The Break

In true Dyer tribe fashion, we have been heading out on adventures these mild winter Sundays.  Our latest adventure was to Glass Buttes.  We pile into the car to sit still, all 6 sets of legs and arms.  Twenty questions of “Are we there yet?”  One grocery stop for food.  One potty break.  Four arguments about who gets to play what electronic device.  The six of us mostly content to find what awaits us at the sage covered buttes ahead.

Warmish temperatures, the ground littered with shiny obsidian, shovels, crowbars and buckets.  There is just enough patchy snow on the ground to occupy the two-year-old and keep him from being sliced by the cold, sharp black rocks.

We are all keyed up at finding the rocks and my 10-year-old exclaims “My arms vibrate when I break these things.”  We bash, bang, and break.  The rocks can be pulled up dirty and whole from the ground and if you give them a crack with a hammer or crow-bar, they either shatter or split through.  When they split through, they are smooth, brilliant, and sometimes carry rainbows inside.  Some of the obsidian have mahogany bands running through them making them seem decorated purposely by some grand artist.

It’s all in all a really fine time.  We’ve roasted hot dogs and marshmallows over a fire.  We have a back-end filled with shiny black rocks and we are getting tired and a bit cold.  We load everyone up.  While Michael finishes the loading of the car, I go up the hill to search out some heart rocks to take home.

As I am coming back down, Michael approaches and says “We are now in a survival situation.”  Ever watch Man, Woman, Wild on the Discovery Channel?  If so, you’ll get it.  If not, you won’t.

Our car battery has died due to all the little bodies leaving the doors open.

We are two hours from anywhere. I actually don’t stress at all.  It’s not raining.  We have food.  We are warm. We have cell service.   Because of all this, it is just one more addition to the adventure.   I google “jump starting an automatic.”  We all, kids included, pray Jesus will help us start this car.  We actually try to put the car in second gear and the kids and I line up behind the big black suburban and heave will all our might.  We get the giggles and get it moving simultaneously.  Luckily, we were parked on a hill and so we shove the car down the hill while Michael tries to get it to start.  No luck.  No worse but no luck.  My daughter says, “I hope we have to sleep in the car!”  My 10 year-old son says, “I hope we miss school.”

We all run down the hill and find a little hollow out of the wind, build our second fire pit, and light another fire.  Michael makes some calls and gets a service vehicle to come from and give us a jump.  We have another camp-fire that is somehow more fun than the first.  Everyone is a bit more silly.  It’s dark.  There’s a great old juniper to climb and the fire casts enough light to do so. The kids tore juniper branches and made torches.  A brush fire waiting to happen.  The glorious danger.

A couple of hours later the truck arrives, jumps us, and we head home.

After lots of sticky fingers, chocolate headaches, and a couple little ones falling asleep, we arrive home.  Dirty.  Really dirty.  Smoky.  And we miss the concert we were going to attend.

After kids are showered and tucked into bed, Michael and I are looking at the rocks.  They are each unique in shape and sheen,  break and ripple.  We have our heads bent over a particularly pretty one and Michael says, “It’s all in the break.”

It’s all in the break.

It’s all in how we break.

If we break.

What’s revealed when we break.

We crack through or we shatter.

IF we crack through, we allow a beautiful glory to be glimpsed.  A rainbow of colorful soul.  A band of mahogany heart.

But cracking through usually means you are hit from the outside.  And let’s be truthful.  Who isn’t hit from the outside?  We are all hit at some time or another.  In some way or another.

And it is brutal.

And it is not God hitting us.  Though that be another subject.

And do we allow ourselves to crack through in surrender and exposure or do we true to keep it all together, shattering in the process?

Probably we have done both.  I know I have.

The effect of cracking through and allowing my soul to be bared is good.  I am more me.  God is seen.  Growth occurs.

The effect of shattering because I am holding on (to image, to false-comforts, to control), usually produces  a lot longer process of healing.  It can still happen.  Jesus can find his way in at any time and in any way.  He lives in no boxes.

But something about breaking clean through makes you aware this is no game and you are at the end of your rope.  The end.

When you hold on?  You still somehow believe you can make it.  You believe you can control your way out.

It’s all in the break.  I feel like these words have wisdom that I can’t even quite access yet.  Maybe there is another blog coming up that will tap into some more.

Before we got out of the car that night, I turned around in the passenger seat and asked my kids.  “So, when Jesus didn’t help us get the car started…what did you think?”  The scary thing is, when you dare to ask your kids to pray for something that may not happen…they can make decisions about God.  Good ones.  Or agreements that link their hearts to baggage they don’t really want to carry.

