m your God.
I’ll give you strength. I’ll help you.
I’ll hold you steady, keep a firm grip on you”
(Isaiah 41: 9b-10)

These outside-myself blessings remind me of His firm grip, that He holds me steady, that help is on the way. He reminds me that through Him, I can.

Blessings:

790) spending time with 4 of 5 sons without outside distractions
791) quiet mornings, watching the ocean, reading the book of Joshua
792) little grey fish trimmed in yellow following my innertube
793) Time bobbing about the ocean and the lazy river with my husband
794) dolphins flying out of the ocean and diving back in
795) Time to get lost in a book that’s been sitting on my bedside table for months
796) my mom joining us for a few days
797) Sun-rise on the beach, watching with my husband the dark pink sun spilling across the grey sky
798) Leaving the white shores and the lazy river – crossed through the Misty Mountains and made our way to our Homely House – and, yes, I was reading The Hobbit the entire way home!
799) A chirp-fest from my backyard birds, as though they were rushing to tell me all the things that happened while we were on Holiday
800) Pink, orange, fuschia, burnt red zinnias still blooming
801) A Blustery Happy Windsday on Sunday, Winnie the Pooh’s birthday – so appropriate
802) The clouds closer to my patch of living, as if I could reach out and touch them
803) The hope of rain coming
804) That when challenges seemingly enlarge, knowing my God is bigger
805) Chili and chicken noodle soups on the stove
806) Brownies the boys baked
807) God coaxing me to let go of things that need let-going

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The Potting Shed and Other Blessings

“Meanwhile, friends, wait patiently for the Master’s Arrival. You see farmers do this all the time, waiting for their valuable crops to mature, patiently letting the rain do its slow but sure work” (James 5:7)
Waiting – I was never very good at that. Learning to cook – that taught me much about timing – and that sometimes you just cannot jump to the end. The middle part, the rising part – it all fails without that.

My tomatoes and zinnia’s are like that, too – the inbetween the seed-planting and harvesting – the waiting inbetween, well – you really cannot rush it.

Parenting is like that, too. There comes a waiting inbetween, where you know you planted all the right seeds in the right ways – 4 square-kind-of-planting. Some seeds, though, require longer in-between, some shorter – but the waiting – for the harvest – oh, sometimes that is hard.

“Be patient like that. Stay steady and strong” (James 5:8).

The Father, He wants us to be patient like the Father.

Patient: “Persevering; constant in pursuit or exertion; calmly diligent” (Noah Webster 1828 Dictionary)

Not giving up hope

:. . . .waiting or expecting with calmness or without discontent” ((Noah Webster 1828 Dictionary)

How are you expecting? “Are you waiting without discontent? That in-between place can get mighty uncomfortable. You might not like the present state of the inbetween. Are you finger-drumming, surly-spirited, glass-half-empty, sack-clothe moaning waiting through the in-between?

Living in the inbetween – where there is no evidence of a good harvest, no evidence of the good things you planted – oh, that is hard.

How are you going to spend all that inbetween? Are you speaking hope? Walking faith? Smelling like Christ?

“Because of Christ, we give off a sweet scent rising to God, which is recognized by those on the way of salvation—an aroma redolent with life” (2 Cor 2:15)

Maybe how you spend the inbetween time is like the Miracle Grow to your tomatoes and zinnias?

Maybe it is how we live in the inbetween that is really the important part – the hope and faith living.

“The Master could arrive at any time. Friends, don’t complain about each other. A far greater complaint could be lodged against you, you know. The Judge is standing just around the corner” (James 5:8-9)

Sometimes, there is a need to share the challenges.

I’ve had recipes fail. My garden struggled this year. The potting shed of raising children sometimes looks more like the corn fields through Kentucky this year.

I know what I planted, though. I know the resilience of God’s plan.

Sometimes I just need friends to listen to the tale, to encourage through prayer, to see the hope of God’s plan for harvest , not to complain, not to commiserate, not to grind up the seed through a faithless pestle of words that just tear up, not hope-up.

“Take the old prophets as your mentors. They put up with anything, went through everything, and never once quit, all the time honoring God” (James 5:10)

God shows us over and over again in the bible – stories of hope fulfilled, God’s promises ful-filled, and in Hebrews 11 – we learn of hope continued to the other side for things promised but not seen here, today, right now. Those stories are God saying that our challenges are no surprise to Him, that He is our Champion – that He will bring us through – we just need to learn to believe Him in the in-between.

What a gift life is to those who stay the course! You’ve heard, of course, of Job’s staying power, and you know how God brought it all together for him at the end. That’s because God cares, cares right down to the last detail“(James 5:7-11)

He cares about every detail planted in the potting shed of my life, my children’s life. He is faithful to the hope and faith in Him I planted in each of my sons.

He wants me to live the in-between as though matters have been taken care of, as though the harvest is assured – and so my words and the words of those around me will be hope and faith words, cheering words, sometimes through tears and pain – but words of assurance of a harvest bountiful, complete. They will have a sweet aroma.

Last night, I saw gaggles and gaggles of geese flying, celebrated a wedding in the midst of precious family, and as I walked grandbaby girl around, I found more acorns. Instead of 5, I picked up 7 – 7 seeds symbolizing 7 hope and faith potting-shed projects.

The acorns remind to live like I believe in the inbetween.

701) The moment, when frustration in the challenge overwhelms and I give it to God, firmly placing it all in His capable hands, trusting Him, knowing He is not surprised and He can handle the challenge much better than I can.
702) Italian Chamber music that soothes frayed nerves
703) Coffee in the morning with Italian Sweet Cream
704) I shabby chiced an old picture frame and put it on my ground-floor window at work – and every once in a while, I find blessing in what passes through my frame – students rushing to class, an evolving garden, rain spilling onto everything, a squirrel not quite hopping, not quite leaping but a leisurely in-between.
705) Coolness, the autumn kind. I know God is beside me all the time, but I always feel Him more – the clouds pull closer to where I am, the blue seems cheerier, somewhat relieved, and the coolness, it touches my cheek – and it all feels like God walking beside me.
706) Being together with all my boys for a wedding
707) Watching my soldier son walk the grandmother of the groom down the aisle, seeing his slow, comfortable smile spread across his face.
708) 4 pairs of shoes to find instead of 6, 4 belts, 4 pressured shirts and pants, 4 ties – all instead of 6 – God whispering, things are moving along as they ought.
709) Shoes outgrown and shoes still to fill – the blessing of hand-me-downs – a kind of experience that reminds me I can handle the challenges that come in those size shoes – because God has shown me He can handle it.
710) Sharing wedding tables with friend’s mothers who are now friends, too.
711) A grandfather’s prayer for his grandson marrying, filled with hope and faith
712) The blessing of beautiful places to celebrate important moments
713) Hugs from people you love.
714) Gaggles of geese, at least 7, flying across the evening sky as I carried grand-baby girl – and we both watched in delight.
715) 7 acorns on the ground, symbolizing these boys of mine, a daughter-in-law and now a granddaughter.
716) Lidia’s message at her blog, Crown of Beauty, about being an ambassador of love in the midst of unlovely situations.
717) Post-it notes reminding me of prayer requests
718) The energy that comes with feeling better
719) Sitting over a dinner table with my mother one evening – time to talk, time to laugh, time to be together
720) Sitting over a breakfast table with my aunt one morning, time to talk, time to laugh, time to be together
721) Just knowing that sometimes people are cheering you on, have got your back – and know your heart is worthy of that kind of support.
722) The littlest one, getting ready to turn 12 on the first day of fall, wanting me to sing him to sleep.
723) Knowing that sometimes, someone asking me to make a sandwich or fill up a plate, sometimes it is just someone really asking for an Acts of Service love language hug – and which it doesn’t sound like a hug or feel like a hug – it can be translated into a hug.
724) Getting ready for tomorrow, if I think of all the schedules, all the things that want to stress me out – and the list starts piling up, the Father, He tells me to set the pile down – to just step into tomorrow – to take the week just one day, or a half a day or a quarter day at a time, to not give up, to respond in love, hold on to Him and He will take me through to the end of it all.

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Sitting in the Stairwell: Vintaging the Past

Stairs at Historic Locust Grove, not the house I am talking about

“Can I just sit in the stairwell?” I asked the owner of “The French Hen” – this antique store that had once been my home.

I am sure she hated those stairs; everyone did. At least everyone who didn’t grow up running up and down them a million times a day. They were old, tall and steep, the stairs of this house that grew when the dog-trot turned into a hallway once-upon-a-time ago.

