Its always a bit of a surprise to me the things that will give me a moment of jolting life-perspective.
Whenever we are almost "out of food" in the house, it amazes me the stuff I can actually come up with to eat or feed the kids. I decided about a month ago that the term "out of food" shouldn't be spoken in my house anymore, because the truth is closer to "there's nothing easy" or "there's nothing I like to eat in this house." My outlook on the whole matter has shifted.
Along those same lines, the kids aren't allowed to tell me that they are "starving." Why? Because I've seen people in China who are ACTUALLY starving, and my children have no business saying that they are feeling that way. It's a perspective that they haven't had a chance to gain yet, but someday they will, and then they will understand why I speak so forcefully when they use that word.
I feel thin or...less thin...depending on the way I look at myself in the mirror. It's all about the angle. (although, every mirror has a different perspective of its own, I truly believe. The one in my bedroom tells me on a regular basis that I need to work out a lot more...so I quit asking it for its opinion. I walk down the hall to the the mirror in my boys' room now. It has nicer things to say. I also know of a couple mirrors (one at a friend's house and one at a church in Indiana) that tell me I am super trim and in shape. Their perspective is always welcome and often sought out!)
When I started packing for my 12 day trip to Italy and Switzerland, my perspective on what I actually NEED to have changed dramatically. We are planning to carry-on our luggage, so it doesn't get lost over the ocean somewhere. Which is a good idea, except it means I have to keep my liquids down to a single quart bag.
Seriously?
One. Quart.
Do you know how many liquid products I use on a daily basis?
It's more than a quart, I promise you that!
And so the whittling down began. And then the repacking...and more whittling...until finally I think I can stuff all my tiny liquid bottles into the bag allotted to me. However, I have no plans to make it through the whole trip without a stop at a CVS (of the Italian equivalent of one) because no matter how much I readjust my perspective on what I must have versus what I can live without...I gotta have face wash, and toothpastes, and probably sunscreen. And those are all things that didn't make the cut in my quart bag. (don't be horrified, please. The things that did make the cut are much more important...like perfume, and hair gel, and moisturizer.)
I've also discovered I can live with only 3 pairs of shoes, two bras, and 4 pairs of shorts/pants for 12 days.
My husband says I should take this new found perspective and apply it to my every day life.
I told him it took me a month, and three packing parties with friends, to get to this point, and he better just be grateful he wasn't carting 20 bags all over Rome, and to stop pressuring me to downsize my whole life!
The most sobering moment of perspective came when we sat down to create a will before traveling overseas without our children. Nothing will put your whole life into its tiny magnified window of clarity like assigning a guardian for your kids and allocating assets to them.
It made me sick to my stomach.
When the kids found out we were doing it, it made them cry.
I told them, while they were sniffling and I was trying not to, that creating a document that specified what to do in the event of our deaths did NOT mean anything bad was going to happen while we were on our trip. It just meant we were protecting them from every possibility that life had to offer.
Faith cried harder.
I pulled her close. "It's okay, honey. Don't be scared. Daddy and I aren't going to die. We will be back before you know it and everything will go on just as always."
She wrapped her arms around me and held tightly.
And I knew that this wasn't only about her parents leaving for 12 days. And it wasn't only about us creating a will.
It was about her perspective, and how it has shifted, and how it will never be the same again.
She remembers hugging her Aunt Joy, and how Joy said many of the same words. "It'll go by so fast. I will see you before you know it. Be good while I'm gone. I love you. God will take care of me, don't worry about anything!"
And Joy never came back.
And our perspectives, and our lives, have shifted.
In the weeks following my sister's death, my dad told me at least a hundred times that he loved me and was proud of me. And every time he said the words, I knew he was thinking about all the chances he would never again have to tell Joy those same things. His perspective shifted, and he changed.
We all have.
Just like I never want to hear my kids use the word "starving," I also cry every time I hug a family member goodbye. Because, despite the words we say, and the confidence we possess that everything will go according to plan...that isn't always what happens.
And it'll change the way you look at everything, if you let it.
It makes every moment more cherished. Like a microscope zooming in on the beautiful seconds of your day, and taking a picture that doesn't make sense to anyone but you.
Eyelashes so long they brush my cheek when I kiss theirs.
Hearts racing because they are playing tag.
Flushed cheeks.
Wide open laughter.
Dirty feet pitter-pattering through the house.
His hand enveloping mine.
Thoughtful friends who touch base just to say they love me.
The breeze picking up and blowing through my hair.
Look at it all through new eyes today.
The simple. The ordinary. The chaotic.
What if it were your last moments? Would it change your perspective? Would you love more and correct less? Would you offer mercy even if it wasn't deserved? Would you embrace the chaos, if you knew it would be your last few seconds to have those little chaos-creating-monsters in your arms?
I think we all would, if only we had a moment to shift our focus.
Count the gifts. Even...no, especially, the ones that are so ordinary they don't seem like anything more than moments passing by.
They are all grace. They are all His hand in your life. They are all fleeting.
Say "I love you" to more people today than you did yesterday. Say it like it's the last chance you'll have. Because I want to KNOW that my children KNOW my heart toward them, and that they can carry it through their lives, even if I can't be with them.
Even if I get on a plane today and never come back, they will know that I love them, and am proud of them. And they will remember me telling them to serve God with their whole hearts for their whole lives, because I will always remember my daddy saying the same words to me.
Grace. Mercy. Love. All of it. Every moment. Every heartbeat.
I want to see it all from an eternal perspective today. I pray you will as well.
Monday, July 7, 2014
Tuesday, June 24, 2014
Summer snooze fest
You know how the person you are in your head is interesting, important, confident, etc...
And then summer starts, and you realize you're really, seriously boring and unimportant? And also not as confident as you thought you were BEFORE you put on your swimsuit for the first time this season?!?!
Yeah...that's happening to me too.
When my husband gets home from work and asks me what we did during the day, my response, over the past month, has been one of three things:
"Cleaned house. All. Freaking. Day."
"Broke up fights. All. Flipping. Day."
"Went to the pool. All. Glorious. Day."
The clean house lasts approximately ten minutes.
The fights are broken up for about ten seconds.
But...we are all super tan. So we do have something to show for our first month of summer.
(and the fact that a tan is all I have to show for my summer so far has only added to the realization that I am, in fact, terribly boring and unimportant.)
Other things have obviously happened this past month.
Our cat killed a rabbit and left it, entrails hanging out, in our backyard, causing my husband to VOMIT in a nearby bush while cleaning it up.
I picked up what I assumed were clods of dirt off my bathroom floor only to realize they were clods of poop...but its not the first time that's happened to me, so it doesn't really qualify as exciting.
Gabe (4) is swimming like a fish and scaring the life out of me every time we are at the pool. (which is a lot, since time at the pool is one of only three things I have done all summer so far.)
I inherited my parents old living room set, which is now occupying my loft and giving me childhood nostalgia every time I walk upstairs.
I bought paint to repaint my wooden deck furniture...but I haven't actually painted it yet, so that also doesn't qualify as exciting. (and I'm pretty sure painting it isn't that much to be excited about either.)
I read an entire book, which is something I can never say during the school year. (unless its a science or history or math book) And I only moderately ignored my whole family while reading it...so that's something, right?
See what I'm saying? The version of me who is super cool and has a vibrant, interesting, full of every-single-moment-activities life...she does NOT exist.
Before you start feeling too sorry for me, though, I have an ace up my sleeve.
I am going to Europe.
In two weeks.
For 12 days.
With just my husband.
We are celebrating our 15th wedding anniversary. (which happened to fall last week, so that's something of note that has happened so far this summer. Ha! I'm cooler than I was a second ago when I thought I was out of things to list...except that version of me FORGOT to list her anniversary as an event...so now I'm back to a loser)
We've been planning to visit Europe for our 15th anniversary since we first got engaged and decided not to go there for our honeymoon. My hubby wanted to plan it for our 10th anniversary, but we knew we would still have children too young to be left for that long, and so we agreed to go for the 15th.