Bevyn says:  “I didn’t care.  I wanted to spend the night.”  And she climbs out of the car with giggles.  Hudson says: “I think God just wanted to help us in a different way.  He helped us find the guy to jump the car.  And he wanted us to have another campfire.”  He says it all through thoughtful eyes.  He’s already been processing this.  Baylor and Gryffon don’t have much to say.

I guess if we are breaking or shattering, questioning or giggling…if we are doing it with Jesus, it will be good.  I hope you are living your adventures under the canopy of his love today.

 

Rescued by Lions

 

Yesterday I was startled by an article titled “Ethiopian Girl Reportedly Guarded by Lions.”  You can read it here. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8305836/ns/world_news-africa/t/ethiopian-girl-reportedly-guarded-lions/

A quick synopsis:  A 12-year-old girl is abducted and beaten by men seeking to force her into marriage with one of them.  Three lions appear on the scene.  They chase away her captors and sit watch, guarding her for half of a day.

Stop.  Go read that again. Imagine it.

A helpless young girl cowering and screaming as she is drug away from her home and then beaten.  By not one man, but seven. Seven men.  One 12-year-old.  Abducted for seven days. Find yourself at 12.  I would have no more known how to get away from seven men at 12 years old then I would have known how to climb Mt. Everest.

So imagine her, imagine yourself, cowering in terror and having the surreal knowledge edge it’s way into your mind that you were either going to die or be forced into a marriage where you would be repeatedly raped and treated like disposable property.

Enduring brutality.  Enduring pain.  Tasting fear.

Tasting dirt in your mouth and blood on your tongue as you are shoved and hit and thrown to the ground.  Stepped on.  Kicked.

And as you lay, living your worst nightmare, a fierce growling is suddenly rumbling the ground underneath you.  Your mind struggles in pain and blackness to place the sound.  As your eyes squint open, you see a black, matted mane and smell the lion’s pungent scent.  You almost faint.  Could life possibly get any worse?  Do you even care right now?

The rumbling growl approaches and starts to sound like a scary harmony.  It comes from one side of you, then the other.  The beating has stopped.  You don’t know if you are glad.  Beaten or eaten?  Which is worse? You continue to lie, weeping and keening, hardly caring what happens.  When all of a sudden there are howls of fear from your captors and they scuffle around in the dirt and are gone.  Gone. Your eyes slam shut. You lay still. You get more tense, if that is even possible. That tawny head sniffs the back of your head. Another nudges your feet. Finally, a smelly, fierce lion looks you right in your half-masked eyes. You stop breathing.

It stares.  You stare. Then it turns around and plods a few feet away on those golden, heavy, feet and sits sideways on it’s haunches.  Flops to the ground.  And waits. Your breath returns slowly but you dare not move. You sense the presence of other lions behind you. You lay there, quiet.  Not sure if you can believe you aren’t being eaten.  Maybe they aren’t hungry and are saving you for later?

Many hours pass and you lay still.  You have to pee but are afraid to move.

Suddenly, the lions rise to their feet and are on alert.  You are fearful it’s snack time. They sniff the air, and are erect with vigilance.  Long in the distance you think you see men.  Shouting.  Calling your name.

You dare not hope.

The men come closer and begin to wave sticks.  You raise your head slowly.  The men begin to yell.  The lions wait until the men are within close range.  Then saunter away, back into the forest. They don’t look back.

Three lions have just rescued you.  They have guarded you.  They have protected you from your worst imaginable end.

Your mind whirls and your heart thuds and you realize you cannot feel your feet.

The men are asking questions.  Their voices sound far away and you are stunned and quiet, emptied of your crying.

And this beautifully strange and horrible thing has made you wonder….who has saved me and what am I saved for?

And the three lions begin to not be lions at all but grander beings with grander purposes and your eyes are open to the divine and life will never be the same.

That’s where my imagination goes for this story.  I hope it’s true.

 

Shoulds

 

My hubby was gone hunting this past week. Making life bend under your hand to be ready to head out on adventures such as this are always difficult. Owning your own business and getting all the details to work out when you are not present can be daunting.

And then there was the fact that we had 5 cords of wood to split and stack on the side of our house. Winter is coming and wood stuck like glue by ice or snow is not fun to stack. He got it all split and the kiddo’s helped with a good bit of stacking.
However, when he left for hunting there were two huge piles still to stack.