I remember falling down them when they were occasional to me, little feet in tights slipping on old polished wood to fly out and . . . thunk-bump! on the slim cushion of my littleness. Tears would spring to my eyes even before my mind recovered its sense.

Yet, here I was, years later, sitting on those 200+ year-old-steps, hoping for what I am not sure. Maybe for my grandmother to walk past, the harness bells once on the front door to jingle, to pull off my grandfather’s work boots one more time, to catch bees in jars or slurp honey-suckle from the backyard vine.

“Do not say, ‘Why were the old days better than these?’ For it is not wise to ask such questions” (Ecc. 7:10)

Better Days? They weren’t. I know that. I don’t want to go back. I never want to go back. God has brought me so far.

Despite life’s challenges, each year, each day is sweeter and sweeter – holistically so much better.

Redemption – given and taken – is a life improver. Faith means knowing there is sunshine behind the clouds. Hope means knowing God has goodness in store – no matter today’s salty tears. God’s love means that His love heals, wrapping around me warming away the cold soul-chills of brokenness.

He has led me to something so[ul] better best.

“In your unfailing love you will lead
the people you have redeemed.
In your strength you will guide them
to your holy dwelling” (Exodus 15: 13-14).

So I sat in the stairwell, not because life here was better. Homesick maybe. Missing people I loved. Missing grandfather’s azaleas – or how he would hide on the ledge at the top of the stairs to scare the hee-bee-gee-bees out of us when we went up for bedtime, grandmother’s fried chicken, lazy summer afternoons on the front porch, life B.C. (before children). Standing in front of the big fireplace during the winter of ’77 and turning, turning, turning like a good roast over a fire pit – but I was in front – and it was an old house with floor furnace, a gas stove and this fireplace.

After my parents divorce, 5-year-old me climbing into my grandfather’s lap and falling half asleep. My grandmother came in asking him to do something. She hushed and walked softly away, letting my grandfather hold me until I was slept out. I understood Father-God love through my grandfather’s love.

“We remember the fish we ate in Egypt at no cost–also the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions and garlic” (Num 11:5).

No, this is not like the Children of Israel being scared, not understanding the future and missing what was comfortable, what was familiar, not bondage to my past.

Stairway at Historic Locust Grove

It is a vintage thing.

Vintage whole cloth memory is not what brought me to the stairwell. What brings me to the stairwell is looking at my past fully and gathering the blessings left there.

Vintage: (verb) to gather or harvest (grapes)[blessings] for wine-making [remembrances] (1828 Noah Webster Dictionary)

To vintage my past, to sort through and let go of the bad and to press the good into my heart.(BCM sentence example of Webster verb definition of vintage)

To vintage (verb) is a joy-catching thing, catching things of God.(BCM definition)

Joy-catching moments like when God and I talked between the azaleas and forsythia. Where I asked Him to make me special to Him. Friday night steaks, my mother’s sewing machine where she made my navy blue prom dress with navy Bill Blass lace (a client where she worked had a son who worked for Bill Blass. He told his son that we couldn’t find pretty enough navy blue lace – and he sent beautiful blue lace to his father – free of charge), where I learned Saul became Paul, the feel twilight grass under my feet in the Spring, learning to trust God as I walked upstairs to bed in pitch black darkness, trusting that He wouldn’t let anything get me, where I learned love can be soft, tough, and graceless and that for love to endure and reach to all family roots one must love with forgiveness, the cardinal outside my window in the Oak tree in the sweet coolness of a summer morning after grandmother turned off the window fan.

I want to catch those blessings God left for me – more precious than the teacup my grandmother left on the wooden box at the foot of my bed one Christmas morning.

Some moments, memories, details you catch – and they are immeasurable, like dust particles floating in the sunlight. It is just a matter of looking for them in just the right light.

Some moments need to be discarded like memories of feeling like a second-hand child, seeing myself as the goose girl when I was a princess all along.

“I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.” (Exodus 20:2)

I sat there that day in the stairwell remembering flying down those stairs on the way to living, climbing them to rest. I sat there, waiting. Waiting for what, I don’t know – but, something in my heart needed. . . something.

Sighing, I pulled myself up. Stairwells are not for sitting. Stairwells are passageways for living. The only thing left worth keeping are the joy-catching moments, the blessings.

Maybe that is why I went – to vintage – to gather the memory of those blessings, the worthwhile pieces out of the whole cloth.

I thanked the lady when I left and walked out.

This isn’t a Lot story. This is a blessing thing, a vintage thing, collecting all the sweet gifts God left me in the backyard, in the kitchen, on the front porch, in the stairwell of where I came from.

In the gathering, I discover how this Father that is God has been intentional in my life, been present for every event, big and little – and that it is never too late to gather the blessing, the joy!

They are still there. Gather them. Vintage them.

168) a menagerie of stuffed bears in whimsical arrangement in a yard, reminding me of how when I look for the blessings, I find unusual, out-of-the-box things

169) A group of red cardinals and their less colorful mates dealing with an afternoon frustration of a mockingbird.
170) Taco soup, an orange juice cake and chicken salad made by a sweet co-worker on the first day of my new job
171) My grandmother’s coffee cake going with me to work that first day
172) Generosity of spirit from my trainer and other team members who say, “It takes a year to learn it all. Be patient with yourself.” And I wish I lived life like that in every area.
173) A window view at my desk
174) Heart doctors taking care of my mom over 16 hours away
175) Praying friends
176) Brothers helping a brother move with good humor on a Saturday morning
177) Green spinach, yellow eggs, beige artichokes and brown sausage in a white pottery pie pan lined with a puff pastry baking into a weeks breakfast
178) A friend walking a couple of miles with me
179) Snowflakes, bunches of them, so many I couldn’t see my neighbor’s house
180) Strawberries, cantaloupe, pineapple and grapes in a trifle bowl for a baby shower
181) “I’ll give you a hug for some pineapple,” a son asked. I readily agreed.
182) Leftovers
183) My candy jar filled with mini Cadbury eggs on my home desk.
184) A matching one on my work desk filled with M&Ms (so wish people would eat them so I could fill it with Cadbury Eggs)
185) Mini Cadbury Eggs in 1 lb bags
186) Boys who help with the dishes on their assigned nights
187) Bedtime hugs and discussions – not taking them for granted.
188) Cornering my teen in the kitchen and flinging a hug on him.
189) Being able to take lunch early on Fridays so I can spend time with my Friday morning knitting group
190) How all my aunts pull close when one of their sisters needs them
191) A Tide Stick removing a very frustrating situation, allowing nothing permanent to remain literally and figuratively
192) That long distance has changed so it is no longer an occasional thing and I can talk to my mother in the hospital at any time.
193) Yellow Post-it Notes for Prayer requests on my bathroom mirror, helping me to keep my promises.
194) My son graduates from his AIT training this week from the reserves. He asked me to help him with his resume because he knows he has a mom who can do that. So glad God put layers and layers of things inside each of us, enabling us to minister in ways unimaginable to our children.
195) Learning to intentionally vintage God’s blessings all around.

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A Crow’s Message

Driving through town, feeling frazzled, a little pinched by the world over temporary challenges, I forced myself to refocus. Pulling myself out of my bottled up concerns, I looked for my Father’s gifts – and saw . . .

13) Shiny Christmas ornaments hanging from a dogwood tree
14) White latticed window panes in a church
15) beneath the window, I had seen a bush – and suddenly, the red berries in that bush popped and splashed color – as though someone had hit the contrast button on my computer photos.

“You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart” (Jeremiah 29: 13).

When I paused, when I refocused, when I looked for blessing over wrestling things that tried to steal my peace – I found blessing He set aside for me, blessing that spilled joy into my days.

16) 5 cupcakes for an after-school treat.
17) A pot of hot coffee and laughter with friends for an hour.
18) The repetition of lining up our business shipping labels on the cutting board, calming, orderly, methodical, productive.
19) Standing at the packing table, sharing a scale with my husband, weighing, waiting, juggling our responsibilities so that we run more smoothly than the machinery.
20) In the midst of a very trying afternoon, I searched for God’s blessing. Life had wrung me out. I kept staring at a tennis court, white benches and black shade cloth hanging from the fence.  No hidden blessing in the benches. No hidden blessing in the shade cloth.