And that is this year. (insert cheesy grin and happy dance which further solidify my loser status here)
If we had infinite resources and time, we would see ALL of Europe.
But we don't, so we have narrowed it to two countries. My top pick, and his.
Italy and Switzerland.
And so, we are taking our kids to their grandparents house, and flying across the Atlantic, for a fairy tale trip 15 years in the making.
We are extremely excited. All our most dreamt-of destinations will be visited. Rome, Venice, the Amalfi coast, Zermont, Zurich, and several others.
I've been preparing for months. (Read-shopping for a new wardrobe and dieting to fit into it)
I won't bore you by continuing to talk about this. (Read-I don't want to make you any more jealous)
I will just say this: Yes, my summer so far has been rather bland.
But its gonna get GOOOOOOD. And I will be, for 12 whole days, the cool person I am in my head.
And on that note, I'm off to fold laundry and then go to the pool.
And then summer starts, and you realize you're really, seriously boring and unimportant? And also not as confident as you thought you were BEFORE you put on your swimsuit for the first time this season?!?!
Yeah...that's happening to me too.
When my husband gets home from work and asks me what we did during the day, my response, over the past month, has been one of three things:
"Cleaned house. All. Freaking. Day."
"Broke up fights. All. Flipping. Day."
"Went to the pool. All. Glorious. Day."
The clean house lasts approximately ten minutes.
The fights are broken up for about ten seconds.
But...we are all super tan. So we do have something to show for our first month of summer.
(and the fact that a tan is all I have to show for my summer so far has only added to the realization that I am, in fact, terribly boring and unimportant.)
Other things have obviously happened this past month.
Our cat killed a rabbit and left it, entrails hanging out, in our backyard, causing my husband to VOMIT in a nearby bush while cleaning it up.
I picked up what I assumed were clods of dirt off my bathroom floor only to realize they were clods of poop...but its not the first time that's happened to me, so it doesn't really qualify as exciting.
Gabe (4) is swimming like a fish and scaring the life out of me every time we are at the pool. (which is a lot, since time at the pool is one of only three things I have done all summer so far.)
I inherited my parents old living room set, which is now occupying my loft and giving me childhood nostalgia every time I walk upstairs.
I bought paint to repaint my wooden deck furniture...but I haven't actually painted it yet, so that also doesn't qualify as exciting. (and I'm pretty sure painting it isn't that much to be excited about either.)
I read an entire book, which is something I can never say during the school year. (unless its a science or history or math book) And I only moderately ignored my whole family while reading it...so that's something, right?
See what I'm saying? The version of me who is super cool and has a vibrant, interesting, full of every-single-moment-activities life...she does NOT exist.
Before you start feeling too sorry for me, though, I have an ace up my sleeve.
I am going to Europe.
In two weeks.
For 12 days.
With just my husband.
We are celebrating our 15th wedding anniversary. (which happened to fall last week, so that's something of note that has happened so far this summer. Ha! I'm cooler than I was a second ago when I thought I was out of things to list...except that version of me FORGOT to list her anniversary as an event...so now I'm back to a loser)
We've been planning to visit Europe for our 15th anniversary since we first got engaged and decided not to go there for our honeymoon. My hubby wanted to plan it for our 10th anniversary, but we knew we would still have children too young to be left for that long, and so we agreed to go for the 15th.
And that is this year. (insert cheesy grin and happy dance which further solidify my loser status here)
If we had infinite resources and time, we would see ALL of Europe.
But we don't, so we have narrowed it to two countries. My top pick, and his.
Italy and Switzerland.
And so, we are taking our kids to their grandparents house, and flying across the Atlantic, for a fairy tale trip 15 years in the making.
We are extremely excited. All our most dreamt-of destinations will be visited. Rome, Venice, the Amalfi coast, Zermont, Zurich, and several others.
I've been preparing for months. (Read-shopping for a new wardrobe and dieting to fit into it)
I won't bore you by continuing to talk about this. (Read-I don't want to make you any more jealous)
I will just say this: Yes, my summer so far has been rather bland.
But its gonna get GOOOOOOD. And I will be, for 12 whole days, the cool person I am in my head.
And on that note, I'm off to fold laundry and then go to the pool.
Tuesday, June 3, 2014
Rise up
My spirit has been stirred up this morning, and I find that I am fighting mad.
Not at any people.
Not at any circumstances.
I'm angry at that evil old snake, that greatest of all liars, that manipulator extraordinaire...
If the devil were standing in my living room right now, I'd punch him in the nose, then knee him in the stomach, then elbow him in the face and thrash him good.
Side note: I took a self-defense class a while ago, with an introduction into Krav Maga martial arts, so I'm pretty sure I could give that slippery old Satan a class A butt kicking.
But the devil is way too smart to stand in my living room, or your living room, and make his presence known. He has a much sneakier way about him.
I believed for years that I was an anxious person. That worrying about situations and trying to control them was just part of my personality. I would get so anxious about things that I would have a break out of fever blisters in my mouth.
And then one night, as I was lying awake in my bed (at 3 a.m.), anxiously turning things over in my mind, trying to worry them into a configuration I could control...that night, Satan over-played his hand.
Or maybe it was an angel, giving the enemy of my soul a nudge that pushed him into the open.
Maybe it was my spirit, and the Holy Spirit that dwells in me, that rose up, fighting mad (like it is today) and said "ENOUGH."
I FELT the worry and the anxiety, as if it were two big hands wrapped around my neck, cutting off my air, choking the life out of me.
I could almost see those fingers gripping my throat.
And that was the moment Satan and his demons lost that battle.
Not because I was instantly released from worry and anxiety.
But because I was AWARE of the enemy, and his ploys, and his lies, in a way I had never been aware before.
I saw my struggle for what it really was.
A struggle against a slippery little weasel who didn't have the guts to fight me head on, whose only move was to mask his attacks as character flaws, personality traits, situational fears.
It was a long slow process, let me tell you. I told a friend, one day not long after, that I felt like it was letting go of me one fingernail at a time.
Satan didn't want to go quietly. He had built quite a foothold in my life. Every time I was anxious about something, and it affected my marriage or ministry or personal walk with God...the enemy gained a victory. And he HATED that his win/loss score sheet was no longer so impressive.
Every time I felt worry rise up in my heart, I remembered those hands gripping my throat.
And I fought back.
"Don't worry about anything. Instead, pray about everything." Philippians 4:6
It's been ten years since that night.
I don't get fever blisters in my mouth due to anxiety anymore.
Of course I still get frazzled, and anxious, and worried.
But I no longer believe the lie that accompanies those feelings.
I no longer think there is nothing I can do.
I fight back on the only playing field where I have the upper hand.
I pray.
My kids have become very used to this. On a particularly stressful day they will hear me praying under my breath, and almost always one of them will say to the others, "Shhh, Mom is praying," which is code for "whatever crazy thing you're doing, cut it out because its making Mom resort to begging God for peace." Smart kids.
Sometimes I have no words, or I don't feel I have the right ones.
Those are the times where I let the Spirit pray. "The Father who knows all hearts knows what the Spirit is saying, for the Spirit pleads for believers in harmony with God's own will." Romans 8:27
My fight, the battle for my soul, isn't fought in the four walls of my house, or church, or job, or in the city I live in, or the state I live in.
It's fought in the heavens.
The enemy is tricky. He disguises himself. He's hard to spot.
He's an excellent liar.
I can almost guarantee that you have heard some of his lies today, or that you will before the day ends, and I am quite sure that they don't/won't sound like lies from the mouth of the nasty Evil One.
They probably sound a lot like a rationalization. Or an excuse. Or even a very good reason.
And this morning my spirit, and the Holy Spirit inside me, has had ENOUGH of that.
On your behalf, and mine, I am ticked off.
Because I know what it feels like to have the spiritual life being choked out of me.
Barely able to suck in a breath.
