What I was in for

I was not prepared. I was not prepared to lose all sense of who I am for so many years or doubt every decision so completely that I gave up making choices entirely. I couldn't have imagined how intricately I would begin to criticize every human being's behaviors, including my own, and the height of standards I'd expect around children who notice everything and nothing like flipping an invisible switch. I was caught off guard by the mental water torture at the close of each day where every drop highlighted a short coming in the last 12 hours to the point that a once quite confident, borderline arrogant, woman would consider checking willingly in at the nearest mental facility. I was shaken to wake up years down the road and, looking back,  see the depression only after regaining some semblance of emotional stability. 

I had no idea, pre-motherhood, that when I judged a parent, based on their toddler's behavior, she was blaming herself as well and had no idea what to do having exhausted the gamut of sage advice and paperback solutions which all fail because three year-olds are innately insubordinate, boundary obliterating geniuses. I was also shocked at the vast ocean of competitive mother's and childless do gooder's opinions and unsolicited advice I'd have to stoically swallow for each "behavior" my little learning human would temporarily test. I could never have seen what I was in for and if I had, I wouldn't have chosen parenthood.

 Then, I'd have missed out on what what can only be considered insanity because that hardship is probably the biggest accomplishment into which I will ever unknowingly step. My kids have made me angrier, more helpless, violently humbled, and broken than any experience could have and in so doing, also forged within me a bigger portion of  strength, bravery, happiness, self assurance, and fulfillment than I could have found without them. In fact, before children I had no clue, even in the meeting of my husband, what love REALLY is. Because of these lessons, I am a better wife and friend since I know what suffering for those you love means. If you can endure screaming, stomping, smashing, embarrassing, unrelenting, selfishness for days on end and hover over their peacefully sleeping bodies willing to love and hold and kiss and provide for them again day after day you can handle most anything anyone else does to you - just as long as no one does anything to THEM!

A lovely place, indeed.

I want to speak to you of love, because that is the only thing worth the vast expanse of time and the short portion of this life that is mine. I have bonded to Christ in the Song of Solomon way. Instead of doubting His affection, I know it well and where once before I ran away, being frightened of the demands of that bond, I now run toward Him. Even on hard days. Even the ones in which I am angry at God. I will not pretend to agree or remain pleased about everything for He knows my mind and it is changing slowly, but for love's sake I will continue our eternal walk enamored.

You see, before I fell head over heels for my dearest and we became inseparable, I was unwilling to compromise. Our flesh yearns after selfish things because before we find true love, we only love ourselves. But the person who has found undeserved kindness and trust and a patient, lifelong, loving partner WILL yearn to please them. Trust me, when you find the Christ for whom the prostitute was willing to place her lips along His mud streaked feet, you will WANT to make changes for His pleasure.

The body of Christ is like a friend who knows your perfect companion and, because they think fondly of you and wish to see you live your fullest, most glorious life, will go out of their way to set you up on a date. They introduce you to a kindness, a comfort, a security so beautiful it is indescribable. So with bated breath and scarce held joy they wait for love to bloom upon your meeting. With great anticipation they fondly recall the chapters of their own romance in hopes that soon your eyes will also glisten with a contentedness it could never have known otherwise.

Isn't that lovely? Isn't that as it should be? Where then are our fond friends and patient, happy conspirators? Somehow, I believe most have turned bullies ringed around and throwing rocks at the weak kid in class. I am watching the would be bride run headlong in terror from the suitor the mob represents because rather than familiar friends, the pillars of religion are behaving like a pimp's enforcers dragging their master's new conquests into enslavement with beatings and hate filled scare tactics.

Was that harsh? Over the top? Ghastly and frightening and wrath conducing? Have you now the rocks in your hands for me as well?

Love is like a painting. The artist carefully envisions all the wonders they wish to capture. They choose a color palette with the hopes that the finished piece will somehow allow onlookers to feel even a small portion of the limitless fount of inexpressible affection radiating from their own heart. Then, they set to work. The sun and moon cease to be markers of time, each stroke an expression of emotion so deep and full. The artist's hopes, fears, wrestlings of spirit secretly hidden beneath layers of paint soon emerge into a glorious work of art. Our relationship with the living God is much like this work of art. You may look upon mine and be inspired but you will never know the true beauty held therein until you hold the brush in your own hand.