Suddenly, a flock of crows soared and dipped to soar again. My eyes latched onto the scene unfolding – and I thought – wow, if God finds joy in those mean old crows – surely He will take care of me in my very struggling day!  Then God showed He had a sense of humor – a flock of tiny birds chased after them. Maybe He was showing  me that my challenges might seem big, might seem over-powering – but they really weren’t – those challenges could easily be routed, like a crow being chased away by a smaller bird.
21) Completed knitting a pair of baby leggings for a little baby girl fashionably late who will turn me into a grandmother any hour now.
22) Narcissus Paperwhite candles in my bedroom.
23) Sitting at the dinner table on my husband’s birthday, with a Chocolate Celebration Cake topped with a Chocolate Ganache.
24) Sitting at the dinner table with 4 of my 5 sons, a lovely daughter-in-law and talking – about history, politics, current events and a baby.
25) My little guy, his head on my shoulder during a movie.
26) My Christmas Tree Sparkling late tonight on glass snowmen, frosted fruit, Santas, Christmas Balls and ribbons. I finally found a quiet moment to soak in its beauty, its sparkly, silent beauty.

When the cares of my heart are many,
your consolations cheer my soul” (Psalm 94: 19)

Thank you, Father, for these consolations that cheer my soul. Thank you for the blessings I found that you’d placed in my life for me this week!

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The Year of the Little Blessings

This blue-skied New Years Eve morning, the cardinal outside my window greeted me with a familiar call. The same call I used to hear outside the window at my grandmother’s house on those fresh summer mornings when my dreams and hopes were young and limited. When I was just a girl.

Cardinal Nest near my Door

The cardinal has always symbolized God’s comfort to me. At various moments in my life, the cardinal has darted from the roadside greenery to soar ahead of me. I can tell you today what I was thinking at those moments, the challenges that simmered within – and the Father’s comfort that seared into my heart, coaxing a smile and hope surged.

Too often lately, immersed in the big challenges, I have neglected to turn my eyes to the little blessings. That has nagged at me this year. At times, I have felt clumsy about spotting the blessings woven through my day.

I can rattle off the big blessings: God holding one son in the palm of His hand on the day he was born, saving his life; the answer to a prayer – our second son; the diagnosis for a son’s stomach ailment; my husband – these are all some of the BIG blessings, some very miraculous.

But, you know, it is in the everyday living, the mundane living where our spirits are shaped, where thankfulness springs up. Not that I am ungrateful or unthankful. Too often I spout thanks, with a sweeping arm and an unseeing eye – not taking the time to truly savor, not truly receiving the full blessing of God’s little gifts.

Being worn out with challenges, sometimes when just making it to the end of the day still holding on to my faith, hope and love is a huge achievement – worn out with the challenges, I fail to see the detail in what God has set at my doorstep.

My Father, He’s been chiding me about not seeing the sweet things He leaves for me, telling me to take better care of my heart and open my eyes to these things He has provided to comfort me whether it’s within the challenges, the refreshing or the walking.

My father doesn’t just give one-dimensionally. He doesn’t just give the BIG gifts.
He leaves little packages of blessing hidden in the shrubs,
tucked in my mailbox,
in a blustery wind wrapping around me,
in the fingers of my 11-year-old son making art to welcome his very first niece,
in the smile of my son eating my hot wings across the blue cotton counter as I cook dozens more,
in the neighbor children laughing and playing outside my door,
in all the wonderful places my cat finds to nap and soak up restfulness,
in the lemons sitting on my counter for my water,
in little and big boys wrapped in warm blankets
in Chocolate Celebrate cupcakes topped with Chocolate Ganache a friend asked me to make.

He wants me to seek those little blessings He drops off in my day,
see them, then pause and soak in their
color, their sound, their smell, their touch
a heartbeat wrapped in skin wrapped in a t-shirt
wrapped in a blanket
to savor
these Father gifts
little and big,
big and little.

This year is not The  Year of the Great Challenge, though there may be challenges. Nor is it The Year of Standing, though there are times when that might be all I can do. While it is not The Year of Refreshing, there will be moments of refreshing – and this last year,  The Year of Walking – I so needed that – but this year, this year is The Year of Seeing and Savoring the Little Blessings – and in the seeing and savoring living Thankfulness, living joy.

When the cares of my heart are many,
your consolations cheer my soul” (Psalm 94: 19)

This year, I will savor these blessings, these consolations to cheer my soul. I will not neglect them, these gifts from the Father.

Wishing you a Happy 2012,
filled
with the joy of the Lord
Soaked
in His Saving Grace and
Wrung out
among the lives you touch

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Like a Caterpillar in a Cocoon

My son’s graduation from basic training left me feeling like a caterpillar in a cocoon, just soaking up the nutrients where I am, not quite ready to emerge from this cocoon that is my family.

The journey to this graduation moment, my son, marching squared, bearing the Bravo Company flag with a sharpshooter badge on his chest – the journey to get here often felt like the memory of crossing my great-grandmother’s swinging bridge.

The journey to this graduation moment reminded me of the time my 6 or 7 year old self  plucked up enough courage to cross  that bridge up high, a swinging bridge with loose rope railing, slated inconsistently.

I made it half-way before a teen cousin preying upon my fear hurtled across, his thumping feet causing that bridge to swing, to bounce raucously.

Crouched down in fear, paralyzed, I stared at the wide empty slots

where the missing slates should be,

not knowing how he would pass

without me falling off.

shaking fear, tears fell

I don’t remember how I made it to the other side, to safety.

All I know is that I didn’t turn back.

I didn’t give up.

Somehow, one-step at a time, I journeyed forward and reached safety, knee-wobbly relief, peace, contentment.

Like that little girl who reached the safety of solid ground ,

today, I can’t figure out if I feel like a caterpillar in a cocoon

or fragrant tea leaves steeping until just right

or an expectant mother nesting before birth

or a narcicuss paperwhite bulb waiting in the cool sun to bloom

or a question waiting for its answer

I just know that right now, I have pulled the blanket

of my family around myself

and burrowed, feet reaching to touch the toes of my children and husband

wanting the warm joy of my Lord to seep down into my soul

and raise up authentic laughter and smiles

that this faith journey, of seeing slates in empty slots,

has led to to the substance of things hoped for

walked out on a parade ground one cool November morning.

“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1)

 

 

 

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Sanctified Together: Cry Ye Sarahs Unto The Lord

Christina and Alisa have just released Sanctified Together’s  November publication. The theme – Life’s Lessons – encourages others through storytelling.

Instead of forgetting the wondrous things God has done in our lives, we need to shout them from the mountain tops (i.e. homes, blogs, churches, neighborhoods, work place, etc.” (Christina and Alisa, Sanctified Together).

God needs us to be story tellers, whether one-on-one or to a group.

“For I will speak to you in a parable. I will teach you hidden lessons from our past—stories we have heard and known, stories our ancestors handed down to us. We will not hide these truths from our children; we will tell the next generation about the glorious deeds of the Lord, about his power and his mighty wonders” (Psalm 78: 2-5, NLT).

Even if it’s not your gift. Even if you’re uncomfortable. When God whispers, “Tell them what I’ve done for you, about my faithfulness – so that they can know I am the most excellent Father, that I am all-sufficient to all their needs, that I am the best comforter, that I am the master designer of their destiny, that I am the sanctifier who makes them pure and holy, that I am the whole-maker who will heal their wounds both self-inflicted and inflicted, I am the way back home”. . . tell them what He has done for you, big and little, little and big.

When someone asks, “Why do you believe?”

All the theology, all the logic in the world won’t persuade them our Father is a mighty God . . . but your story will . . .

Bill Graham said, “If you want to change someone’s life, tell a story.”

If you need a little encouragement or a lot of encouragement to your Monday, please stop by and visit all the guest story tellers of our mighty and wondrous Father at Sanctified Together: Life Lessons. I am one of those storytellers. Maybe afterwards, you’ll stop back by and tell me one of your stories!

Cry Ye Sarahs Unto the Lord

I held one child in my arms, year after year — he grew — and month after month, I grieved. 48 months, 48 “No’s.” Desolation snowballed into a downward spiral that drained me physically, emotionally, spiritually.

Secondary infertility was my diagnosis: the inability to conceive after the first child. Sarah, Rebekah, Elizabeth, Rachael, Hannah, the barren woman — they became my soul sisters. I understood their cry — and I rejoiced in their answered prayers. I sat at their feet, looking for behavior solutions in their stories.