Hardly capable of standing up.
Weak and afraid and alone and powerless.
Except we ARE NOT ANY OF THOSE THINGS.
More lies!
Hear some truth, gasping soul! HEAR IT!
"For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against evil...against mighty powers in the dark world..." Ephesians 6:12
"And they defeated him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony." Revelations 12:11
"For God has not given us a spirit of fear or timidity, but of POWER, love, and a sound mind." 2 Timothy 1:7
"Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom." 2 Corinthians 3:17
"The Lord is my light and my salvation, so why should I be afraid? The Lord is my fortress and protects me from danger, so why should I tremble?" Psalm 27:1 (read this whole chapter!!!)
Pray, saints of God. Pray for each other. Ask each other for prayer.
Don't struggle against the enemy alone. Don't let him choke your spirit!
SEE WHO HE IS.
FIGHT BACK.
And now I feel like I've just taught a spiritual Krav Maga beginners class.
"Though the rain comes in torrents and the flood waters rise and beat against the house, it won't collapse...BECAUSE IT IS BUILT ON BEDROCK." Matthew 7:25
Not at any people.
Not at any circumstances.
I'm angry at that evil old snake, that greatest of all liars, that manipulator extraordinaire...
If the devil were standing in my living room right now, I'd punch him in the nose, then knee him in the stomach, then elbow him in the face and thrash him good.
Side note: I took a self-defense class a while ago, with an introduction into Krav Maga martial arts, so I'm pretty sure I could give that slippery old Satan a class A butt kicking.
But the devil is way too smart to stand in my living room, or your living room, and make his presence known. He has a much sneakier way about him.
I believed for years that I was an anxious person. That worrying about situations and trying to control them was just part of my personality. I would get so anxious about things that I would have a break out of fever blisters in my mouth.
And then one night, as I was lying awake in my bed (at 3 a.m.), anxiously turning things over in my mind, trying to worry them into a configuration I could control...that night, Satan over-played his hand.
Or maybe it was an angel, giving the enemy of my soul a nudge that pushed him into the open.
Maybe it was my spirit, and the Holy Spirit that dwells in me, that rose up, fighting mad (like it is today) and said "ENOUGH."
I FELT the worry and the anxiety, as if it were two big hands wrapped around my neck, cutting off my air, choking the life out of me.
I could almost see those fingers gripping my throat.
And that was the moment Satan and his demons lost that battle.
Not because I was instantly released from worry and anxiety.
But because I was AWARE of the enemy, and his ploys, and his lies, in a way I had never been aware before.
I saw my struggle for what it really was.
A struggle against a slippery little weasel who didn't have the guts to fight me head on, whose only move was to mask his attacks as character flaws, personality traits, situational fears.
It was a long slow process, let me tell you. I told a friend, one day not long after, that I felt like it was letting go of me one fingernail at a time.
Satan didn't want to go quietly. He had built quite a foothold in my life. Every time I was anxious about something, and it affected my marriage or ministry or personal walk with God...the enemy gained a victory. And he HATED that his win/loss score sheet was no longer so impressive.
Every time I felt worry rise up in my heart, I remembered those hands gripping my throat.
And I fought back.
"Don't worry about anything. Instead, pray about everything." Philippians 4:6
It's been ten years since that night.
I don't get fever blisters in my mouth due to anxiety anymore.
Of course I still get frazzled, and anxious, and worried.
But I no longer believe the lie that accompanies those feelings.
I no longer think there is nothing I can do.
I fight back on the only playing field where I have the upper hand.
I pray.
My kids have become very used to this. On a particularly stressful day they will hear me praying under my breath, and almost always one of them will say to the others, "Shhh, Mom is praying," which is code for "whatever crazy thing you're doing, cut it out because its making Mom resort to begging God for peace." Smart kids.
Sometimes I have no words, or I don't feel I have the right ones.
Those are the times where I let the Spirit pray. "The Father who knows all hearts knows what the Spirit is saying, for the Spirit pleads for believers in harmony with God's own will." Romans 8:27
My fight, the battle for my soul, isn't fought in the four walls of my house, or church, or job, or in the city I live in, or the state I live in.
It's fought in the heavens.
The enemy is tricky. He disguises himself. He's hard to spot.
He's an excellent liar.
I can almost guarantee that you have heard some of his lies today, or that you will before the day ends, and I am quite sure that they don't/won't sound like lies from the mouth of the nasty Evil One.
They probably sound a lot like a rationalization. Or an excuse. Or even a very good reason.
And this morning my spirit, and the Holy Spirit inside me, has had ENOUGH of that.
On your behalf, and mine, I am ticked off.
Because I know what it feels like to have the spiritual life being choked out of me.
Barely able to suck in a breath.
Hardly capable of standing up.
Weak and afraid and alone and powerless.
Except we ARE NOT ANY OF THOSE THINGS.
More lies!
Hear some truth, gasping soul! HEAR IT!
"For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against evil...against mighty powers in the dark world..." Ephesians 6:12
"And they defeated him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony." Revelations 12:11
"For God has not given us a spirit of fear or timidity, but of POWER, love, and a sound mind." 2 Timothy 1:7
"Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom." 2 Corinthians 3:17
"The Lord is my light and my salvation, so why should I be afraid? The Lord is my fortress and protects me from danger, so why should I tremble?" Psalm 27:1 (read this whole chapter!!!)
Pray, saints of God. Pray for each other. Ask each other for prayer.
Don't struggle against the enemy alone. Don't let him choke your spirit!
SEE WHO HE IS.
FIGHT BACK.
And now I feel like I've just taught a spiritual Krav Maga beginners class.
"Though the rain comes in torrents and the flood waters rise and beat against the house, it won't collapse...BECAUSE IT IS BUILT ON BEDROCK." Matthew 7:25
Thursday, May 22, 2014
Normal
It has been a month since I posted a blog entry.
By way of an excuse, I will just say that I've been busy. (FYI, that is my least favorite excuse for anything in life. Everyone is busy, and life busyness shouldn't be an excuse for anything, in my opinion.) I'll rephrase: I've been consistently choosing other things over blogging...like brushing my teeth, and exercising, and teaching my children all that 1st, 3rd, and 6th graders need to know for the year. Also there have been trips to the zoo, weekend getaways with family, toenail painting, redecorating, water gun fights, movies...and more. You get the idea. Busy=Choosing other things.
This week, for example, I went to see a movie with my sister.
By. Ourselves.
Without any of our 7 children.
Its been years since we did that...like ten years, at least.
We had the best time.
It was a movie about motherhood, and it was so true to life that we laughed till we cried.
On the way home I said "We could have starred in that movie. Or written it."
Which is not even a little bit of an exaggeration. If the movie people need material for their next "I'm a mother who may lose my mind or one of my children at any second and at the same time I'm trying to pretend like I've got it all together and insane things keep happening for no reason" movie...they should really call me.
Nate picked up a piece of candy/gum off the floor of Target this week. I stopped him before he put it in his mouth. Why did I stop him? Well, to remind him to "wipe it on your shirt before you eat it," of course.
Gabe tossed a vitally important piece of some robot down the vent in the hall. So I laid down on my stomach, removed the vent cover, and stuck my whole arm in there hunting for it.
My boys have all peed in remarkably inappropriate places in the last few weeks. The front yard, the slip-n-slide, the pool at a water park, the strawberry patch, the middle of the church parking lot.
I put my car in park before jumping out to grab something...except it wasn't all the way in park, it was in reverse, and it started rolling backwards before I was able to hop back in and stop it. It only rolled a few feet, so no harm done.
My 12-year-old daughter started shaving her legs this week. Not because she really, really needed to (she's blond, after all) but because she wanted to for her own comfort. And I said it was okay, mostly because I'll probably be fighting with her over stuff for the next 8 years, and this was one I didn't feel warranted a battle. Still, after giving her a few tips on how to NOT cut her leg off, as well as a forced-casual "good luck," I got sad. She's my baby girl, and she's growing up. When I glanced at my husband to see if he was feeling the same way as I was, he just raised his eyebrows at me and said "she's going to cut her leg off." Sigh...