You can stand and critique all the aspects of my painting, submitting my most sincere and personal journey to your philosophy, upbringing, and interpretation of biblical knowledge of good and evil. You can watch my love and I muddy our shoes along the roads of our finding each other out and listen in to the public conversations between us sharing your bag of apples among your circle of well polished, agreeable colleagues. Occasionally, you can come to the conclusion that a representative of your crew should chuck a well meaning rock at me under a sadly veiled guise of love to prevent me from some pitfall you've divined in my future and then return to your safe circle nodding in unison about how it wasn't cruel if it was for my own good and widely agreed upon. But I implore you to STOP watching about like a socially accepted collection of stalkers and loose yourself in your own painting, in your own journey, in your own truest love! Only in that way will you win admirers to the suitor you represent.

Were the gallery of life full of such paintings wouldn't the world be a lovely place, indeed?

Who am I? Seriously, who?

If I wake from a coma and no one is there to remind me who I am, how will I know which car in the parking lot belongs to me, which home is mine to enter? How will I know what is mine to use or give away or what profession I hold and to which boss and authority I answer? What if I was a vile human being before but I wake up not remembering that with a chance at being someone else? I have the choice to believe and accept the life from before or abandon all and start anew. When I was saved, it was like being woken from that coma and I turned to God, to the Bible, to tell me who I am. Forget who I was before. Forget who ruled over me before.

Who am I now? Seriously, who? I believe in God. I believe that Christ is my savior but what does that mean for me? Do I have a life of come what may, in which I am subject to evil in and around me as before, powerless only to hold on for death until I can be with God, promised only a life with Him AFTER this life is over? Or have I died already and woken up into a life of power, abundance, blessing, and authority over evil? If I am dead and Christ is alive in me, then whose power do I have? Whose authority have I been given? Not to say things won’t be infinitely different when we are spirit alone, but I am not there yet and, therefore, unconcerned because it will come in its time and my place is secured. I AM however, concerned as to the point of my current existence and the tools which I have been given. If I do not know who I am, how can I be who God intended me to be when He formed me in the womb, when He put a destiny in me for His kingdom,  predestined me to be conformed to the image of His Son (Ps 139:13 &16, Romans 8:29)?

Christ is my gateway to holiness (Col 1:22), perfection forever (Heb 10:14), the righteousness of God (Rom 3:22), power and authority in the earth (Luke 9:1).  I believe that Christ extends the spirit He bestowed upon His disciples to me as well, being one. Christ is as a man taking a far journey, who left his house, and gave his work and authority to me (Mark 13:34). I am adopted to sonship, heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ (Romans 8:15-17).  His seal is on my head, no other! (2 Cor 1:22) I do not live in the realm of the flesh but in the realm of the Spirit (Romans 8:9). The Spirit God gave me does not make me timid, but gives me power, love and self-discipline (2 Timothy 1:7).

I have overcome the evil one and (2 Cor 5:13) I can extinguish all his flaming arrows. (Eph 6:16) Not that the ruler of the air wasn’t able to come against me before I knew Christ, it’s just that he cannot now for I am seated in heavenly places (Eph 2:1-6). Satan was cast out of heaven and Christ gave me the ability to overcome all the power of the enemy (Luke 10:18 &19).  He still wanders about seeking to devour but I’m entirely capable of resisting (1 Peter 5). If I resist, he will flee (James 4:7). Furthermore, I am tempted by my own evil desire and enticed (james 1:14). But no temptation has overtaken me that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let me be tempted beyond my ability (1 Cor 10:13). I am powerful, full of power, not weakness (2 Timothy 1:6). It’s my job to fan into flame the gift of God, and live up to what I have attained (Phil 3:16).