I got it into my head that it would be nice to stack it all as a surprise for him. It was cold out. I first sent my two oldest out to stack every time they were fighting. It worked rather well.  In fact, one night when the kids thought it was more fun to get out of bed a million times instead of sleep, I said “Well, there is lots of wood out there to stack.” They had a bit of the deer-in-the-headlights look. Considering to themselves – “Is mom really crazy enough to make us go stack wood in the dark? I think she might be.” And so they went to bed quite well after that night.

So at random times we were all out tossing wood into the red paint-chipped wheel barrel and hefting it over to the woodpile, stacking triangle shaped pieces one upon the other.

It’s actually sort of fun.

I love that you see progress. My life is full of hands that constantly need wiping, load after load of clothes that need laundering, dishes that need washing, and floors that attract mud and crumbs and dog hair. Things just don’t stay done long.

I love making the wheel-barrow as heavy as I can doing my darndest not to tip the thing over. Or if I do, trying so hard to make it to the pile after I right it re-filled. It feels a bit like a challenge.

And I love loving my husband in this way. I like the idea of him coming home knowing he was thought of and that he has one less thing to do.

That made me thoughtful.

I hate to say this…but sometimes I do loving things out of guilt. Out of “shoulds.” I should play with my kids. I should make my husband’s lunch. I should call this friend or that friend. I should finish that e-mail.

Yuck.

I despise “shoulds.”

And I doubt any of those shoulds feel like love to the recipient.

Crud.

As I’m writing this I think I am more aware of how sad this all is.
I intended to write something sort-of inspiring, and there is still a twist of that coming, but I think right this moment I am startled at how unloving I can be. Unloving in doing “good” things.

“Jesus. Come here for me. Let me not live in these false “shoulds” – this false and hypocritical love. This is not who I am in my true heart of hearts. I want to love well. To love with all of me. Not this piece of striving that seeks to earn the affections of others or that seeks peace and everyone “feeling” like they are loved. Forgive me Jesus. I regret my false loves and my broken motivations. Forgive me here and make me new. Unite my heart with yours, moment by moment to live by your love. I thank you and I trust you to do this in me. I love you for being you. In Jesus, AMEN.”

Back to my story. So I really do think as I carry the wood, how much I want to make my husband happy. I want him to feel loved. I’ll stack wood all day long if it means that his heart feels buoyed by love. I might be cold, getting splinters, and neglecting things I need to do inside. But if it is for love? It is worth it.

And I think about how this applies to loving Jesus.

I ran into a lady’s fender in the parking lot the other day. It would have been so easy to ignore. To drive away without leaving my number. No one was there. I considered it. I don’t want our insurance to go up. I always feel like I am making decisions or mistakes financially that cost us. My husband is kinder than I deserve and he would never yell at me or make me feel badly for this. But I do. I feel bad. So in my mind, I think, “It would be easy to drive away.” But then I don’t. Not just because it’s the “right” thing to do. Because I know it doesn’t tell Jesus that I love him. And I want my life to tell Jesus that I love him.

And so I write down my number and my sorry and $1000 dollars later all is well. And it is well. With my soul. When the sweet lady called me back she said “I’ve had this happen more than once and no one has ever left their number before.”

That was my kiss from Jesus. It was his simple statement that “This mattered and you did love me here.”

I’m so glad.

Even though it took a choosing, this isn’t that different from the wood stacking. It is living from love. I love my husband and I love Jesus and the love that comes toward them is imperfect, but bent with a prism of desire. I want to love them. Not because I “should” or it’s “right” or because I will benefit though ALL of that is true. It’s a love born out of gratitude…beauty….strength…years lived together….fighting hard and loving well….broken days and long days of glory. All packaged up into one word.

Love: An unconditional and irrepressible desire for the good of another.

(just made that up or put it together from other definitions I have heard). 

 

Protect

 

pro·tect:

to defend or guard from attack, invasion, loss, annoyance,
insult, etc.; cover or shield from injury or danger.

I am skilled at protecting myself.  No pats on the back, please.  It’s actually quite destructive.  I wrote a friend that it’s like “Caging yourself so you will be safe from hurt and all the while you are keeping yourself from love.”  And who wants to live caged?

But this isn’t about me protecting myself.  The other morning, Michael and I were sitting on the couch talking and he said in his hold-nothing-back verbage, “I was feeling so protective of you, I wanted to
punch someone!”

Actually, I’m totally tempering his words.  They were more violent and had some cuss words thrown in.
I love my husband.