Yesterday I was soaking up some sun while the boys played in the sprinkler, and the kids started calling that they had found a mouse, killed by our cat, on the deck. I instructed Clay to put on his gloves, pick it up, and throw it away...less than a minute later the dead mouse was dropped on my shoulder. It was still warm. And furry. And accompanied by squeals of laughter. (not mine, I assure you.)
You see what I mean? My life could be a movie. It is anything but normal.
Although...what is normal, really?
I've decided there is no such thing. Life just IS. It changes every day, and any attempt to force it to be a certain way will only result in feelings of failure followed by consumption of entire bags of Twizzlers.
And so, I am adding something new to my list of "least favorite, and therefor banned" sayings. Along with "I've been so busy that I haven't had a chance to..." I'm no longer allowing the phrase "I just want things to be normal..." to be uttered in my presence.
Because normal is a lie. It's a mirage. And if we keep hunting for it, it will become a peace-of-mind killer.
"I have learned, in whatever circumstances, there-in to be content." Philippians 4:11
Even with a dead mouse on my bare shoulder.
I am content. And peaceful. (and also possibly a liar.)
Embrace your normal today. However warm and furry it may be.
And...after a month without blogging, that is, in fact, the best I can do.
By way of an excuse, I will just say that I've been busy. (FYI, that is my least favorite excuse for anything in life. Everyone is busy, and life busyness shouldn't be an excuse for anything, in my opinion.) I'll rephrase: I've been consistently choosing other things over blogging...like brushing my teeth, and exercising, and teaching my children all that 1st, 3rd, and 6th graders need to know for the year. Also there have been trips to the zoo, weekend getaways with family, toenail painting, redecorating, water gun fights, movies...and more. You get the idea. Busy=Choosing other things.
This week, for example, I went to see a movie with my sister.
By. Ourselves.
Without any of our 7 children.
Its been years since we did that...like ten years, at least.
We had the best time.
It was a movie about motherhood, and it was so true to life that we laughed till we cried.
On the way home I said "We could have starred in that movie. Or written it."
Which is not even a little bit of an exaggeration. If the movie people need material for their next "I'm a mother who may lose my mind or one of my children at any second and at the same time I'm trying to pretend like I've got it all together and insane things keep happening for no reason" movie...they should really call me.
Nate picked up a piece of candy/gum off the floor of Target this week. I stopped him before he put it in his mouth. Why did I stop him? Well, to remind him to "wipe it on your shirt before you eat it," of course.
Gabe tossed a vitally important piece of some robot down the vent in the hall. So I laid down on my stomach, removed the vent cover, and stuck my whole arm in there hunting for it.
My boys have all peed in remarkably inappropriate places in the last few weeks. The front yard, the slip-n-slide, the pool at a water park, the strawberry patch, the middle of the church parking lot.
I put my car in park before jumping out to grab something...except it wasn't all the way in park, it was in reverse, and it started rolling backwards before I was able to hop back in and stop it. It only rolled a few feet, so no harm done.
My 12-year-old daughter started shaving her legs this week. Not because she really, really needed to (she's blond, after all) but because she wanted to for her own comfort. And I said it was okay, mostly because I'll probably be fighting with her over stuff for the next 8 years, and this was one I didn't feel warranted a battle. Still, after giving her a few tips on how to NOT cut her leg off, as well as a forced-casual "good luck," I got sad. She's my baby girl, and she's growing up. When I glanced at my husband to see if he was feeling the same way as I was, he just raised his eyebrows at me and said "she's going to cut her leg off." Sigh...
Yesterday I was soaking up some sun while the boys played in the sprinkler, and the kids started calling that they had found a mouse, killed by our cat, on the deck. I instructed Clay to put on his gloves, pick it up, and throw it away...less than a minute later the dead mouse was dropped on my shoulder. It was still warm. And furry. And accompanied by squeals of laughter. (not mine, I assure you.)
You see what I mean? My life could be a movie. It is anything but normal.
Although...what is normal, really?
I've decided there is no such thing. Life just IS. It changes every day, and any attempt to force it to be a certain way will only result in feelings of failure followed by consumption of entire bags of Twizzlers.
And so, I am adding something new to my list of "least favorite, and therefor banned" sayings. Along with "I've been so busy that I haven't had a chance to..." I'm no longer allowing the phrase "I just want things to be normal..." to be uttered in my presence.
Because normal is a lie. It's a mirage. And if we keep hunting for it, it will become a peace-of-mind killer.
"I have learned, in whatever circumstances, there-in to be content." Philippians 4:11
Even with a dead mouse on my bare shoulder.
I am content. And peaceful. (and also possibly a liar.)
Embrace your normal today. However warm and furry it may be.
And...after a month without blogging, that is, in fact, the best I can do.
Friday, March 21, 2014
How He Loves
"And we know that all things work together for the good of those who love God, and are called according to His purpose for them." Romans 8:28 NLT
We all know this verse. Its one of the most popular scriptures for people to quote, usually in an attempt to help someone feel better about a particular trial they are facing.
"It's going to be okay! All things work together for good!"
"Just remember, all things work for good."
"He's working it all out for good."
Can we have a moment of brutal honesty here?
I. Hate. It. When. People. Say. That.
I know its supposed to be helpful, but, honest to God, I have to control the urge to punch the person in their nose.
Because it doesn't help. If that's all you can think of to say...I recommend silence instead.
Knowing the verse doesn't magically make trials go away. Neither does hearing it.
Understanding the promise in the verse does not, in any way, make the THING we are facing any more GOOD. It really only makes the hearer feel like they have been chastised for finding their particular trial difficult. Like we should all just KNOW that our hard times are really good, and that's all there is to it.
It's a stupid thing to say, and just in case you ever think to say that to me in the future...I will most likely control myself and NOT punch you in the nose...but you can never really be certain of that, can you?
Okay, moment of brutal honesty adjourned.
I've heard this verse my whole life. We all have.
But we are missing the point. We can't really understand the point until we have lived it.
Yesterday I was talking to my husband, telling him about my day, filling him in with a moment-by-moment play-by-play, (because what man doesn't want to hear every single thing their wife did all day, right?) and suddenly, in the middle of my recounting, I had to pause, and blink, and gasp.
My husband was looking at me strangely, his glazed-over-eyes clearing as he realized I had stopped jabbering incessantly.
"It was really good, wasn't it?" I stated, more to myself than to him. "Never in a million years would I have thought it could be better this way, but it really is for our good."
He smiled at me, as if he had known all along what I had, only that moment, figured out.
Perhaps you would like to hear the tale? (name that movie...oops, sorry, that's a game Faith and I play, inserting movie quotes into our everyday conversations and quizzing each other...)
The tale goes back almost four years, to the death of my sister, Joy. Most people know that story. I won't retell it. Here are the facts.
She was a missionary in Malaysia.
She died due to complications of a congenital brain defect.
We didn't know she had it.
No one in our family was able to get to Malaysia in time to say goodbye to her.
It was a terrible, tragic, horrible shock.
After she died came even more shocks. It would cost $13,000 to have her body shipped back to the states for burial. None of us could afford that.
And so her body was cremated. And the US Embassy in Kuala Lumpur shipped an urn, filled with her ashes, to my house.
It was just a box wrapped in purple cloth, and it arrived like any other package.
But it was awful.
I sat in the entryway of my house, with my husband and kids surrounding me, and I wept.
And for many months after that, I dreamed that she wasn't really dead. In my dreams she had been taken prisoner and I had to go rescue her, or she had gotten lost and couldn't get word out.
Because I never saw her body. I never held her hand as it grew cold. I never heard her stop breathing.
So my mind had trouble making it real. Sometimes I still have trouble believing it is real.
Fast-forward a bit.