 Paul admits not having reached it yet but continues to strive heavenward. Choose as you may to believe these things attainable only after death only when you reach the fullness of heaven separate from our earthly bodies. Or choose to embrace the possibility of reaching such goals during life, having believed that heaven is at hand now and we are seated in holy places with Christ currently. It’s your choice. Be it to me as I believe for faith was and is ALWAYS the key to spiritual gifts, revelations, and healing. Those in the wilderness died there for lack of faith. I would rather press on to a promised land in this very life. (2 Peter 1:4) I would rather participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. I will try as hard as I may to possess the qualities that will keep me from being ineffective and unproductive in my knowledge of Christ. Most importantly, if I know who I am and who I’m meant to be, then I know what power I have, what hope I have, how great I am intended to become.

We have all been given a choice, and in making that choice head down a path. Only, that is not the end of our choosing.  Those who have chosen Christ walk toward the same end goal, but it is still up to us to choose the tools we carry and the toolbox is open to us all. Our way can be joyous or mournful, we can become strong or weak, we are able to let the enemy in or keep him out. We may display patience or impatience, gratitude or selfishness, love or hate, forgiveness or grudges, peace or wrath, self control or lack thereof. We can put on our armor or cast it off. As Christians we still have many, many choices to make.

the daises need to stop wishing they were roses

No one's life is perfect.We hear that all the time. We hear it so much it's just one of those meaningless things we say like, "tomorrow's another day". We know as they escape our mouths that it was just noise, just a thing to say to fill the uncomfortable sorrow, just a wishful thought devoid of hope and meant as a mild excuse for all our countless daily shortcomings. We shouldn't be arrogant, or selfish, or conceited but we have taken that WAY too far, to the point, almost, of self hatred and abuse.

When does it all get to be OK? It's ok we went to bed with a sink full of dishes because we were having a family day at the park. It's ok the kids went to school dirty from yesterday when we worked in the yard all evening and were too tired when the meltdowns started to mop an entire bathroom after the bath time deluge. It's ok my kids ARE neat and tidy and I'm really good at organizing and scheduling and cleaning.  It's ok we didn't have kids at all. It's ok I work as a janitor and go fishing on the weekends. It's ok I rock my white collar job and never want to step foot outdoors at all.  It's ok I don't care about politics or Monsanto, or what sale is where. It's ok I like to boycott loads of things on principle. It's ok I HATE crafting. It's ok sometimes I'm sad, or mad, or feel a little melancholy for no reason. It's ok I'm always pretty happy. It's ok I have what they call ADHD and I don't see it as a defect at all. In fact, really actually LIKE my brain all sped up and bouncy without meds.

There aren't enough hours in the day. There's another one that suggests we fail at time management, at seizing the day, at life, but would that help? REALLY? How super-person do we need to be? The kids are loved. Some work got done, some family time spent together.  When will what we DO become ENOUGH? Who will teach us how to live our lives with contentment because we LIVED our lives, together? We made a GREAT run of the day and, yeah, we skipped a few hurdles and wrestled with our emotions but, all in all, the day was full. Not FAILED.

The older I get, the more humanity's plight breaks my heart. We live like husks of people. Blowing to and fro on a wind of rush, rush, rush and in the breezes of better, better, better. We pass on to our kids and our friends the idea that we are failures when they look up to us as their everything. Ok, so any kid past five or so decides the world should be THEIR way and we parents are in THEIR way, but come the hurts, the questions, the fears, and delights to whom do they run to share them? We teach everyone that no matter how hard they work or how much they achieve, it will NEVER measure up.

Just who are we measuring, anyway? We have to be Martha Stewart, Gordon Ramsey, an astrophysicist, coupon mom (or dad) of the year, Bill Gates, that super spunky soccer parent, the foremost authority on everything, a successful career person, homemaker extraordinaire, and Jesus all rolled into one.  And that is what we teach our kids they need to become if they want to be good at life, but we tell them that they are great how they are. They know what you really mean: I have to be better, better at everything, and you will be enough, maybe, probably not. No, you'll never be enough.