Now, let’s hope he doesn’t go out and punch anyone.  He’s hunting in Eastern Oregon so he can’t.
Unless he has a knock down drag-out with my brother, who he’s hunting with, or an elk. 

What I am trying to get at is this:  For some curious reason, I had never heard him say so strongly that he wanted to protect me.  I am not used to anyone feeling that about me.  I’m sure he has felt that before but
for whatever reason this time, it has not been communicated in a way I can hear
it.

I don’t even know quite how to say this but…I absolutely floated my way through the entire day.

I had this uncharacteristic pleasure all day that I was protected.

 

Michael can’t keep me from harm.  So it’s not that I was safe from hurt.  But I somehow knew I was
covered in a way that I had not known before.  It felt freeing.  I somehow had that much more ability to live life as my exploratory, risky, what-is-over- the-next-hill self.

I also felt a trust in my tender self.  I have a heart that loves unreservedly sometimes and I feel like it’s safer to reign myself in.  And somehow here, in this place, I was freed to love.

And it’s peculiar too because I am studied at protecting people. I feel ferocious on behalf of the hearts of others regularly.  So to have this ferociousness lived out for me seemed like an intentional gift from Jesus.

These words just came played on my playlist:

You love like a Father, You love like a brother

You love like a Lion, fierce Like no other

You violently chase me down, to embrace me

Engulf me in who You are

Amber Brooks, Like You Promised

Jesus has often violently chased me down to embrace me. This is his unruly and intense love lived out for me.  But this experience, made me know what being “loved like a Lion, fierce like no other,” is experientially like.   The first love saves me from myself.  This love saves me to become myself.

I came alive in it.

I was freed up in it.

I was much more me.

And this was love from a man.  From my husband who is as much like Jesus to me as anyone on this earth.
However, he is fallible.

Just wait until I feel this from Jesus.

It’s coming.

And I can’t wait.

Jesus, with breath held, I give you my heart again and again and again.  For every step I take backwards, I trust you to grace me with your ferocious love, and move me 20 steps forward.  I am yours.  I thank you for my husband who embodies your face to mine.  And I wait for you.  I believe I will experience this love from you in a distinctively new-scented way. May my friends who read this glimpse you this intense on their behalf.  For you love like no other.  In your rare and irreplaceable name, Jesus.  Amen.

*And a fun aside?  A few years ago, Jesus told me I was his “lioness.”  He gave me a picture of a female lion on the rocks by our property. That’s what you see above.

 

You

 

Vs. 1

O miracle man I know you in true relief

Not a smiling divine far above me and mine

But a nails dirty wood-man, a tender heart–thief

Singing over my rescue with love like ruby wine

 

Chorus

Star-flinger, night-painter, dark-breaker,

Oh it’s you, really you

And I cannot say how assured I am

But to sing this song of you

Art-maker, warmth-waker, myth-writer

Oh it’s you, really you

And I am undone, so won all for you

Just you

 

Vs.2

As you tip toe through souls like the lion you are

With soft padded feet that still leave us scarred

The rooms of our hearts burdened no more

Unruly beauty spilling over wonder restored

Bridge

My shoulders relax and rest down as I find you

Bleak rule-filled days are thrown far gone

Erased in my love-storm as you fracture me through

And I am but left with this love song

Every craving and ache expanded to make room

For you

 

Pilgrimage of Worship

Matthew 2

I don’t know that I will be able to blog every day about my reading but there is a bit of unexpected time carved out for me now and so I will today.

This day that I turn the pages of scripture follows a restless night’s sleep, the teary kindergarten son up until 11pm because he got his heart- feelings hurt the first day of school, and weird spiritual war-making nipping at our heals.  I’m tired today.

And I read about the scholars in Matthew 2 “on pilgrimage to worship the newborn Jesus.”  And I’m
thoughtful that maybe we are on that same pilgrimage…just different times, diverse lives, unique hearts.  But the same journey…

Then the star appeared again, the same star they had seen in the eastern skies. It led them on until it hovered over the place of the child. They could hardly contain themselves: They were in the right place! They had arrived at the right time!

¹¹They entered the house and saw the child in the arms of Mary, his mother. Overcome, they kneeled and worshiped him. Then they opened their luggage and presented gifts: gold, frankincense, myrrh.

Recently I was trail-running and talking to God and I felt like he asked me to worship him over a situation that honestly, I saw nothing to worship him over.  But I could tell he was asking me to worship any way.

Worship OVER this particular situation. Not just worship God because of who he is but OVER this.