Sarah and Abraham encouraged accountability in their relationship — story after story of each enabling the other’s weakness drove that home. That the only time Isaac is shown taking his problems directly to God was when he asked God for Rebekah to conceive shows the mighty power of a praying husband. Hannah unabashedly spilled her heart out in front of everyone, so passionate was she in emptying it for her God. Elizabeth, having grown reconciled to her barrenness, showed us how to rejoice in God’s surprises. Rachael cried out for a child to make her look good. Leah wanted to win her husband’s love by giving him sons — and found God’s mighty, fulfilling love. And, the barren woman’s house was filled, probably because she opened herself up to love more others than she could ever possibly conceive. Click here to read the rest of the article: Cry Ye Sarahs Unto the Lord

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My Lofty Podium

Grow where you are planted. Minister where your roots reach.

Don’t wait to go to China, to Uganda, to some other place than where you are.

Minister now, where you are planted. With a story, your story. Of what He has done for you.

“Tell of His glory among the nations, His wonderful deeds among all the peoples”  (Psalm 96:3).

Among the nations is also right where you are.

Some people might have a street corner. Some people might have a campus step. Some people might have a classroom podium or a sandy spot on a beach. My campus step, my street corner, my podium – is my kitchen counter. 5 boys x however many people they bring through my house – that is my mission field.

Trickle-down Faith-a-nomics.

I see my ministry grow where the boys bring people through the house. When you come through my door, you get good food and real conversation – across-the counter-conversation. Maybe my stories of what God has done for me will water a seed planted – and that seed planted will grow roots that will go to the nations – right in my town or across the world.

“As every man hath received the gift, even so minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God” (1 Peter 4:10).

You don’t have to go to far away places. You don’t have to lead a ministry team. It is about living your ministry that God fitted you for, planned you for, placed you – where you are.

Live Ministry – giving service, care, aid, comfort to the those who don’t know they are the long-lost children of God or to God’s children who are hurting or maybe even need to be budged to grow.

Instead of trying to weed myself out of where I am planted, I have come to understand God planted me there for a reason. This understanding drastically changed the expectations I had created of where I thought I ought to be.

Like a shade plant transplanted from the afternoon sun into a cool, shade spot,

or a desert plant removed from the long, drawn-out shadowed  corner of a house nestled next to a butterfly bush and placed in a dry rocky area to thrive,

I have thrived, bloomed riotously (I so love that word).

“Pray you therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth laborers into his harvest” (Matt 9: 38).

The harvest is from where you stand to as far as your heart can pray. Yes, pray for laborers but realize that you are a laborer of the harvest  and your field to harvest is where you are right now.

I need to tell those stories of what He has done from where I am, whether it is my kitchen counter or a podium in a church in Africa. It is just as important a work, loving God’s children here, pulling strangers into the family of God here. . . in my kitchen as it is in another country.

My counter, my root spot, my lofty podium is behind my kitchen counter.

Where’s yours?

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God’s Name for Me

There’s lots of baby name talk going around the family. Everyone keeps asking, “Have they picked a name yet?”

I suggested Suzy Belle after my great-great grandmother. Just to see their expressions. Priceless!

Someone told my son and his lovely wife, “When you see the baby, you’ll know her name.”

That is so sweet, in a Utopian kind of world. After all, when Rachel gave birth to her second son, she tried to name him, Benoni, “‘Son of my Sorrow” – which Dad changed to “Son of My Right Hand.”

Waiting till the last minute can have tricky results – I know – that’s how I got my name. I couldn’t leave the hospital after I was born until I had a name – My dad wanted to name me after an old girl friend and my mom just was having none of that. Finally, an exasperated nun said, “Her first name is Mary” and my quickly threw my second name behind that. She still can’t decide on my name, calling me anything from “Laura Leigh” to Mary Leigh to “Leslie Leigh.” Needless to say, I have never been very fond of my name.

My husband and I spent 9 months birthing the names of our sons. Those names are rooted in meaning, steeped in Biblical history, and reach back to people who loved and nurtured, who meant good things to us.

“A good name is to be chosen rather than great riches, and favor is better than silver or gold” (Proverbs 22:1).

A name full of faith and hope reminding that we are “children of promise” (Galatians 4:28).

Besides their birth names, my sons have spirit names reminding me of the good things God put within them: Perceiver of Truth, Faithful, Joyful, The Fire and Power of the Holy Spirit, Love.

One blue sky day a few weeks ago, my thoughts were turning all these things over in my head, and something whispered inside me, “God has a name for you.”

If He did all the following:

“For you  formed my inward parts;
   you knitted me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works;
   my soul knows it very well.
My frame was not hidden from you,when I was being made in secret,
   intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes saw my unformed substance;in your book were written, every one of them,
   the days that were formed for me,
   when as yet there was none of them” (Psalm 139: 13-16).

How could He have done all this and not have a name for me?

God knew
I’d like Polka Dot goloshes
God Knew
I’d like to mix my pottery with my china.
God Knew
I’d be terrible at keeping secretes.
God knew
I’d love coffee shops and cats.
God knew
Injustice would torment me.
God knew
Orange Dulce Tea would be my favorite
and that I’d be opinionated.
God knew
I would not be a perfectionist
and that I would struggle with its effects.
God knew it all because He put it in me
and He knows I can overcome anything
He has called me to overcome
because He also put that within me
God knew I would spend a life-time
discovering His plans for my life
and how those plans would touch other people,
pulling others into the God’s family circle.

No, I don’t think God would have done all that, loved me so much and not named me. He’s not that kind of Dad.

“But now thus says the LORD, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: ‘Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.” (Isaiah 43:1).

Sometimes, God names outloud for history to hear: From Abram to Abraham and Sarai to Sarah, from Jacob to Israel and Saul to Paul, John, Jesus.

It took me a long time to realize that God, the Father, who planned for me, loved me as much as Peter, James and John. I am not an outsider to the His family circle; I am pulled in, hugged and loved – and named.

One day, in a face-to-face time, I will hear Him call me, hear His name for me. I bet it is beautiful, full of meaning, full of love.

He’s already named baby girl, too!

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Blueberries for the Soul

Blueberry picking – it was something I wanted to do. The boys balked – maybe because it was a melting hot July day or because they didn’t care about blueberries.

But blueberry picking we went. The farther away from town we ventured (a whole 6 miles), the more distrusting they became – like I would drop them off in the middle of nowhere for a family of grizzly’s to devour them.

Off the paved road, onto a gravel road, moving to seeming nothingness I drove;.

When we arrived, they were almost glad to pour out of the van, out of the air-conditioning into the hotness. As I handed out buckets the blueberry lady handed out advice, “Find the paths that lead into the blueberry bushes. There’s not much on the outside bushes. The good ones are deeper in.”

For a moment, I followed her advice a bit like my boys would follow mine. I saw the blueberries hanging on the peripheral bushes,  and thought, “Wow! What was she talking about? These look mighty fine to me.”

I picked like that for a little while, my mind ping-ponging back and forth between the blueberries my fingers reached for and the blueberry ladies words.

Reminding me of a time someone shared a closer relationship with Jesus with me that I brushed off with a smile –The Hope of a Seed planted in Faith.

“so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it” (Isaiah 55:11)

I had great hopes for my blueberries, what I would make with them, expectations of a bit of Spring Time in a winter storm. In the quiet of the blueberry patch, with the occasional murmur of voices from more than just our group of pickers, the silence sounded different than town silence. The birds in their 10 a.m. routine called back and forth – there were more of them than us. My mind kept returning to the blueberry lady’s words and my blueberry expectations. Could there really be better blueberries?

The voice of seeds planted murmur to your heart if you are truly seeking that relationship. Those seeds don’t give up.

“Oh God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water”(Psalm 63:1)

Sweat rolled down my back, and I wondered how long before the boys would be clamoring for a drink. In an instant, I decided that if there were better blueberries, I wanted them. Taking the blueberry lady’s guiding words, I moved away from my outside bush, ready to try to step onto a path that took me deeper. It wasn’t much of a path. I had to push a bunch of blueberry branches out of my way, pushing to see if the berries deeper in the path were really that different. Would my expectations be redefined?

Curiosity got the best of me. Curiosity about more of God. Was there more? Was there better? Did I really know the best God had to offer? Or was it just the best of what I knew? Easy to get to, easy to see. I was willing to see if I knew it all – willing to admit I didn’t know it all, part of me secretly wanting there to be more of God.

“Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you”(James 4:8).