Not to say we shouldn't have goals and aspire to greatness, but seriously, we ARE pretty awesome already. LIFE is pretty awesome, even when it's sad. Accept your strengths without embarrassment because GOD gave them to you, it wasn't really any credit to you alone anyway. It's ok to be GREAT at things. Let your weaknesses be ok, too, because we are all a different part of a whole body and we were built to be great at some things and utter junk at others. Why? Because other people were made to be awesome at that other stuff. Not to SHAME you but just to live with variety, with spice, with individuality and wholeness! 

You need a bunch of different flowers to make a bouquet. We can't all be daisies and we can't all be roses and the daises need to stop wishing they were roses and realize that some of us prefer daisies anyway (and some don't). In the realm of flowers I fancy myself a milk thistle. It's sharp and wild and horrible for gardens, unfriendly for picking, and not at all meant to be in a bouquet, but draws butterflies and has a deep, deep root. What kind of person are you? Can that just be ok and, most times, even GREAT?

like a homeless child in a strange city

When I was 15, I gave myself a tattoo. I scorched a needle with a lighter and dipped it into my brother's "borrowed" bottle of India ink and marked myself with my first love's initials. Recklessly and with full abandon, I made a poor choice. Isn't that usually the way? These days I find myself contemplating a new one, something suitable to cover my mistake. I'd rather not have made it, like so many others, so many worse. 

Sometimes I wonder how we can look at people in the midst of their mistakes and judge them for it. Somehow their poor life choices or attitudes suddenly become the basis by which we decide just how much sympathy they are worth and how much kindness we will offer.  Sadly, we withhold the very love that God offers so freely to us all in our brokenness. He aches over them and mourns for their return to safety, return to Him. He grieves their loss while we condemn them. How long ago was it that we ourselves perfected our own behavior? For whom has Christ come, the righteous or the sinners?

Underneath the blinding brightness that covers our sins is a righteousness of filthy rags yet we would pretend to be more than our brothers lost yet in their suffering. Why would we not extend the hand of mercy when we know how similar we are and realize that we walk with our best friend while they stumble alone? 

God alone knows how many more failures it will take before they choose to walk with Him. It may be tomorrow. It may be the end of their life. Perhaps, I shudder to think, it may not come at all and the frivolous pleasures of this life are all the joy they will ever know. How devastating! Does that not feed our compassion and assuage our fire for judgement?

In all our church attendance, all our serving, all our pleas for our own guidance, knowledge, healing, growth, in all our sacrifice how can we harden our hearts to the very ones God has called us to love? How many times should we forgive our brother? Often the ones we judge most harshly sit right beside us in the pews. If someone hits us in the face, the Bible says to let them have another go. So how can we who call ourselves His, look with such disdain on those who are only hurting themselves far worse than anything they could possibly do to us?

Matthew 9:12-13 “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.' For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

Just because our sins without Christ were committed years ago and now we sin with the knowledge that He makes us clean, does that permit us to abuse those who are currently sinful and alone? I have done so much wrong I could NEVER atone for my own mistakes so why would I expect anyone else to be able to do that for themselves? I am so thankful to be a new person and my heart is so broken for those who haven't made it yet that I feel no anger at their position but pity, instead.

I imagine I can grow closer to God, more favored, by sacrificing my life and deeds to Him. I used to think that because I was His and chose His ways, wore myself out doing good deeds in His name, He would love me more but now I see I was wrong. Just as a mother, whose son is in jail, has lost no love for her child but is full of anger and pain and longing for his future, so too is the Father for His lost children and so too should we be for our wayward brothers and sisters. 

I have decided to cover my past ink laden mistake with one simple word: Mercy. Then I will always be reminded to offer that above my sacrifice, to everyone. I cannot atone for my own sins with my actions, however changed, improved they may be. Neither can the currently lost find redemption by cleaning up and playing church. It is God given and we are all as worthy, the currently saved, as those who do not yet walk with Him or those who are falling away. The only difference is, we have found our true love, our best friend, our home, while they flounder alone like a homeless child in a strange city and we throw rocks.......