As a family, we decided to bury the urn containing her ashes, and mark it with a headstone, because it would hopefully help us all start to accept what had happened in a country on the other side of the world but had changed us all forever.
So, we found a spot on my sister, Sarah's, property, and we had a graveside service, just our family.
And it was so sad and so terrible, the tiny hole we had to dig to put the box in, and how it didn't take us but a few minutes to cover it over with dirt.
How I ached to kiss her cheek, or stroke the back of her hand, or lay beside her on her hospital bed.
I didn't want the box.
I couldn't imagine there would ever be anything I would feel thankful about with regard to her ashes.
But...
Yesterday I was showing a picture to some friends. It was a picture of Joy's grave, and what it looks like now.
We have created a garden, the Joyful Garden, in the nearly four years since she died. Every year around her birthday, my sisters and I buy and plant something new at the grave, and expand it, and weed it, and put down landscaping mulch. It's really starting to look beautiful.
This year we enlisted a few of our cousins to help us build a stone wall to enclose it.
That's the picture I was showing my friends, a picture of the wall, and how truly spectacular it turned out.
And as I was telling my husband about how impressed my friends were with our endeavor over the past weekend...that is when it really hit me.
We wouldn't have been able to bury her body there.
We would have had to bury her body in a cemetery.
And then we wouldn't have the Joyful Garden.
We wouldn't be able to visit her grave side, and feel close to her, anytime we wanted to.
We wouldn't be able to spend days surrounded by our cousins, working up a sweat to build something that honors Joy.
We wouldn't be able to see the gladiolas blooming, and smile at their loveliness, and be thrilled by how enchanting the garden becomes as the years pass.
The ashes and the urn, and the closure that was so long in coming because of them...those things turned out to be for our GOOD.
They are a blessing.
And I am nearly choking on the words as I write them, because how can anything that includes the ashes of a person we love ever be considered a blessing?
But...the daffodils are blooming right now in the Joyful Garden.
One of the hardest things about the worst time in my life...turned out to be for my good.
If you want to tell me about the hard thing in your life, or the dark place you are in, or the pain you are facing, or the fear of trials, I can promise you I will NOT tell you that God is working for your good.
Because if someone had said that to me when I was holding that urn...I probably would have punched them in their nose.
It's not good, the pain and trial and darkness and hurt. Its horrible, and gut wrenching, and I will probably tell you that I wish more than anything that you didn't have to go through it.
But...God is still there.
He's working.
He's holding you in His arms, and if you let Him, He will keep you from drowning, He will shelter you as long as the storm rages, He will breathe for you when you don't have the strength to take another breath.
And one day, you will have a moment like I had yesterday, where you can look back at the trail, and the trial you've been walking and living, and you will be shocked and breathless to realize...
He worked for your good, even in the tragedy.
It won't make the tragedy less awful.
But it will be a reminder that you are loved.
Somehow, today, those ashes are a love letter to me from God.
How can that be? It's too hard to fathom. It's too much for my heart to bear.
But...there is a garden. The Joyful Garden.
And its the evidence of His love.
We all know this verse. Its one of the most popular scriptures for people to quote, usually in an attempt to help someone feel better about a particular trial they are facing.
"It's going to be okay! All things work together for good!"
"Just remember, all things work for good."
"He's working it all out for good."
Can we have a moment of brutal honesty here?
I. Hate. It. When. People. Say. That.
I know its supposed to be helpful, but, honest to God, I have to control the urge to punch the person in their nose.
Because it doesn't help. If that's all you can think of to say...I recommend silence instead.
Knowing the verse doesn't magically make trials go away. Neither does hearing it.
Understanding the promise in the verse does not, in any way, make the THING we are facing any more GOOD. It really only makes the hearer feel like they have been chastised for finding their particular trial difficult. Like we should all just KNOW that our hard times are really good, and that's all there is to it.
It's a stupid thing to say, and just in case you ever think to say that to me in the future...I will most likely control myself and NOT punch you in the nose...but you can never really be certain of that, can you?
Okay, moment of brutal honesty adjourned.
I've heard this verse my whole life. We all have.
But we are missing the point. We can't really understand the point until we have lived it.
Yesterday I was talking to my husband, telling him about my day, filling him in with a moment-by-moment play-by-play, (because what man doesn't want to hear every single thing their wife did all day, right?) and suddenly, in the middle of my recounting, I had to pause, and blink, and gasp.
My husband was looking at me strangely, his glazed-over-eyes clearing as he realized I had stopped jabbering incessantly.
"It was really good, wasn't it?" I stated, more to myself than to him. "Never in a million years would I have thought it could be better this way, but it really is for our good."
He smiled at me, as if he had known all along what I had, only that moment, figured out.
Perhaps you would like to hear the tale? (name that movie...oops, sorry, that's a game Faith and I play, inserting movie quotes into our everyday conversations and quizzing each other...)
The tale goes back almost four years, to the death of my sister, Joy. Most people know that story. I won't retell it. Here are the facts.
She was a missionary in Malaysia.
She died due to complications of a congenital brain defect.
We didn't know she had it.
No one in our family was able to get to Malaysia in time to say goodbye to her.
It was a terrible, tragic, horrible shock.
After she died came even more shocks. It would cost $13,000 to have her body shipped back to the states for burial. None of us could afford that.
And so her body was cremated. And the US Embassy in Kuala Lumpur shipped an urn, filled with her ashes, to my house.
It was just a box wrapped in purple cloth, and it arrived like any other package.
But it was awful.
I sat in the entryway of my house, with my husband and kids surrounding me, and I wept.
And for many months after that, I dreamed that she wasn't really dead. In my dreams she had been taken prisoner and I had to go rescue her, or she had gotten lost and couldn't get word out.
Because I never saw her body. I never held her hand as it grew cold. I never heard her stop breathing.
So my mind had trouble making it real. Sometimes I still have trouble believing it is real.
Fast-forward a bit.
As a family, we decided to bury the urn containing her ashes, and mark it with a headstone, because it would hopefully help us all start to accept what had happened in a country on the other side of the world but had changed us all forever.
So, we found a spot on my sister, Sarah's, property, and we had a graveside service, just our family.
And it was so sad and so terrible, the tiny hole we had to dig to put the box in, and how it didn't take us but a few minutes to cover it over with dirt.
How I ached to kiss her cheek, or stroke the back of her hand, or lay beside her on her hospital bed.
I didn't want the box.
I couldn't imagine there would ever be anything I would feel thankful about with regard to her ashes.
But...
Yesterday I was showing a picture to some friends. It was a picture of Joy's grave, and what it looks like now.
We have created a garden, the Joyful Garden, in the nearly four years since she died. Every year around her birthday, my sisters and I buy and plant something new at the grave, and expand it, and weed it, and put down landscaping mulch. It's really starting to look beautiful.
This year we enlisted a few of our cousins to help us build a stone wall to enclose it.
That's the picture I was showing my friends, a picture of the wall, and how truly spectacular it turned out.
And as I was telling my husband about how impressed my friends were with our endeavor over the past weekend...that is when it really hit me.
We wouldn't have been able to bury her body there.
We would have had to bury her body in a cemetery.
And then we wouldn't have the Joyful Garden.
We wouldn't be able to visit her grave side, and feel close to her, anytime we wanted to.
We wouldn't be able to spend days surrounded by our cousins, working up a sweat to build something that honors Joy.
We wouldn't be able to see the gladiolas blooming, and smile at their loveliness, and be thrilled by how enchanting the garden becomes as the years pass.
The ashes and the urn, and the closure that was so long in coming because of them...those things turned out to be for our GOOD.
They are a blessing.
And I am nearly choking on the words as I write them, because how can anything that includes the ashes of a person we love ever be considered a blessing?
But...the daffodils are blooming right now in the Joyful Garden.
One of the hardest things about the worst time in my life...turned out to be for my good.
If you want to tell me about the hard thing in your life, or the dark place you are in, or the pain you are facing, or the fear of trials, I can promise you I will NOT tell you that God is working for your good.