I kind of sighed and though “Ok, God. I trust you but this seems crazy.” And so I started praying and telling him all my doubts and how I didn’t believe in that moment that he could redeem.  How I was skeptical of his goodness here.  I repented of my mixed motives, my unbelief, and my fear of disappointment.  And a song came on my Ipod that said “Nothing can stand in the power and presence of Jesus.”

Here’s the youtube link.

http://youtube/dGv5d8EE34k

(Search Jared Anderson Great I Am if the link won’t work)

And something about that song combined with God’s request broke my heart open and I began to cry and plead and hope and believe.

To worship God over impossible circumstances.

And I think it mattered.  It mattered to my heart for sure.  I think it might have mattered to the hearts of others.  Dallas Willard says somewhere in regards to prayer “Without God we cannot, but without us, he will not.”  That just might be true.

And I guess what I’m getting at is this: I was broken to worship because I saw Jesus in the moment of that song
that said “NOTHING can stand in the power and presence of Jesus.” I heard and felt truth.   Just like the wise
scholars, I was overcome with who he is and could do nothing but worship.

So, maybe, we are all on a pilgrimage to worship Jesus.  To find him who he is, as he is and respond
in delight and worship.  To, like the scholars, exclaim our amazement at being in the presence of Jesus in the grace of the right time and place.  I guarantee you that anything you love about Jesus or think of him is but a scratch of how incredible he really is.

Let’s journey together to get all the glimpses we can of this beautiful,  skin- to-skin close, strangely counter-intuitive and wildly- holy man.

 

Relief

I am accepting Pastor Tim’s challenge with great hope:  To read, each day of the work/school/life-week, a chapter of the Bible.

Today is the first day.

I woke up early this morning, the smell of smoke in the air through my open windows.  The morning is
hazy yet crisp.  I find in my heart a battling excitement and tender regret.  My third little guy, Baylor, starts his first day of kindergarten.  He is beyond excited and I love who he is and know he will thrive and learn and play in kindergarten.  He is ready!

And I am so thrilled for him.

And yet, I remember how sweet our time together has been.  I have loved having him around these past few
years without the chaos of all four kids.  Just Baylor, the baby, and I hanging out together.

It’s been sweet and good.  Not perfect but an irreplaceable charming time.  And so there lies my
regret.  A tender leaving.  A willing surrender and letting go.  I’ll miss this most delightful buddy of
mine.  My eyes prick with salt and I sigh a breath of love and loss both.

We walk into kindergarten and he’s a pro already.  Hanging the grey and yellow hand-me-down
backpack up on the hook marked with his name.  Putting his lunchbox in the meticulously labeled cubby and finding with joy his friend, Lilly, with her name tag beside his at his round red table.  What a very good day.

And this is the day that I bring the first Chapter of Matthew into.

I’m struck by so many things.  First, Abraham.  Jesus came from a beginning of Abraham.  Remember that man?

What floods my mind is Abraham trudging up the mountain with much more regret than I have, for he isn’t just sending his boy off to kindergarten but for all he knows, is bringing him up to die.

Away from Abraham’s heart until life’s end.

Remembering maybe the laughter that must bubble out of this son of surprise and the first trembling
steps and all the fond memories a father has of a son.  He steps foot after heavy foot, not knowing
how he will tell his Isaac that he is the sacrifice for the altar that day and wondering what kind of a God would ask this.

Is he a crazy God?  Is he ruthless?  Does he care at all?  What kind of God asks for your son of laughter?  That must have been such a very heavy hike.  And then the flurry at the end of the journey.  Building the altar,
laying the fire-sticks ready, and answering the dreaded question:  “Father, where is the offering?”  by wrestling his laughter-son onto the altar to begin with knife raised the slaughter of sacrifice.

Can you imagine binding your son with ropes so that when you raise the knife to plunge it into his heart he won’t run from the pain and horror of it all? Perhaps covering face, like Rembrandt depicts so you couldn’t see his eyes or maybe he couldn’t see yours.   We get the knowledge of the end of the story but in that moment, Abraham and Isaac had no knowledge of  how their violence-day would end.

Just writing this, my heart beats hard with the treachery of it.

And then, while knife is raised and tears streaming, the voice of God thunders through the air straight into the heart of Abraham, the heart of Isaac.

“Abraham, Abraham!”

And can you dream of the staggering relief at that moment?  The voice of God you longed for but feared might not come.  Fingers weak in the air holding a knife to do everything that is most counter-intuitive to you?

What pure relief.