End the Bout and Retire

I lost myself. Somewhere in the giving of my body to pregnancy, every dream to the desires of my husband, every second to the needs of my children, and the stray moments of cultivating a life of philanthropy, I feel I've nearly ceased to exist.

I've read one book in 3 years. One book for sheer pleasure, not spiritual devotion, not education, not children's tales. I miss reading. 

I miss quiet, thoughtless moments. Even in the few hours after the kids have gone to sleep my head is full of this barrage of planning, criticizing, questioning, agonizing, processing, frustrating. Even letting it go, whatever the IT may be, is like diving into a dog fight and wresting one animal from another.

I have FOUGHT a momentous battle in myself. I KNOW "we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ." (2 Cor 10:3-5) I fight against my OWN mind. 

I KNOW "Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it" (Matthew 16:24-25) But I have not done it willingly and, at times, have even been bitter over such a calling. "Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver." (2 Cor 9:7)

The Bible tells me He will give me peace, that His burden is light. Mine is VERY heavy, but I don't know how to put it down. It seems a great mental effort to let a thing go and even then it is truly not released for it springs again to my mind, later, and later, and again. I want to hold on to my books, my crafts, my dreams, my plans, my desires but the time for those things is consumed by the needs of those around me. 

The world would advise "me" time. I know it's NEVER enough. I have taken such time and am even more loath to return to my duties then I was before I lavished an hour or two on my own indulgences. Nowhere, that I have found, is this encouraged in the Bible. To be honest I find no respite in it either, there's a constant pulling toward duty that keeps me from enjoying it.

I feel I give almost my all to everyone. I have a few expectations. I have recently been emotionally shattered and, I feel, financially cheated. I am told, it seems, by people that expectations deserve such demise, as though I am at fault for believing people should be more thoughtful. In any case, I am advised to "pray for those who mistreat you. If someone slaps you on one cheek, turn to them the other also. If someone takes your coat, do not withhold your shirt from them. Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back." (Luke 6:28-30)

I have carried, drug, wrestled, and been defeated by a gaping hole called UNFULFILLED my whole life, not without warrant, mind you, but even the most easy, stable, and perfectly functional life has its pitfalls. Though it be a large thing that trip me and a small slight that trip you, we are both on our face in the dirt. The point is, I want to detach myself from my emotions and lose myself to others with no regard how they treat me. I want to do what I should DESPITE them all and devoid of bitterness. I want to call the constant boxing match between my duties and desires in favor of obligations, end the bout, and retire. 

Somehow I think when Jesus said, "Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends." (John 15:13) he wasn't only foreshadowing His death and speaking of diving in front of a bullet. He was telling us to forgo ourselves, our personality, desires, longings, loves, sometimes even dreams, for the sake of everyone else and especially God. How do I get THERE?

Beat the human out....

As usual, I have been struggling a LOT. When the Bible describes us travailing in birth pains until our son ship is manifest (Romans 8:22). I know EXACTLY what that means. It seems the fruit of the spirit does not come easily to me at all. I am rebellious, sadly. I buck everything and when I KNOW I should think, feel, act differently than I do, the wrestling match begins. I have to beat the, well, human, out of myself. It doesn't go peaceably.

Raising children is an insurmountable task for me.  I need to be more than I am so that I can teach them the proper things. I don't want them to struggle with the same issues spiritually. Believing, as I do, that God is true and He deserves praise, worship, loyalty, and love from every living thing, it is then my duty to help them along this path so they achieve more in it than I ever could. It is my goal to be their ladder, or really to let Christ work through me so that He is their ladder. This means that I cannot do what I want. I am in doubt. I do not know how to be more than I am. I do not have a childhood bank of object lessons from which to pull. So I pray because God must show me how to be the right parent, how to attain and exude His glory, not my own.

I struggle with contentment, envy, and, as I mentioned, authority. Knowing God and that His will is the same as my own in conquering these foes for Him I trust my prayers will be answered and my enemies put under my feet, not without diligence and sacrifice on my part. I have been asking how to be content for quite a while. I want to be a Godly wife, not just a good one. That's hard. It's self-sacrificing. It means I come last.