I shoved my fears aside, tic fears, chigger fears, creepy-crawly fears – The deeper I moved, the more surrounded by a Holy silence, heralding something wonderful to be revealed. Blueberry picking deeper in the patch, I pulled the outside of the bush aside, and delved even deeper – and found the most beautiful of the blueberries. My ignorance almost kept me from the best.

As I picked those blueberries, I thought how like our relationship with God this is. At first, we are satisfied with the exterior relationship but as the relationship grows from God to follower, Savior to saved, Father to daughter, Groom to bride – the intimacy grows as we draw nearer and nearer.

“I have looked upon you in the sanctuary,
beholding your power and glory.
Because your steadfast love is better than life,
My lips will praise you.
So I will bless you as long as I live;
in your name I will lift up my hands” (Psalm 63: 2-4)

I popped outside the blueberry deepness and called to the boys, showing them what they would find if they went deeper into the blueberry patch.

I don’t think they really appreciated it – not today, not at this moment – but that is my job, to show them how to delve deeper into blueberry things, into God things.

Sometimes my boys respond to me like I did to someone sharing a closer relationship to God with me, when I brushed them off with a smile. But she pointed the way, just like I point the way – to a deeper relationship. And those words just sink in, in a Faith and Hope way, like seeds, that will whisper to them, murmur to the, “Draw closer. There is more. More than your knowledge knows.”

“And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart” (Jeremiah 29:13).

“My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food,
and my mouth will praise you with joyful lips,
When I remember you upon my bed,
and meditate on you in the watches of the night;
For you have been my help,
and in the shadow of your wings I sing for joy.
My soul clings to you;
your right hand upholds me” (Psalm 63: 6-8)

A faith seed planted, resting and growing in the Hope that it would lead me into intimacy with Him. I heard the murmurings of Hope and Faith, and I pressed in, drew closer, sought Him in places I wasn’t sure existed and reached out to Him.

In that blueberry path, that hot July day, I thought how faith grows when one realizes the possibility that we do not know it all, when we concede there might be more to God than we know – and we are willing to step into those paths that speak of a closer relationship with God – believing what Faith said about God, leaping in expectation, focusing on the goodness of God, trusting, having confidence that there is more to God though we may not know that more truly is.

In that Hope, we humble our selves when we realize we do not know it all – but are willing to get uncomfortable just to redefine our expectations of our relationship with the Father.

• Recipe for Blue Cotton Crunch – Click Here

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Fruit Trees, Grafting and God

In that blueberry path, on a hot July day, I thought how faith grows when one realizes the possibility that we do not know it all, when we concede there might be more to God than we know – and we are willing to step into those paths that speak of a closer relationship with God – believing what Faith said about God, causing Hope to leap in expectation, focusing on the goodness of God, trusting, having confidence that there is more to God, though we may not know what that more truly is.

“Living in Him” reminds me of when I so loved my husband that we married and we moved in together – and when I don’t see him, eat with him, walk with him, talk with him multiple times daily, I miss him, get a little wigged out because that kind of commitment is the grafting together of two people into one, changing who they were before.

Yet, though my husband completes me, it is not as powerful a grafting, as being grafted into our Lord and living in Him.

According  Leonard Hertz in his article, Grafting and Budding Fruit Trees,  “Fruit trees cannot be reproduced “true” to the original cultivar from seed. They can only be reproduced by grafting.”

There is a difference in the fruit we produce when grafted into a relationship with the Father. We can only bear the true fruit from the Father by being grafted into Him. Being good alone, then, just won’t work. The fruit is not quite the same. Only when we are grafted in to that intimate relationship can we truly bear the fruit of God.

Hertz also said, “Grafting is useful, however, for more than reproduction of an original cultivar. It is also used to repair injured fruit trees or for top-working an established tree to one or more different cultivars.” Through this grafting “in Him” a spirit crippled and abused can be repaired, healed, made whole.

God wants me to have that kind of “Living-in-Him” type of relationship, to be grafted into Him – and that is the only way to produce God’s true cultivar, fruit selected for desirable characteristics that can be maintained by being grafted into Him:  love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.

What is love without God? What is joy without God? What is peace, forebearance, kindness, without God? Goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control – without God?

They are different fruit cultivar without God.

Maybe, if I can find that kind of message in a blueberry patch, just maybe, I can introduce that kind of relationship to my sons, and just maybe one day, maybe they will have a blueberry patch moment, other than a whining, complaining, are-we-done-yet moment. Just like the tree-farmer passes to his child the craft of grafting, fruit trees and harvesting, so, too, do I want to pass to my sons the knowledge of being grafted into an awesome God.

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A Do-Nothing-But-Believe Simply Saturday

I am having a Simply Saturday moment where I am just letting everything go, and that rocking chair on my porch looks too good to ignore. There’s a pork butt simmering in the crock pot for Barbecue later and a steaming cup of Orange Dolce tea beside me. It is the first day of the Fall Holiday, a two-week break. I think it is a knitting, reading, and a simply do-nothing Saturday kind-of-day. But I wanted to share with you something warm to my heart.

I received a letter from my son in basic training where he is learning to adapt to a constantly changing environment where things often do not go as planned, where he is learning to love the burn of a workout caused by someone else’s mistakes, where he told me to tell his brother to stop goofing off in high school and take his education seriously, where he finds his feet taking him to Sunday church.

I am having a “faith is a substance-hope-for” moment where “the evidence of things not seen” are peeking out. I want to leave you with one of my very favorite posts that I recently updated with content and photos. If you are having a hard-to-believe moment or season, stop by and be encouraged: Believing Impossible Things.

May you be filled to the brim with Joy-Catching moments on this Simply Do-Nothing Saturday.

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Unconditional Love: Rule # 26

Unconditional Love cries – because sometimes it just has to. . .

God knew we would need to cry. He created tear ducts, after all. Sometimes great joy and great sorrow so threaten to burst the seams of our mortality that without these tear ducts, we would explode.

He knew there would be times of weeping, even wailing – in darkened closets so our children don’t hear or within the arms of our loved ones. He tells us so (Ecc. 3:4).

He knew there would be days our souls would scratch with the emotional sackcloth of grief, humbleness, and, yes, even repentence. He said so (Psalm 30:11).

I am not talking about crying over the big things like death, just the living and growing things, as simple as word and action challenges with our children.

For you and for me, we cry – sometimes over the same things. Sometimes it is the straw that breaks the camels back that starts a torrent of tears. That straw for me might leave you incredulous, “You’re crying over that?” The straw that breaks you might lead me to look askance, “You’re crying over that?” That realization humbles me – different catalysts might cause that breaking point where our heart angst moves those tears inside out.

But I bet the underlying reason for all those tears – is a mother’s love.

Because mothering is not always easy. Mothering hurts – and unlike childbirth, there are no pain medications offered for day-to-day mothering to help minimize or control the pain.

Except for these tear ducts.

In the last few years, there has been something new mixed in with my tears. Prayer. Scripture. Murmurings of faith. Instead of turning my grief, my hurt, my over-whelmedness inside, I turn it out  – my prayers spoken in tandem with those tears,  “Lord Jesus, Have Mercy on Me. . . .Greater is He that’s in me than He that’s in the World. . . The Lord is my Rock, my Fortress, my Deliverer. . . Deliver me. . . Deliver my child. . . Be with me. . . . Be with my child. . . .”

Because if my spirit is so grieved, then how must my child feel? be? need? I cry because there is a need – something that affects not only their now but their tomorrow. And inside me, maybe it’s the helplessness, the over-whelmingness, the solution blindness, the hurt, the frustration, the cross-eyed exasperation – and the straw that broke the camel’s back – it bubbles up like a shaken soda pop – and overflows into the messiness of a wailing soul evidenced by these tears that slip through those ducts that God made just for such an outpouring of need. . . for Him.

“You keep track of all my sorrows. You have collected all my tears in your bottle. You have recorded each one in your book” (Psalm 56:8)

Unconditional Love cries to release the pain in our mother hearts. Those tears are not all about us but also for the one we cry for, cry out of love for. When we cry out of love, not selfishness, I think, God honors those tears, that unconditional love that fill us to the brim so that it overflows through out tear ducts.

Sowing love through tears. Sowing prayer through tears. Sowing hope and faith through tears.

Yesterday, I cried over a straw-that-broke-the-camels-back reason. And God collected those tears in His bottle, recorded the story of each tear – and the prayer, the faith, the hope prayed with each tear – those tears will be answered with songs of joy, each wail will have the opportunity to turn into a song to which we dance with joy.