Because if someone had said that to me when I was holding that urn...I probably would have punched them in their nose.
It's not good, the pain and trial and darkness and hurt. Its horrible, and gut wrenching, and I will probably tell you that I wish more than anything that you didn't have to go through it.
But...God is still there.
He's working.
He's holding you in His arms, and if you let Him, He will keep you from drowning, He will shelter you as long as the storm rages, He will breathe for you when you don't have the strength to take another breath.
And one day, you will have a moment like I had yesterday, where you can look back at the trail, and the trial you've been walking and living, and you will be shocked and breathless to realize...
He worked for your good, even in the tragedy.
It won't make the tragedy less awful.
But it will be a reminder that you are loved.
Somehow, today, those ashes are a love letter to me from God.
How can that be? It's too hard to fathom. It's too much for my heart to bear.
But...there is a garden. The Joyful Garden.
And its the evidence of His love.
Tuesday, March 11, 2014
Shadows
I've been thinking about shadows lately. (yes, I know that is a totally random thing to be pondering, but that is the way my weird mind works sometimes.)
There is a dog named Shadow in the kids movie "Homeward Bound. He is loyal and brave and tough.
Peter Pan loses his shadow and has to have it sewed back on. He is lonely without it.
In the Lion King, Simba refers to the hyena's home as "that shadowy place."
...clearly I watch too many kids movies...
Depending on the time of day, my shadow makes me feel skinny...or the opposite of it.
Our house casts a shadow on our front lawn, so much so that there is still a bit of snow surviving in places, despite the fact that it was 70 degrees here yesterday.
For the most part shadows are kind of a pain. They obscure things from view. They are a place where sneaky people notoriously hide. They are home to all the creepy, crawly critters. Most plants can't grow there, because there is no light.
And then their are the metaphorical shadows. The ones that lurk inside us.
They rise up at unexpected times and cast their long dark fingers across our hearts, making it cold and sad and lonely.
Shadows of regret.
Of mistakes.
Of unforgiveness.
Shadows of loneliness. Abandonment. Fear. Doubt. Grief.
I have shadows under my eyes this morning, caused by the shadow of grief that lurks in my heart. When it rears its ugly head and blots out the sun, I feel helpless against it. No amount of light pierces it for very long. I swear, this shadow of mine has claws and teeth and breathes fire.
The worst thing about all these heart shadows is: we never know when they will rise up and blanket us in their darkness. Its totally random, triggered by nothing, or by something that doesn't make any logical sense.
And suddenly we are standing in the grocery store, paralyzed by fear.
We are sitting on the couch, and guilt overwhelms us.
We are on the phone with a friend, and unforgiveness is choking the breath from our lungs.
Yesterday some plans I had been hoping to make with my baby sister fell through. She lives in Hawaii and I don't get to see her very often, and I was pretty determined to make this particular plan work. When I finally realized that it just wasn't feasible...I sat down in my bathroom floor and cried.
And cried. And cried. And cried.
Because a shadow had risen up. And I was reminded of a family dinner at a restaurant 3 1/2 years ago, a dinner I wasn't able to be a part of and a picture taken of everyone but me. I was reminded that it was the last pictures taken of my family with Joy in it...and I wasn't there. And now she's gone. And that is a night I will regret missing out on for the rest of my life.
And fear joined the regret, and irrationally I worried that Rachel would die before I got to see her again, and I had a panic attack, because even though she is still on this planet...it seemed no different than trying to get to heaven to see Joy...I just couldn't reach out and hug either one of them.
And it was dark and cold and shadowy in my heart the whole day, despite the fact that it was absolutely perfect outside.
But last night...something else crept in. A whisper. A feeling. A gentle tug.
A song on the radio.
These words: "...find rest in the shadow of the Almighty..." Psalm 91:1
What?
My breath hiccuped in my throat.
My tears tracked silently down my face.
The shadows didn't magically retreat from my heart.
But...
I can find rest in the shadows?
I don't have to fight them off?
I don't have to wait till they retreat?
I don't need the sun to shine?
I can rest in the shadow.
Because its His shadow.
Because all the other ones are totally consumed by His.
Oh. The freedom.
We don't have to wait for our dark places to be filled with light.
We don't have to hang on until the hard times pass.
We don't have to choke back the shadows of past pain that threaten to overwhelm us.
We don't have to pretend the shadows aren't there.
No! Crawl deeper into the Shadow. He is there with us in the dark...and we can rest.
There is a dog named Shadow in the kids movie "Homeward Bound. He is loyal and brave and tough.
Peter Pan loses his shadow and has to have it sewed back on. He is lonely without it.
In the Lion King, Simba refers to the hyena's home as "that shadowy place."
...clearly I watch too many kids movies...
Depending on the time of day, my shadow makes me feel skinny...or the opposite of it.
Our house casts a shadow on our front lawn, so much so that there is still a bit of snow surviving in places, despite the fact that it was 70 degrees here yesterday.
For the most part shadows are kind of a pain. They obscure things from view. They are a place where sneaky people notoriously hide. They are home to all the creepy, crawly critters. Most plants can't grow there, because there is no light.
And then their are the metaphorical shadows. The ones that lurk inside us.
They rise up at unexpected times and cast their long dark fingers across our hearts, making it cold and sad and lonely.
Shadows of regret.
Of mistakes.
Of unforgiveness.
Shadows of loneliness. Abandonment. Fear. Doubt. Grief.
I have shadows under my eyes this morning, caused by the shadow of grief that lurks in my heart. When it rears its ugly head and blots out the sun, I feel helpless against it. No amount of light pierces it for very long. I swear, this shadow of mine has claws and teeth and breathes fire.
The worst thing about all these heart shadows is: we never know when they will rise up and blanket us in their darkness. Its totally random, triggered by nothing, or by something that doesn't make any logical sense.
And suddenly we are standing in the grocery store, paralyzed by fear.
We are sitting on the couch, and guilt overwhelms us.
We are on the phone with a friend, and unforgiveness is choking the breath from our lungs.
Yesterday some plans I had been hoping to make with my baby sister fell through. She lives in Hawaii and I don't get to see her very often, and I was pretty determined to make this particular plan work. When I finally realized that it just wasn't feasible...I sat down in my bathroom floor and cried.
And cried. And cried. And cried.
Because a shadow had risen up. And I was reminded of a family dinner at a restaurant 3 1/2 years ago, a dinner I wasn't able to be a part of and a picture taken of everyone but me. I was reminded that it was the last pictures taken of my family with Joy in it...and I wasn't there. And now she's gone. And that is a night I will regret missing out on for the rest of my life.
And fear joined the regret, and irrationally I worried that Rachel would die before I got to see her again, and I had a panic attack, because even though she is still on this planet...it seemed no different than trying to get to heaven to see Joy...I just couldn't reach out and hug either one of them.
And it was dark and cold and shadowy in my heart the whole day, despite the fact that it was absolutely perfect outside.
But last night...something else crept in. A whisper. A feeling. A gentle tug.
A song on the radio.
These words: "...find rest in the shadow of the Almighty..." Psalm 91:1
What?
My breath hiccuped in my throat.
My tears tracked silently down my face.
The shadows didn't magically retreat from my heart.
But...
I can find rest in the shadows?
I don't have to fight them off?
I don't have to wait till they retreat?
I don't need the sun to shine?
I can rest in the shadow.
Because its His shadow.
Because all the other ones are totally consumed by His.
Oh. The freedom.
We don't have to wait for our dark places to be filled with light.
We don't have to hang on until the hard times pass.
We don't have to choke back the shadows of past pain that threaten to overwhelm us.
We don't have to pretend the shadows aren't there.
No! Crawl deeper into the Shadow. He is there with us in the dark...and we can rest.
Monday, February 17, 2014
Angels
I believe in angels.
I know this isn't news to most people who know me, but I am a bit of a Charismatic. So it probably isn't a surprise to anyone to hear me admit that I believe there are angels among us.