So while the kids were down for a nap and I wanted to watch tv, I found myself griping about wasting those precious and limited minutes loading the washer and the wood stove and putting on dinner instead. And suddenly as well as finally, He spoke to me. I was carrying a armload of wood to the fire stoking my own flames of neglected desire in the process and suddenly the thought was whispered, "Be thankful for this wood." 

That rough, heavy, daily chore became a blessing. I am warm. I am able bodied. The loading and starting of the washer, no longer a chore. I am not huddled in a doorway with too few clothes shivering my life away with no hope of help or love or kindness. But some are.

I know we know this. At odd times in driving or praying or eating or teaching our kids we say, "Kids in Africa would be glad for this." Truth be told there are people in your very town that would, too. But then we forget. We get mad about lines at school, about policies at work, about the dishes, the laundry, the never-ending honey-do list. These chores MUST be accomplished, most daily. God, help me, help us all, always see them as the blessing they are and forget instead to be frustrated.

As I was heading up from the basement where the wood stove and washer are to put on supper, Mathew 13:12 came to me: "Whoever has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him." I don't think I really ever understood this verse before now. In a spiritual light my peace and joy stand to be taken and my gifts in life will become a burden. If I can be thankful for my duties and in them find blessing, I will have joy added to my action but if I hold on to the frustration, the task becomes arduous and all goodness is then taken from it.

one poorly handled tantrum at a time

Today as I was losing my cool with the kids I started all that poisonous mental talk. You know the kind: Why am I always stuck here with all these responsibilities?  Why can’t they just do what I say? Why so many messes. Oh poor pitiful me.

I realized suddenly that I have been calling my blessings a curse and utterly shirking my responsibilities.  I fancy myself a warrior, built for battle, standing up for the side of right.  But honestly when it comes to the actual battles in life I cowardly run away, refuse to deal with the issue, or throw a tantrum in my mind that would rival the ones for which my children are sent to their rooms.

Instead of dealing with the dishes, I check Facebook. Instead of folding the laundry, I clean the relatively clean bathroom. All the while this bickering is running tickertape fashion through my mind.  It’s no wonder there is so much harshness escaping my mouth, so much yelling.  It’s no wonder I feel so angry.

I have been called to fill the most beautiful heads with Truth, with example, with love and in explicit selfishness I choose my coffee, my television shows, my time.  My time I deem better spent entertained and self served rather than an example of patience, honesty, diligence, sacrifice and forethought.  It is often discussed in circles of wizened empty nest mothers how they long for the youth of their children whose hands are no longer the size we inexplicably feel the need to replicate in every medium possible.  Here I am wishing my babies’ childhood away one poorly handled tantrum at a time.  And really many of their tantrums are my fault.  It’s their last resort after my attention and negative is better than none.

I am a fixer. Every scraped knee, lost job, or passing sorrow sparks an immediate flood of solutions on righting the tilted ship. I do not wallow in seeking out the how-did-this-happen except to remember what future pothole to avoid.  I want to know how to make it right.  In my most vulnerable of moments, after the screaming stops and everyone settles back into themselves, like birds suddenly startled ruffle each feather back in place on the safest branch they can find, I am shamed and I ask my husband to fix me.  Give me that one piece of advice that will change how I think, change who I am, because in my head I know I don’t want to be this furious and malcontent person.  I don’t want to be the tyrannical dictator ruthlessly exacting my demands on all my lowly subjects – or family, rather.

As ineffectual and perhaps insane as it may sound I need to learn to be my own contender.  I have to stand up to me.  For every negative viewpoint I must counter myself with the positive until good thoughts beat the poor ones out of my head enough times they just stop coming around.  For every self debasing lie I must remind myself who I am, who God says I am. I must meet the challenges He sets before me and fill the role for which I’ve been created with warrior-like stoicism.  

Everything takes practice and this mind renewal is no exception.  My kids deserve better. My husband deserves better. I deserve better but what’s more God deserves everything I have to give.  This race, like any other, must be run for the right reason and the finish line should be reached panting and spent with every selfish desire pushed aside and pain ignored until my goal has been achieved.  First though, my goal must change.  Instead of coffee or rest or computer time, instead of friendships or crafting or gardening, instead of ME, my goal must be HIM and showing them who He is and how to house Him because that’s what we were made to be: temples, brides, and friends – of God.