God was prepared for those tears. He was waiting to collect them. He wants our hearts to love like that.

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An Elevenses Birthday Prayer

Today, my artist celebrates his elevenses birthday.

Considering that this son often comments when he wants to eat at irregular intervals and I remind him we recently ate, “Yes, that was first breakfast. But what about second breakfast, elevenses, luncheon, afternoon tea, first supper, second supper.”

When my oldest son came home from college one day and commented, “You know, Mom, we’re a peculiar family” – well, he might have been thinking about moments like that, where Tolkien takes over our conversations.

It is possible he was thinking, “But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that you should show forth the praises of him who has called you out of darkness into his marvelous light” (1 Peter 2:9).

I know that when he said that, I was thinking 1 Peter 2:9. My oldest son’s expression was bemused, wryly so. I opted for the most postive translation.

Caleb's Art

But back to my elevenses son, apparently born into a “peculiar” family, the heart of the brotherhood (not to be confused with the Center of the Brotherhood). When he was born, my joyful son asked, “What’s his spirit name, Mom?”

“Peace?” I asked, hopeful, frazzled at the wrestling and arguing between the 2nd and 3rd one at that time.

“No, Mama,” he said, 5 years old, leaning into the baby of the brotherhood. “He’s LLLOOOooovvvvve.”

And, he has been. He is our human resource guy – the one everyone loves, the one who manages to reach into the hearts of each brother without getting into their bubbles.

Outside the brotherhood, he is an artist, a guitar player, a soccer player, a basketball shooter, a wanderer into his own space, a prayer warrior when his friends hurt, a seeker of solitude with a saucy sense of humor.

His art delights me. He’ll go into his room, or sit at the kitchen table, drawing for hours, gifting me with them – and I am humbled by his giving, by his art, by his heart.

Sometimes he draws cartoon story lines. He drew 3 pictures for my office, which I cherish.

This elevenses boy, in this peculiar family, brings things outside that God put inside before he was fully formed. God gave him a heart for drawing, for making music, for building things – and God’s generosity humbles me more because these gifts He gave my son overflow and touch me, this mother’s heart that so struggles to be the mother I am called to be.

Caleb Art

My prayer for this elevenses son who expresses himself with the workmanship of his hands instead of words, I pray for your mind that guides your hands, that you seek to do the work of God, the work He gave them the gift to do, that your mind gives your hands honorable things to do.

I pray that your mind stay good and true, striving to learn more. . . more of the good things in life, the true things in life – and that your hands create testimonies of faith, hope and joy from your brand of peculiar humor and insight into life.

I pray for those hands that work with artist tools: hammers, pens, pencils, things that cut, things that create – that the heart of God is shown through that work. I pray your hands are blessed with strength, courage, follow through, attention to detail, care, comfort and health, evidence of the wear and tear of nobleness.

I pray that your hands reach for God in love, in praise, in worship, in thanksgiving and in times of reaching from the tops and bottoms of life, even 5th grade life.

I pray that your eyes discover the beauty of God around you – in the green eyes of a cat, to windowsill raindrop patterns, a blue sky, the cinnamon sprinkle of freckles, sidewalk rectangles, friendship smiles, bicycle spokes, the sound of wind in a fast run, castles on a hill, even the pentagons and hexagons of a soccer ball sitting on tufts of green grass, in turtles crossing roadways – that in your art, you meet God.

I pray that as your gift grows, your art praises God, calls to people in darkness, calling them into His marvelous light, in an elevenses way, a teen way, a young man way – a growing with you way.

I pray that your heart continue to find contentment in the gifts God put within you and that God send laborers across your path to help you unfold His plan in your life, to develop the gifts He gave you, and to encourage you in your journey to become the boy to man God created you to be.

Happy Birthday beloved, peculiar son nested amongst a peculiar family. I am so blessed God gave you to us.

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Not Giving Up!

When my boys come to me for  boo-boo prayers, migraine prayers, and over-coming fear prayers, I know we are going in the right direction.

When my oldest son called from the Christian camp he worked at asking me to call the sweet, older ladies at church who are such prayer warriors to pray for a camper’s mom battling cancer, I knew we going in the right direction.

When my rebellious son allowed me to lay hands on him and pray before he went to basic training . . . . and he cried – I knew  we were going in the right direction.

When they come home
and tell me they have prayed for someone else,
I know I took them
where they needed to go.

All the challenging in-between moments that wear me down are just trip-wires in the path, designed to bring down my mission.

“Those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy” (Psalm 156:5).

I might lose my balance, trip, even fall – but I pull myself up. Graceless, awkward, wobbly, but I keep on going.

“Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up” (Galatians 6:9).

I will not give up. . . on my children. . .

“be strong and do not give up” (2 Chronicles: 15:7).

. . . or on myself.

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Hidden Springs: Unleashing a Holy Spirit Flash Flood

We went blueberry picking, my boys and I. It was late July, just when the summer heat decided the show itself. We went after the first day of school, a 2 hour day, looking for Hidden Springs Farm beside Hidden Springs Creek.

We drove 6 miles outside of town, winding through curvy roads, past a burned-out store, turning onto a road that spent itself into a one-lane gravel trail that made me wonder how they got to town in the winter.

We turned right onto a road that skirted a huge, dried-out creek-bed called Hidden Springs, moving closer and closer to the blueberry farm, an isolated place where someone could lose the outside world.

“Is there ever any water in the creek?” I asked the blueberry lady, as I handed out buckets to 3 boys and one, very sweet girl friend of The Teen.

In some seasons, it rushes with water, she said.

Hidden Springs Creek was empty. Silent.

“I saw the glory of the God of Israel coming from the east. His voice was like the roar of rushing waters, and the land was radiant with his glory” (Ezekiel 43:2))

No roar. No rushing waters. Just emptiness.

I’d had a dream once, where my family picnicked beside a dried-out creek bed. In my dream, I asked whether it ever flooded– and the guide (for some reason there was a guide) said, “Oh, sometimes it rushes in, over-spilling the creek bank, flooding the family home, washing everything clean.” In my dream, we were talking about the Holy Spirit –that the Holy Spirit had once flowed through my family.

For I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground: I will pour my spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing upon thine offspring” (Isaiah 44:3).

That creek bed, that rushed with water in seasons, it made me thirsty. I felt the dry, dusty, cracked river-bed in my boys – and I wanted that rain, that Holy Spirit Rain for them, too. I wanted that season to be now.

“When the poor and needy seek water, and there is none, and their tongue faileth for thirst, I the LORD will hear them, I the God of Israel will not forsake them” (Isaiah 41: :17).

I thought how cool it would be it would be if  Hidden Springs Creek produced a flash flood of Spirit-filled water – kind of like the water that rushed, morphing into horse-shaped rapids in The Lord of the Rings. Something visual. Something Tangible. Something with a Wow-Factor that washes away any doubts.

But the Holy Spirit, it isn’t contained to river beds, creek beds and oceans.

There is a spring in each of us, a Holy Spirit spring – flowing, gushing with Living Water. For so many of us, though, it is a Hidden Spring. Because we don’t understand, we dam up that living stream available to us. We don’t let it wash through our life.

I’m like that with a lot of things. I didn’t use my kitchen Aid Mixer for years because I really didn’t understand what it could do for me. There are programs on my computer I don’t use because I don’t understand. I avoid what I do not understand.

Until, one day, someone said in a Sunday School class where we were talking about the Holy Spirit, “If God has more for me, I want it.”

That resonated. That loosened the foundation of the dam I’d built.

Paul prayed for people like me, who didn’t quite get the Holy Spirit. He prayed this prayer:

“I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, and his incomparably great power for us who believe.

That power is the same as the mighty strength he exerted when he raised Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms,

far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come” (Ephesians 1: 17-21).

I asked God – is this real? This Holy Spirit Power? The same power you used to raise Jesus from the dead? That’s available for me? In the tool box you gave me when I became your child?

Is it for me? Little me in the big world? The same Holy Spirit Power that fell on the day of Pentecost? That rose Jesus from the dead?

“but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4:14)

And, if it is for me, can I not only have it. . . but show me how to turn it on in my life, so that the dry, cracked banks of my own Hidden Springs can rush to over-flowering with the Holy Spirit, cleansing me, filling me with energy, conviction, refreshing, helping me pray. . . and yes, praying in the spirit, if that is indeed real, too, for me, too.