And how about that Isaac-son?  Laying bound on a bed of wood, horror-stricken and fear-laden at what your father, your most trusted man is about to do?  Incredulous and heart-palpitating terror fill your whole being when suddenly you hear the voice of God call to your dad and say :

“Don’t lay a hand on that boy! Don’t touch him! Now I know how fearlessly you fear God; you didn’t hesitate to place your son, your dear son, on the altar for me.”

This God-who-will-provide just rescued father and son in the same moment in different but profound ways.

Abraham has in his faith now an altar where God provided in his most desperate circumstance (again – for read a bit of Abraham’s back story.  God had a way of doing this over and over for Abraham.  Sound familiar?  It sure does to me).

Isaac, laughter-boy, will grow in the knowledge that God so loves him that he rescued him from his most frantic and fearful moment.  He will grow into the face of a man who God has rescued.

If we look real close, we’ll see that same face on the people we love walking about here and now.

Imagine cutting the ropes off your son.  Think how it would feel, to grab his hand with your rough one, and pull him off the alter with hugs and laughter and relief and together go grab the thicket-caught ram and lay it upon the alter instead.

I would be doing some crazy joy –dance.  Think little girls holding hands, heads thrown back, bouncing in a circle just for the joy of life.

I am caught off guard by the pure relief in this story.  I feel it as I write.  That bound-feeling of all hope is lost, there is no way out…and then whoosh……..flooding into the air and my soul is the relief of loving God.

The soothing relief of being rescued by him instead of trying in unholy, unrelenting, and completely unsatisfying ways to rescue myself.

I really love God for who he is in this moment.  I may not understand him but I love him right
now.  I really do.

And I’m going to stop writing.  In my mind, as I began this, I thought I would pull out all the unsavory, quirky yet faithful people and quickly detail their place in the line of Jesus.  I only got to Abraham.

A small slice in the life of Abraham.

And I am so won for Jesus in this moment of relief that I am going to hang out here with him.

I hope you will too.

“Jesus, O how you do love us and I love you too and no one, no one is as precious to me as you.  And
it’s all because you loved me first and love me last and I am completely overwhelmed by you.  Let me live and
breathe this relief of love today.  Let every person I find, every prayer I pray, every meal I cook, every dish I wash, every face I wipe, express that crazy love-relief you provide and are.  I love you so.”

 

Freedom

I’m tired these days. LIfe is a long journey. It’s 10:30pm and I cannot pen words for my day.

But a couple of morning ago, I had this thought that won’t quite leave me alone. I’ll share it with you.

I was listening to someone talk about the wedding in Cana where Jesus turns water to wine. The speaker was talking about the extravagance and generosity of Jesus. He wasn’t ready to reveal himself, but did. He didn’t turn water into $10 wine but into the $100 dollar sort. 180 gallons of really good wine. What a party that must have been.

It is amazing. What a loving, fun, generous Jesus. I love wine. I get that it was really good and the crown on the party.

But what made me stop and think was this: Jesus didn’t warn anyone. He didn’t go to the neighboring tent-maker without work and say “Watch it man, you know you are weak right now. Don’t drink too much and make yourself sorry.” Or to the widow whose husband just died and all she wants to do is forget and say “Love, don’t have too much wine or you’ll make choices that haunt you tomorrow.”

No. Jesus, with dignity, grants us our freedom. It doesn’t even say he worries about it. He’s much bigger than me. I worry. I so desperately want to make people choose life and love and hope that I want to set choices before them that make them choose well.

But not Jesus. He grants us a dignity that says he believes in our ability to choose him. To choose life. To choose love. And? He believes in the redemptive love that he and his father offer. He knows it is a love not seen anywhere else.

Because what kind of a love would this be, if he controlled our choice like I would like to?

Not love at all. That’s duty.

Loving Jesus is nothing about duty and all about the unbridled disbelief that you could possibly be loved in all your mess and hopelessness and hurt. That doesn’t disqualify you but instead opens you, opens me, up to receive the love you have been waiting for all your breathing days. The only response can be returned love.

I love Jesus. Can you tell?

Three days later there was a wedding in the village of Cana in Galilee. Jesus’ mother was there. Jesus and his disciples were guests also. When they started running low on wine at the wedding banquet, Jesus’ mother told him, “They’re just about out of wine.”
Jesus said, “Is that any of our business, Mother—yours or mine? This isn’t my time. Don’t push me.”

She went ahead anyway, telling the servants, “Whatever he tells you, do it.”