Beyond this mortality

I've lately been struggling with a loneliness that steeps everyone in my life in poor taste.  Somehow my friends aren't really friends. My family doesn't really care.  No one sees me for who I am but only for what I can give or do for them. Suddenly, I found myself going down the list of people in my life and checking off the ways in which they've failed me.  I was making my emotional weakness their fault instead of taking responsibility for my own selfish cravings.


Obviously none of these perceptions about others are true but the emptiness and longing they create feels real. Now, before any of you truly awesome and supportive friends read this and start offering up your lovely words of encouragement and ego-stroking kindness, I want you to know that I don't want any of that. My purpose in writing this isn't for my own encouragement but for that of others out there that I know need to see that they are not alone.


Then suddenly (as He often does) God shook my conscience a bit and said, "Now you know how I feel." What?! How could the King of Kings, Creator of the universe relate to my petty misgivings? And it dawned on me that the whole point in the creation of man was for a companion.  Evidently there was a loneliness that existed before we were made.

God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong ( 1 Cor 1:27). We feel stupid talking out loud to the air or believing that a love from someone who has no arms to hug you or lips to kiss you can be more satisfying than the faulty and often selfish love from another person. But we aren't talking to the air, not if we truly believe in God and His methods are higher than ours. I asked God to increase our relationship more by being more physically tangible and He refuted that I need to make our relationship stronger by learning to be more spiritual because He is spirit. We want God to operate more in the manner of touch and sound because with that we are more familiar but He is ever calling us for higher purposes, for a life in, but much further beyond this mortality.  He offers a real healing, a true cure, while we often seek only an aspirin to mask the symptoms.

I truly believe that in ALL things (even the most horrid) God works for the good of those who love him and seek His purpose (Romans 8:28). So I found that He was using one of my most despondent moments to teach me to lean on Him.  You see He knows you the way you want some human in life to know you. He loves you more than your spouse, your friends, your parents love you. He will not fail you like people can. God uses all of our pains to beckon us toward His outstretched arms. Our longing for earthly recognition, for human acclaim, comes from a dark place but our deep and tender desire for companionship is not only mirrored by but also only truly fulfilled by the Almighty.

My happy is ecstatic

I am full of passion. My happy is ecstatic. My sad is heartbroken. My anger is flammable. I am painted brilliant colors with the sun reflecting blindingly off of them.

I often feel like a bull in a china shop, as if everything I say and do runs someone over. I feel forceful. I feel strong. I feel like a gust of wind when most everyone else is a dandelion seed.  I get the impression people as a whole would rather we all be subdued, tranquilized, if you will. They seem to say quite often, "Calm down." So I hear, "Lie down, wild horse. Lie down among the teacups and Fabergé eggs.  This is OUR home now and you must be - complacent. Have a pill. It'll help you..... conform."

I feel that in their wide stares and silence at my exclamations of elation or outrage or fervent disappointment.  I feel it most when I am dead wrong and no one will stand  up and point out that my whirlwind is headed in the wrong direction. I know it in the fact that I have often been diagnosed as bipolar, ADHD, and depressed by sidewalk psychiatrists. Any child who jumps and runs and climbs and sings while some adult is explaining for the fifty thousandth time the importance of constant sssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhhhhh and sit still is force fed sedation.

I want to run headlong into the outdoors and yell with my head turned back to where everyone is mindlessly milling, "Look, look! Do you see this green grass? Do you feel this wind and the sun on your skin? Do you feel ALIVE?!!? I want to smash their stupid smartphones down and say, "Hey! Did you notice the trash in the gutter, the old lady struggling with her grocery bags, the people with their bruises? Don't you want to DO something?!"  How can we spend hours fighting gameboy zombies and screaming encouragement at teams that can't hear us while all the while deeming it too tedious to fight life's REAL atrocities like champions? I am AGHAST. I am shaking with incredulity.  Aaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrggggggggghhhhhhhhhh. (I seriously did say that Argh just now but quietly because the kids are sleeping.)