I want some of that Living Water Jesus offered; I want that comforter He sent. But I don’t just want it. I want to use it. I want it to flow – not be dammed up behind my lack of understanding, traditions, a watered-down faith. I want my faith watered-up, flash-flooding, over-flowing, covering me, my family, my home.

The LORD will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail” (Isaiah 58:11).

I want those Hidden Springs loosed in me. What about you?

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Breaking and Rebuilding

A few weeks ago, on a Sunday morning, my son left for Army Reserves Basic Training. He will be gone 25 weeks, for both basics and additional training.

My aunt said I was going to cry when I dropped him off.

I didn’t.

I felt like I’d been driving with a caged, ornery grizzly bear. When he climbed out of my car, he walked to his sergeant’s car who was driving him a half a state away where he would catch a plane to take him to another state. Another officer called out, “You can still change your mind. If you don’t you’ll end up like me. . . You haven’t taken the last oath yet.”

He was in the officer’s car without a backward glance and gone. I felt empty.

Some ask, “Aren’t you scared?”

My response, “If this is the road my son is supposed to travel, I would be more concerned if he didn’t.”

After all, Jonah tried to run away from God’s plans ending up camping out in the belly of a whale. Running away from where you are called to go just creates discomfort physically, emotionally and spiritually.

Moms of soldiers don’t ask questions. The first thing they say, with conviction, “They are going to break him down. Then they’re going to re-build him up.”

At first, I think of my blue bicycle with its big, white basket that I had when I was a little girl. I rode it everywhere, to my aunt’s house up the street, to the pool – and then when I was older, to all my jobs.

My brother, 2 years older, took it into his head he wanted to be an engineer. To commemorate this recognition, he wanted to take my bicycle a part and put it back together. I was 10 at the time. I had total confidence in him.

My confidence cost me $14 of my own money to have someone else fix my bicycle. $14 in 1972 was big money. My brother grew up to be an engineer. He has more success with X-Ray machines than he does blue bicycles with big white baskets.

I trust that the military is better at this taking apart and putting back together than 12-year-old boys. I am confident they know all about breaking and re-building tanks, buildings . . . and men. Unlike my 12-year-old brother, they are experts at this.

For weeks, I have turned over this idea of my son being broken and rebuilt, studied it from all angles, breaking down and building up of my son, of this soldier-in-training.

“He will come home a different person, a better person,” my friend with a military son said.

“And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter; so he made it again into another vessel, as it seemed good to the potter to make” (Jeremiah 18:4)

God loves these rebellious sons. He pursues them. Often, he favors them – Like Jacob, Samson, David and Saul.

Like Jacob, my son has been raised to know God, and like Jacob, he has wrestled against the nobleness of God.God found Jacob in the desert. He broke him – and then rebuilt him over the next 20 years. Jacob returned home, repented behaving ignobly to Esau and lived a contented life.

Like Samson, my son has been raised to seek God’s plan, to honor his parents. Though, the word says that God needed Samson to rebel for His plan to work, he turned away from his parents’ wise advice and trusted foolishly. Ultimately, Samson was broken and God rebuilt him into the hero and martyr he created him to be.

And Saul. . .  Saul who persecuted the followers of Christ. Saul who did not want to believe in Jesus Christ. God broke him and rebuilt him into Paul who told the gentiles, “You are God’s children, too.”

Even David was broken through the loss of a child, to be rebuilt, redeemed by God.

“I learned God-worship when my pride was shattered. Heart-shattered lives ready for love don’t for a moment escape God’s notice” (Psalm 51: 17) The Message

Nobody ever wants their children broken. Nobody ever wants to be broken. Yet, if in the breaking, wholeness is built – then by all means break and rebuild, break and rebuild me, too.

“For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do” (Ephesians 2:10)

Sometimes, we become like the marred clay, marred by choices we made – marred by choices others made. Because of that, we need to be broken down and rebuilt.

As the Army breaks down my son, I pray that God is in the rebuilding.

“Unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who build it.” (Psalm 127:1)

Everyday for almost 3 weeks, I listen for the mail truck – and when I hear it, I walk out to collect the mail. The last time I was so eager for mail was about 29 years ago when I was dating my husband, separated by a summer and different towns.

The mail man would tease me about the letters I received. I miss mail men like that.

Today I pulled 2 letters from the mail box.

I read them, and I cried – all the way through each one. He used words like learning to be a leader, making it through the gas chamber, 2 minute showers, putting fear in the back of your mind, studying to save lives.

He said he loves this path. We’ve both put that fear away.

I have been praying this soldier’s prayer I adapted from Luke 7:1-10. It put into words what my heart couldn’t as I studied this breaking and rebuilding.

Prayer for My Soldier Son

I pray my son will become like the centurion who had such great faith in Jesus that Jesus marveled.

I want him to understand authority like the soldier, whose understanding enabled him to grasp the mighty power and authority of Jesus.

I want him to be humble like the soldier who said that he was not worthy of Jesus coming to his house – though Jesus was coming, thought him worthy of coming – this soldier who probably recognized the sin within him – it didn’t stop him from reaching out to God – I want my son to be like that soldier.

I want him to be a soldier, like this soldier, who loved the Jewish Nation, who helped build churches – because then my son will love both our country and Israel – and he will seek to build good things.

This son who I have called “Faithful” since he was littler than five, I want it said, “When Jesus heard these things, he marveled at him, and turning to the crowd that followed him, said, “I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.” ~ Adapted from Luke 7: 1-10

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Scripture Collage for a Soldier-in-Training

Last week, I stood at the stove, praying for my second son who was in his 2nd week of Army Reserves Basic Training. Standing there, stirring and turning dinner, my mind worn out by other sick children and pressing issues, I tried to recall scripture.  I needed help. The mother within never ceases to search for comfort and strength and ways to encourage!

I sent out a request for scripture, to pray over a son in the military or training for the military. I was humbled by the generosity of so many women. Thanks Ladies – all of you, who sent me scripture when I asked – scripture that I can pray over my son during his 10 weeks of Basic Training. You so blessed me, with your scriptures and your comfort words that encouraged.

As I entered these scritpures, I realized what I wanted to say, how during the breaking of old ways and building of new during this 10 weeks – it made me realize what kind of man I hope comes out of the rebuilding – and it is a man like the centurion in Luke 7 – and between all your scriptures, your encouragement and a bit of dissension – my heart settled and I found what the mother within me was looking for.

Woven throughout in purple is my mama’s prayer adapted from Luke 7: 1-10.

The collage is now a mini-poster for my refrigerator – and saved as the background for my computer – and these scriptures are at my finger tips at all times.

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The Demilitarized Zone: The Dinner Table

The Dinner table, well, really, any dining table I have noticed is a family demilitarized zone. Even Kitchen Counter eating, with all its charm is not a demilitarized zone. The dinner table, whether it is at home, in a restaurant, at lunch or dinner, neutralizes home-grown hostilities to build relationships.

Not pistol-packing hostilities. Just household, growing-up, parent-child, brother-to-brother, even husband-to-wife hostilities. Hostilities born out of differing expectations, simmer frustrations caused by non-household interactions, personal space invasions, authority issues, sometimes just breathing issues, unfulfilled needs, not-belonging issues from the out-side come in – all kinds of living issues – all living together, heading toward the dinner table.

There’s an un-spoken armistice or peace treaty at the table. Issues are left outside the demilitarized zone – kind of like leaving your gun at the sheriff’s office when entering town. Sometimes the need to disarm over a hidden issue occurs but is easily handled.  Behavior changes in this neutral zone we call the dinner table as we sit down, passing ketchup, A-1, or Worcestershire Sauce, salad dressing, green beans, meat, salt and bread.

Rules and authority are recognized at the dinner table, sometimes nudgingly but never begrudgingly. For example, no eating until prayer is said.

One night, the Dad was out of town on business. The second son, he was the oldest man at the table – so the dinner prayer fell to him. He balked the first time I asked him to say the dinner prayer, not wanting to lead this way. The second time I asked, he bowed his head and prayed over dinner. He even blessed the hands that prepared the food. It was a blessing moment, a giving and receiving moment.

Followed by laughter. All factions find common ground over the breaking of bread, the passing of seasonings and sauces.

“Why do we have to sit down to eat?” is a common question.

“So that if you’re ever invited to the President’s house for dinner, you’ll know how to behave,” I always answer.

We don’t always sit down to table for dinner. Sometimes it is just a kitchen-en-counter meal.