Six stoneware water pots were there, used by the Jews for ritual washings. Each held twenty to thirty gallons. Jesus ordered the servants, “Fill the pots with water.” And they filled them to the brim.

“Now fill your pitchers and take them to the host,” Jesus said, and they did.

When the host tasted the water that had become wine (he didn’t know what had just happened but the servants, of course, knew), he called out to the bridegroom, “Everybody I know begins with their finest wines and after the guests have had their fill brings in the cheap stuff. But you’ve saved the best till now!”

This act in Cana of Galilee was the first sign Jesus gave, the first glimpse of his glory. And his disciples believed in him.

After this he went down to Capernaum along with his mother, brothers, and disciples, and stayed several days.

 

Celebrate and Dance

I am trying to learn how to become a writer.  Words on the screen, scribbled on college-ruled notebook paper, or jotted on the back of receipts have often felt more comfortable to me than those spoken out loud.  This becoming a writer has been a life-long process and blogging is part of it.  My heart- felt thanks to each one who reads my blog once or regularly.  Every time you read, you witness my “becoming.”  And as a friend of mine once said, “Everyone needs a witness.”  It is true.

One morning as I was perusing the internet, I noticed a writer that I enjoy posted a contest about “Mothers and Daughters.” God spoke  in my heart and said softly, “Write.”  I honestly felt too scattered and  busy, but I sat and wrote for 15 minutes.  I barely edited it.  Then sent it off.  It was sort of half-hearted.  For two reasons most likely, busy like I said and then there is this thing in me that is a bit afraid to try…. because
failing hurts.  If you don’t try, you don’t fail and nothing is lost.

Nothing…or everything.

I found out this week that I was one of the winners of the contest.  And you should have heard me. Excited? No.

Skeptical.

I said to my husband -

“I bet there were only 3 people who entered the contest.”

“I had typo’s and grammatical errors.  I should have edited it properly.”

“I don’t like it.  Why did I send that?”

“It doesn’t really count…it’s not published.”

I sort of moaned around a bit and he just looked at me without saying a word.  I knew my response was off.  Not right.  But that is what I was feeling.

Later, I considered what it would look like for someone I loved to accomplish something like this.
To succeed in some small way.  I would be proud and really thrilled.  I also thought about how to love others well, you have to learn to love yourself.

My son and  I were clumsily hitting some tennis balls this weekend. It was one of those sunny, windy Oregon days.   He was frustrated at himself for hitting the ball out.  I was just happy to be out of hibernation.  I said “Hudson, neither of us know how to play.  We aren’t supposed to be good yet.  We are just practicing.  Let’s just have fun and learn to be more comfortable with the racket and the ball.”  He’s a bit like me.  He wanted to be perfect the first time.

Not much in life is like that.  We have to practice and celebrate the small victories.  Sometimes that just looks like a dance all alone in your bedroom with a big grin on your face.  Sometimes, that’s eating and drinking and dancing together.  Maybe it’s just a small blog telling your story.

I am writing this to tell you about my small triumph.  Jane Kirkpatrick chose my story and put it in her e-mail newsletter.  I get a copy of her new book.   I actually won something.  I am celebrating and asking
you to be my witness.  I’m going to find a way to dance my delight today.

Life is short.  Life is beautiful, messy, and rare.  Our moments of success ought to be marked.
I hope this experience reminds me to celebrate more.  Myself, my children, my husband, and my friends.  We are all worth celebrating.

So raise your glass, tap your feet, and grin for the glory of it all.  It’s a good day.

*  I didn’t see it up yet, but I think the story is supposed to be on Jane’s website at www.jkbooks.com or her Facebook page if you are interested in reading.

 

Safety

Safety is not the absence of danger but the presence of Jesus.

Graham Faulkner (missionary from New Zealand to Guatemala).

My husband’s dad died this week.  Their story is a difficult one.  Michael’s dad, Dennis, was  mentally ill with Schizophrenia all of Michael’s life.  As I write that, the gravity of 35 years of mental illness brings tears to my eyes.  Can you imagine living in a foggy existence of hallucinations, knowing something is wrong but not knowing for the life of you
how to fix it or gain any relief? Whew.  I can’t.  I chafe under a bad day, how would I fare under a lifetime of mental torture?

There were some good moments.  Michael tells about a time he and his younger sister visited Dennis where he was “normal” and apologized for not being the dad they needed.  I remember vividly the bear hugs he gave (even me…though I’m not his kid) every time he saw us.  I recall always being surprised that he knew each of his kids whether they had seen him a few days ago or a few years ago.