But I don't just believe because I've read in the Bible that they are real...no, I have seen the evidence of their presence.
My mom says that when I was little, I would ask her questions about the shiny man who lived with me in my room. "He's smiling at me, Mommy," I would tell her. She told me it was my guardian angel.
My youngest son, Gabe, used to smile and wave to what he called "that nice bright guy" in his room. I told him that his angel was with him, to protect him. He would nod his little curly head and grin when I told him that the Lord always had angels protecting him.
I am certain there was an angel present the day Nate burned his arm. He was 7 months old and had just started scooting/crawling, and I had walked out of the room for one minute when I heard him screaming. He had managed to pull my 400 degree hair straightener down from the counter and onto his wrist. When I rounded the corner, he was laying on top of it, face down. For a split second I just KNEW his face was covered in burns, but somehow it was only his arm. There was an angel there, with a hand between my baby's face and that 400 degree device. You'll never convince me otherwise.
Last week came the most dramatic testimony yet of the presence of angels.
We got snow...a lot of snow for North Carolina. Eight inches graced the area, and 25 degree temps insured it would hang around for several days.
We couldn't get out of our driveway, and so the kids wanted to search of an acceptable place in our subdivision to go sledding. I got everyone dressed in their snow clothes and sent them out, telling them I'd be a few minutes behind them. I knew they wouldn't last too long, since it was so bitterly cold, and I also knew I would freeze to the bone in half that time because I don't own snow gear, other than a pair of boots. So, I was stalling, taking my time in an attempt to save my southern bones from frostbite.
Less than ten minutes passed, and then I heard a screaming child coming toward the house.
"Emergency!!!!" Clay was gasping for breath and yelling at the top of his lungs.
"What?!?!" I met him at the door, only mildly worried. My kids can be a bit on the dramatic side, being that they are MY KIDS and all.
"Faith...and Gabe...fell...in the...creek..." He was breathing so hard it took him a few minutes to get the sentence out, and my entire body froze.
"What creek? Where is that?" I asked, slamming my feet into my boots.
"I'll show you," he gasped again, and we took off running.
We had to cross behind our house and down the length of the back yard, across the back of a neighbor's yard, and down the side of another yard to get to the hill they had discovered. It sloped down nicely, and I didn't blame them for thinking it was a good place to sled. But on one side of the hill ran a creek...and on the snowy bank sat my oldest and youngest child, huddled together, crying.
They had ridden down the hill together, and gotten slightly off course, and veered into the creek.
INTO THE CREEK.
IN 25 DEGREE TEMPERATURES.
When Gabe tried to stand up, he slipped on the icy bank and fell in deeper, till he was chest deep in the water, and Faith had to wade in further and pick him up. Then she collapsed because her feet were numb and her boots were full of water, and they fell in again. Finally she managed to drag them out of the water, and she stripped off their boots, soggy socks, and Gabe's drenched snow pants. She sat down on the sled with him, and wrapped her arms around him, and that is the sight I came upon as Clay and I sprinted through the snow.
"It's okay Gabe, Mommy is coming," she was sobbing over and over, rubbing his feet between her hands. When she saw me coming, she called out, "I'm so sorry I couldn't stop the sled. I'm so sorry."
They were both shaking violently, and so was I by this point. Yoga pants and a t-shirt aren't exactly snow gear, just FYI.
I grabbed Gabe up in my arms and yelled, "Clay, help your sister."
Sprinting up a hill through the snow is not really an easy thing to do, and its even worse when you're carrying a 40 pound child who is shaking uncontrollably and unable to hold onto you.
I was praying out loud.
Behind me, Faith kept saying how sorry she was, and then she said she couldn't feel her feet and didn't think she could walk.
"Get on the sled, I'll pull you," Clay offered.
"You can't pull me Clay, I'm too heavy. Just help me," she sobbed back. So with one hand Clay pulled the sled, loaded down with the soaked boots and snow pants, and with the other he dragged Faith by the arm.
I had stared coughing pretty hard by this point, and gasping for breath only made me cough harder. I was wet, too, from the water that was dripping from Gabe's coat, and he kept screaming "My feet have needles, my feet have needles."
"Jesus, help me." It's all I could say, over and over, as I coughed and gasped and stumbled to the house.
I don't really remember making into to the house, or getting to my bathroom, or stripping Gabe of his clothes and tossing him into a lukewarm shower, but I do remember that as soon as I put him in the water, he screamed louder, and I collapsed.
Nate was standing beside me, rubbing my back, saying "Mommy, don't go back out without your coat. Mommy do you want a blanket? Are you okay, Mommy?"
"Watch Gabe," I wheezed to him. "I have to go help your sister."
Faith and Clay had almost made it to our yard by the time I got back outside. She was still crying, but she was shaking so bad that she didn't have much energy for sobs, so it was silent tears.
"Is he okay?" was her first question. "I tried to stop the sled, Mom. I'm so sorry."
Telling Clay to get the rest of the stuff inside, I took over hauling her to the house, and had to strip her clothes off her because she was shaking so badly.
Black spots danced in front of my eyes.
"Get in the shower, NOW!" I told her, and then I collapsed again.
I don't know how long it was before I managed to stop coughing. I thought I was going to die. If you've ever experienced nearly frozen lungs, you know what I'm saying when I say I've never felt that kind of pain in my life.
Hours passed before any of us felt like talking about what had happened. I was still coughing and wheezing, and Gabe and Faith were still shivering and sniffling. We were all somber.
Faith kept saying she was sorry.
Gabe kept saying he was scared.
I kept kissing them, and kissing them, and kissing them.
"Faith, how did you know to take off the wet stuff right away?" I finally asked her. "That was pretty quick thinking."
She shrugged her shoulders. "I don't know. Something inside me just said to get the wet stuff off and then snuggle up to stay warm. I knew Clay went to get help, so I just waited, and I just knew I needed to keep Gabe as warm as I could."
Hours later, I called my mom, who was out of town, to tell her about the incident. After I had finished recounting the tale, she asked me a strange question.
"What time did this happen?"
I told her.
"Oh my gosh, that's exactly the time we were praying with some people here, and the lady prayed for protection for my family."
I looked at my kids, Faith and Gabe snuggled up together under blankets, and tears started falling again.
After I hung up the phone, I asked Faith again how she had known what to do. She shook her head.
"I just had this feeling inside that I needed to get us dry and warm. I don't know Mom. I don't know how I knew what to do."
"I do," I responded. I told her of the prayers, prayed by a stranger from 2 states away. "An angel was standing beside you, Faith. An angel was whispering to your heart, telling you to take off the wet clothes and snuggle up to stay warm. The Lord sent an angel to help you."
Every day, every moment, every accident, every close call, every regular uneventful second of our lives we are held in His hands. We never slip through the cracks, we never escape His notice, we are never left to our own strength.
I sprinted up a hill carrying a 40 pound child through the snow. An angel was pushing me, his wings spread around us to take some of the bite out of the wind.
Clay dragged his older, heavier sister up the same hill, pulling a laden down sled behind him, after having already sprinted the hill twice. Angels surrounded him, urging him on, lending their strength.
Faith saved her little brother's life by pulling him out of that water and stripping him of the sodden clothes and wrapping him up in her arms. An angel stood beside her, helping her, guiding her.
Prayers are heard in the heavens. Angels do the bidding of God Almighty, in response to the prayers of the saints.
If you don't believe me, come over to my house and I will walk with you down to where this happened, and you will see what it would have taken for any of us to do any of what we did that day on our own...and you will know what I know, with every breath, with every kiss on my baby boy's rosy cheek, with every moment of quiet snuggled up with my daughter and my sons.
Angels are real. I believe it.
"The angel of the Lord camps around those that fear Him, and delivers them." Psalm 34:7
I know this isn't news to most people who know me, but I am a bit of a Charismatic. So it probably isn't a surprise to anyone to hear me admit that I believe there are angels among us.