There is something about sitting down to a table and eating, sitting across from each other, facing each other. Learning to sit long and talk much over dinner.

“Can I be excused?” one asks, not particularly liking the evenings fare, wanting to be some other place.

“Even if you do not eat, you need to sit, talk and share about your day,” I answer.

Then there are Big Dinner days. “Big Dinner tomorrow night,” I’ll announce. At Big Dinner, there is big food and big talking – politics, faith, everyday living, story telling, joking, silliness and serious. The same as regular dinner table living but bigger. Everybody is expected at Big Dinner. The little guys squirm, not wanting to sit long and talk much.

I remember sitting long and talking much – it is a soul marinating time, a seasoning time where things go down deep inside that maybe you don’t quite understand. . .yet. Maybe the patience isn’t there yet to fully grasp the fellowship, of politics that affects you indirectly, of stories of people you don’t know, when the spotlight is not just on you, where things go over your head because when you’re little things do that.

Sometimes the dining table is in a restaurant. Recently, I had a lunch date with my two oldest sons. For my second son, it was a symbol of adulthood – to go to lunch while his other brothers were at school. At graduation, he crossed over to a different way of living. On that day, lunch was a sending-off lunch, commemorating the second son leaving for basic training for the Army Reserves.

We ate at our favorite Cajun restaurant, where my oldest son’s rehearsal dinner was, where the family celebrated the second son’s 16 birthday, and so many of my birthdays. Watching my sons talk, laugh, I saw the dinner table do what it is best at: providing a theater for relationship building. 

Two totally different young men with totally different approaches to life when not at the dinner table, today finding commonness, compassion and outreach to reach other. Relationship building was the main course. Amnesty from the demilitarized zone left the table with them, a peace accord not spoken reached through the breaking of bread.

Sitting at the dinner table, sitting long and talking much, Big Dinner or little dinner, passing salt and sauces, building relationships, leaving conflict outside the demilitarized zone, little ones learning so much – it is a good thing, living in the demilitarized zone that is the dinner table!

“They all ate and were satisfied, and the disciples picked up twelve basketfuls of broken pieces that were left over” (Mark 8:8)

 

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Faithful for Life – Can I Be?

As we drove through town, just the two of us, me and my third son, a junior, we talked – about new friends and old friends. The early morning coolness blew though the windows, my hair tickling my cheeks. Sans little brothers, the quiet was perfect soil to grow meaningful words. Those words grew without coaxing – one of those true moments.

“They called me Jesus,” he said, this son who has a joy-of-the-Lord spirit, talking about his friends from where we lived the last 2 years. “‘Cause I always wore sandals.”

And because he believed when they didn’t.

My older boys love sandals – even in the cold months. Chacos are their favorite, usually hand-me-down Chacos from the oldest son, Old Navy flip-flops will do in a pinch.

“Most of them were atheists. One was a Jew. I still pray for them. I pray they’ll be saved.”

Despite their unbelief – He told them about that belief anyway, in words and actions, in their presence and in prayer.

We talked a little more, our talk winding around. I’m not sure where these next words came out of in that conversation, where I was listening more than talking.

“Yeah. I fell away for a time,” and as that sunk into my heart, he said, “But I came back.”

He saw I wanted to say something, and he interrupted, “I came back, mom. We don’t need to talk about it.”

Both he and his brother fell away for a time, after Papaw died. After our minister stood Hospice Compassion Care room and prayed for a miracle, a miracle for this man who was dying with cancer, who had played tennis just 2 months ago, this man adored by 12 grandsons.

I just wanted to reach over, grab his neck and hug the stuffing out of my son. If I tried, he’d just say, “10 and 2, Mom. 10 and 2,” reminders to keep my hands on the steering wheel. He’s always reminding me ’cause I’m either talking with my hands or trying to tickle a rib in the passenger seat.

That falling away – I remember fearing when I was little falling away. How can you be 8 or 10 or 16 or 25 – and think, “Is there enough good stuff in me to be faithful to God for a life-time?” Remember how forever it took just to get to Christmas each year?

At 19, I battled faithfulness. I had prayed for someone since I was a little girl, that God would lift her out of her struggles. I had a tantrum and ignored God for awhile. But He kept whispering to me, gently calling me – and one day I heard, “I placed the opportunities. It was up to her to use them.” I saw the truth, and turned back, wondering if I could be as faithful to God as He was to me. If I could live a lifetime of faithfulness.

“The righteous flourish like the palm tree
and grow like a cedar in Lebanon.
Let me be long-lived, Oh Lord, like the palm tree and the cedar in Lebanon. And like the Cedar, let me grow to my full potential, and like a cedar chest, let me keep away things that would eat at what is within me, keeping me whole and full, full of things of You.

They are planted in the house of the Lord;
they flourish in the courts of our God.
Let my faith roots be deeply buried in your house, Oh Lord. Let me bear hardships in faith, brave challenges without letting go, believe in the evidence of things not seen. Let me not just endure but thrive, grow, riotously blossom, reseed, and grow in your courts.

They still bear fruit in old age
they are ever full of sap and green,
to declare that the Lord is upright;
Let me show my children how to grow old, loving you Lord. Let my faith stories declare your faithfulness, your enduring love, your mighty strength. Let your Holy Spirit pull up into me, like water pulls up in a tree, replenishing the sap of my faith – and, at the right time, the healthy time, let it spill from inside out, these stories telling of your faithfullness, your love.

he is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in him” (Psalm 92:12-15).
You are my rock, my fortress, my deliverer. You are not a God who abuses, not a power-hungry God who wants us to dance for your amusement like a marionette on a string, but a noble, worthy God who loves unconditionally, who is better than I can imagine, who wants us to love you because we want to. I might shake. I might fall in a heap at your feet. But you do not. And when all the pieces of me crumble on You my rock, you breathe life back into me like you did to the dry bones in the valley(Ezekial 37) – and I will stand again, strong, tall, enduring, like the Cedars of Lebanon.

If the LORD had not been my help,
   my soul would soon have lived in the land of  silence.
When I thought, “My foot slips,”
   your steadfast love, O LORD,  held me up.
When the cares of my heart are many,
   your consolations cheer my soul” (Psalm 94:17-19)

Thank you, Father. You knew I would struggle. You knew it would take me a long time to understand that your kind of Faith is indeed a lifetime faith, an enduring faith. Thank you for not only catching me when I fall, but thank you for catching my sons when they fall. Thank you for being more enduring, more faithful, more understanding than we are. Thank you for replenishing my spirit, my faith, me with YOU. Thank you for moments in the car with my son when I see an enduring faith growing in him, a heart to call your children who don’t know they can be your children to you, who knew you enough to walk back to you when his heart hurt and he didn’t understand. The more I walk this life with you Father, the more I understand love and the more I love you real, Father. Thank you for giving me time to grow your kind of love inside me!

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Forgiveness Stops Telling the Story

My husband said quietly, “If you’re still talking about it, you haven’t forgiven it.” Forgiveness deletes stories.

I realized these hurts that I carry around were like cheap trophies boasting of no great win. War wounds continually picked at couldn’t heal, wounds not of nobleness and courage but of weakness and loss.  Not a fireside story of inspiration. Why did I keep telling the hurt stories? The injustice stories?

. . . because I wanted resolution, restoration, justice

But forgiveness is not about resolution. It is about letting go, and that means to stop talking about it – unless it is a redemption story, a ministry story, a where-God-took-me-after-forgiveness story to teach others about forgiveness.

God shows us how to forgive. He shows us forgiveness throws sins into unretrievable places.

• He ” throw(s) them into the depths of the ocean!” (Micah 7:19)
• “as far as the east is from the west, “ (Psalms 103:12)
• “behind your back“ (Isaiah 38:17)

He WANTS to “remember(s) your sins NO MORE” (Isaiah 43:25). He does not retell how you have slighted Him. He sent His son to build that bridge of forgiveness to Him. He built it on the cross: “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29).

Today, I walked away from the offense, the hurt. Crossed the bridge of forgiveness into a place of blessing, green pastures, milk and honey, shade, streams of living water, peace. The hurt stories and the injustice tales couldn’t follow me across that bridge – and I couldn’t carry them across. If I wanted to get to that place on the other side, I had to drop, fling or just set those stories and tales down.

Across the bridge of forgiveness, God will heal me, strengthen me – and the stories I tell will change, transformed by my forgiveness, my setting down.

Are you still talking about it?

Do you need to hit the delete button of your story collection?

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