My favorite memory will be this:  Michael and I went down to Texas two weeks ago when we heard how ill Dennis had become.  He was flat on his back in a nursing home that was like most nursing homes.  Too many patients, too little room, sterile walls, white tiled floors, and an array of people in wheelchairs and walkers, whose hope had long been gone.  I HATE nursing homes.  I am not the nice visitor.  I am the fidgety, anxious visitor.  God had been pressing on Michael to go and make sure there were no words left unsaid between him and his dad.  For Michael, that meant expressing his desire to see his dad in Heaven.  Michael did not want to maintain any regrets.  It’s a big thing to find all the words to tell someone concisely how one Jewish man who lived thousands of years ago leapt into your heart and demolished you in such a way that you chose to place your every allegiance into his scarred up hands.

Especially to someone with a mental illness.

My husband told his story and THE story in the most insistent, gentle, and persuasive way.  I wish I had a recording.  I can’t quote it for you.  I can’t tell you exactly why it was so beautiful.  Except to say that seeing my great big husband leaning on the edge of the bed so he could be heard and that he could hear his dad was one of the most precious things I have ever seen.  Michael has a “trueness” about him that is contagious.  I mean by that – he doesn’t put up with anything false.  It’s what first drew me to him.  He makes you want to live like that just by being with him. He’s like Jesus in that way.  Jesus is the only one else I know who is so  “true.”

As Michael explained himself, his dad got real twitchy.  Squirmed in his skin and just seemed uncomfortable.  I honestly thought maybe Michael was pushing too much.  My mercy jumped out and almost made me say “STOP.”  I’m glad I didn’t.  At the end, when Michael finished he said “Dad, why did you get all stressed out?” Dennis said “I don’t know.”  Michael said “Yes, you do.  Why?”  Dennis tried to skate around it but finally answered “Because it’s too much to live up to.”

WHOA.

I have had years of thinking I had to live up to something too.  That is a brutal weight to carry because you have no hope of doing so.  If we are his, the affection of Jesus is as much a covering on our souls on our darkest day as on our most shining
hour.  Our experiences change but his love?  His love is secure.

Michael tried to unravel what Dennis thought he had to live up to.  It was hard.  Bitterness and unforgiveness had
been rampant in his life.  A difficult divorce.  Years of failures and a broken heart.  That day we went home wondering
how effective we had been.  So much water under a tenuous and rickety bridge.

That morning we had breakfast with friends.  They both said some things about forgiveness that caught our attention and just made the word “forgive” sit on our hearts a bit.  That evening, Michael’s cousin Phil said “I wonder what would happen if you went in and told your dad you forgive him for everything he hasn’t been for you?”

The wisdom of friends and family is great.

So the next day, Michael goes in and eventually (no- we did not spiritually brow beat his poor dad the whole
time. We hung out too.) said “Dad, I need to ask your forgiveness for not being a great son.  I should have visited
you a lot more than I did.  I should have been here for you.  I’m really, really sorry.  Will you forgive me?”

IMMEDIATELY Dennis says “You got it.  I forgive you.”  Heartfelt.  Without  hesitation.

Then Michael says, “Dad, I forgive you too.  I forgive you for being unavailable in my life.  I forgive you for not being there for me.  I forgive you for not being the man who taught me to drive a car or build a shop or shoot a gun.  I forgive you for
everything.”

Dennis is quiet.  And very restless.  He appears very uneasy.

Michael says, “Dad, the way you forgave me – when you said “You got it.”  That is just the way Jesus forgive you.
There is nothing to live up to. It’s just a gift.  People teach that there is something to live up to but there isn’t.  It’s just
relationship.  I want to know, Dad, that you will be in Heaven with me.  I want to sing with you.  I want to live knowing
who you are when you aren’t sick.  I want to walk on the beach with you. I want to experience all of Heaven with
you.   I love you, Dad.”

The hallelujah chorus did not break out.  Angels didn’t visibly surround us.  Dennis didn’t magically say “Yes, I believe in Jesus!”

But a work was done….I am sure of it.  Michael feels peace.  He is sad for all of his losses.  The losses have been long and sustained.  Life is not easy.  I’m thinking of my quote at the beginning.  I actually thought I’d write something very different from what came out.  There are other ways this quote is applicable to my life right now. And yet how true it is in this story.  Life is full of hurts. It is not worth living in a way that shields us or those we love from those hurts but instead we must live each day, each moment in the presence of Jesus.

It is only there next to Jesus that we can be sustained in love, through the hurt, to the redemption on the other side.