But I don't just believe because I've read in the Bible that they are real...no, I have seen the evidence of their presence.
My mom says that when I was little, I would ask her questions about the shiny man who lived with me in my room. "He's smiling at me, Mommy," I would tell her. She told me it was my guardian angel.
My youngest son, Gabe, used to smile and wave to what he called "that nice bright guy" in his room. I told him that his angel was with him, to protect him. He would nod his little curly head and grin when I told him that the Lord always had angels protecting him.
I am certain there was an angel present the day Nate burned his arm. He was 7 months old and had just started scooting/crawling, and I had walked out of the room for one minute when I heard him screaming. He had managed to pull my 400 degree hair straightener down from the counter and onto his wrist. When I rounded the corner, he was laying on top of it, face down. For a split second I just KNEW his face was covered in burns, but somehow it was only his arm. There was an angel there, with a hand between my baby's face and that 400 degree device. You'll never convince me otherwise.
Last week came the most dramatic testimony yet of the presence of angels.
We got snow...a lot of snow for North Carolina. Eight inches graced the area, and 25 degree temps insured it would hang around for several days.
We couldn't get out of our driveway, and so the kids wanted to search of an acceptable place in our subdivision to go sledding. I got everyone dressed in their snow clothes and sent them out, telling them I'd be a few minutes behind them. I knew they wouldn't last too long, since it was so bitterly cold, and I also knew I would freeze to the bone in half that time because I don't own snow gear, other than a pair of boots. So, I was stalling, taking my time in an attempt to save my southern bones from frostbite.
Less than ten minutes passed, and then I heard a screaming child coming toward the house.
"Emergency!!!!" Clay was gasping for breath and yelling at the top of his lungs.
"What?!?!" I met him at the door, only mildly worried. My kids can be a bit on the dramatic side, being that they are MY KIDS and all.
"Faith...and Gabe...fell...in the...creek..." He was breathing so hard it took him a few minutes to get the sentence out, and my entire body froze.
"What creek? Where is that?" I asked, slamming my feet into my boots.
"I'll show you," he gasped again, and we took off running.
We had to cross behind our house and down the length of the back yard, across the back of a neighbor's yard, and down the side of another yard to get to the hill they had discovered. It sloped down nicely, and I didn't blame them for thinking it was a good place to sled. But on one side of the hill ran a creek...and on the snowy bank sat my oldest and youngest child, huddled together, crying.
They had ridden down the hill together, and gotten slightly off course, and veered into the creek.
INTO THE CREEK.
IN 25 DEGREE TEMPERATURES.
When Gabe tried to stand up, he slipped on the icy bank and fell in deeper, till he was chest deep in the water, and Faith had to wade in further and pick him up. Then she collapsed because her feet were numb and her boots were full of water, and they fell in again. Finally she managed to drag them out of the water, and she stripped off their boots, soggy socks, and Gabe's drenched snow pants. She sat down on the sled with him, and wrapped her arms around him, and that is the sight I came upon as Clay and I sprinted through the snow.
"It's okay Gabe, Mommy is coming," she was sobbing over and over, rubbing his feet between her hands. When she saw me coming, she called out, "I'm so sorry I couldn't stop the sled. I'm so sorry."
They were both shaking violently, and so was I by this point. Yoga pants and a t-shirt aren't exactly snow gear, just FYI.
I grabbed Gabe up in my arms and yelled, "Clay, help your sister."
Sprinting up a hill through the snow is not really an easy thing to do, and its even worse when you're carrying a 40 pound child who is shaking uncontrollably and unable to hold onto you.
I was praying out loud.
Behind me, Faith kept saying how sorry she was, and then she said she couldn't feel her feet and didn't think she could walk.
"Get on the sled, I'll pull you," Clay offered.
"You can't pull me Clay, I'm too heavy. Just help me," she sobbed back. So with one hand Clay pulled the sled, loaded down with the soaked boots and snow pants, and with the other he dragged Faith by the arm.
I had stared coughing pretty hard by this point, and gasping for breath only made me cough harder. I was wet, too, from the water that was dripping from Gabe's coat, and he kept screaming "My feet have needles, my feet have needles."
"Jesus, help me." It's all I could say, over and over, as I coughed and gasped and stumbled to the house.
I don't really remember making into to the house, or getting to my bathroom, or stripping Gabe of his clothes and tossing him into a lukewarm shower, but I do remember that as soon as I put him in the water, he screamed louder, and I collapsed.
Nate was standing beside me, rubbing my back, saying "Mommy, don't go back out without your coat. Mommy do you want a blanket? Are you okay, Mommy?"
"Watch Gabe," I wheezed to him. "I have to go help your sister."
Faith and Clay had almost made it to our yard by the time I got back outside. She was still crying, but she was shaking so bad that she didn't have much energy for sobs, so it was silent tears.
"Is he okay?" was her first question. "I tried to stop the sled, Mom. I'm so sorry."
Telling Clay to get the rest of the stuff inside, I took over hauling her to the house, and had to strip her clothes off her because she was shaking so badly.
Black spots danced in front of my eyes.
"Get in the shower, NOW!" I told her, and then I collapsed again.
I don't know how long it was before I managed to stop coughing. I thought I was going to die. If you've ever experienced nearly frozen lungs, you know what I'm saying when I say I've never felt that kind of pain in my life.
Hours passed before any of us felt like talking about what had happened. I was still coughing and wheezing, and Gabe and Faith were still shivering and sniffling. We were all somber.
Faith kept saying she was sorry.
Gabe kept saying he was scared.
I kept kissing them, and kissing them, and kissing them.
"Faith, how did you know to take off the wet stuff right away?" I finally asked her. "That was pretty quick thinking."
She shrugged her shoulders. "I don't know. Something inside me just said to get the wet stuff off and then snuggle up to stay warm. I knew Clay went to get help, so I just waited, and I just knew I needed to keep Gabe as warm as I could."
Hours later, I called my mom, who was out of town, to tell her about the incident. After I had finished recounting the tale, she asked me a strange question.
"What time did this happen?"
I told her.
"Oh my gosh, that's exactly the time we were praying with some people here, and the lady prayed for protection for my family."
I looked at my kids, Faith and Gabe snuggled up together under blankets, and tears started falling again.
After I hung up the phone, I asked Faith again how she had known what to do. She shook her head.
"I just had this feeling inside that I needed to get us dry and warm. I don't know Mom. I don't know how I knew what to do."
"I do," I responded. I told her of the prayers, prayed by a stranger from 2 states away. "An angel was standing beside you, Faith. An angel was whispering to your heart, telling you to take off the wet clothes and snuggle up to stay warm. The Lord sent an angel to help you."
Every day, every moment, every accident, every close call, every regular uneventful second of our lives we are held in His hands. We never slip through the cracks, we never escape His notice, we are never left to our own strength.
I sprinted up a hill carrying a 40 pound child through the snow. An angel was pushing me, his wings spread around us to take some of the bite out of the wind.
Clay dragged his older, heavier sister up the same hill, pulling a laden down sled behind him, after having already sprinted the hill twice. Angels surrounded him, urging him on, lending their strength.
Faith saved her little brother's life by pulling him out of that water and stripping him of the sodden clothes and wrapping him up in her arms. An angel stood beside her, helping her, guiding her.
Prayers are heard in the heavens. Angels do the bidding of God Almighty, in response to the prayers of the saints.
If you don't believe me, come over to my house and I will walk with you down to where this happened, and you will see what it would have taken for any of us to do any of what we did that day on our own...and you will know what I know, with every breath, with every kiss on my baby boy's rosy cheek, with every moment of quiet snuggled up with my daughter and my sons.
Angels are real. I believe it.
"The angel of the Lord camps around those that fear Him, and delivers them." Psalm 34:7
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
KZ #5 2025
The trip has come to an end. We stayed up all night, drove a caravan to the airport, went through the chaos of checking luggage...and then ...