I feel like life MATTERS. People MATTER. Ideas and behaviors and how we treat each other makes astounding difference. We paint our world and the lives of others with the words that come out of our mouths and the motions we make with these God-given, flappable, flailable, wrappable, squeezable, jumpable, flingable, loveable limbs. I feel like I DO have something to prove and I get the overwhelming urge to run up and shake people and yell, "LIVE! There is only one of these lives and it MATTERS what you do with it! Don't you know that?" Don't you?

into the trenches of wars that aren't ours

I wanted to give you all something lovely and encouraging for Thanksgiving but time and again, the words were not there.  In their place swirled a thousand thoughts, a relentless barrage of melancholy. I could not shake it so I will share it.

Countless times I've heard people say, "It looks like you have it all together." "It looks like you can handle it by yourself." "It looks like you don't need any help." "You are where I want to be." You need to know that it looks that way because my smile is set when you peer through the window of my life for a brief moment.  You don't see the suffering because I carry it inside.  I have all the patience in the world with my flailing, sprinting, climbing children because I have lost it enough times to feel guilty and had to reason out the appropriate punishment and the times when I have to concede to their youthful vigor.

I am reminded that I have seen worse, but I am not without my breakdowns. I have cried for so long that there were only tearless, breathless sobs left, that my eyes were all but swollen shut and had a vicious headache from the racking emotional trauma.  I have watched the people I love most whither away.  You do not see the inner toil of every day because I do not broadcast it on social networks or rush to tell when people ask how I am. Mostly, people don't care anyway and even if they do, a brief hug and a little chat doesn't fill the emotional pantry when you've been starving all your life.  My biggest turmoils now are for those who are where I was or those whose souls are so far lost I don't know how to begin to speak to them about God.

Most people don't actually want to "touch" the problems of others. They want to offer an encouraging word, some scripture, and get on with their day feeling thankful that they don't have those problems or superior that they don't make such stupid choices.  This reality is my nemesis.  We are supposed to cover one another, to stand between them and their attacker, whatever that may be. To do so means to put yourself in harm's way. It means you willingly give up your comfort for theirs, even if they don't deserve it.  Your heart is broken because theirs is.  All too often we smile and hug and say, "If there's anything I can do...." and then wait for the person in need to ask for something tangible. 

If you really know what it is to need, you know that isn't how it goes.  We have to get to know people and then surprise them.  Discover their troubles like Shurlock Holmes (because they won't tell you) and then toss off our warm blankets, give up our full bellies, miss the events we wanted to go to, and dive into the trenches of wars that aren't ours.  We have to suffer our secure hearts to hurt with those that hurt and guess what, it bloody well hurts - a lot. 

Mostly, it hurts because even in your suffering with them, you can't fix it.  You can't take their addiction or make them feel worth something. You can't promise them health or financial ease.  You can't piece together a broken marriage, a broken person, a shattered hope.  You can't guarantee the people will ever change. You can't throw material things at what most often turns out to be an emotional hole and hope to fill it in. All the hugs in the world won't bring back someones baby or rewrite someones horrid childhood or amend the scars of someones misdeeds.

A meal, a smile, a friendly talk, clothes, cars, toys, a ride to the store won't fix the major problems but we need to give all that and, most importantly, we need to give it consistently.  Ultimately, the problem is loneliness.  Our consistency tells someone we really do care, every time, not just when it's convenient for us. We are willing to wrestle internally with our own opinions and offer love and encouragement instead of stern advice and self-righteousness. The reality is only God can heal their suffering, and we need to be there to remind people, even when we doubt that sometimes. 

We wonder why such a powerful, loving Creator allows things to happen.  We cry, we scream, we rant, we feel depressed and then we must remind ourselves that our emotions are lying to us.  The truth of the Bible says that He is always with us, always loves us.  He is the only one who knows our beauty the way we want the world to appreciate us, after all we are wonderfully and fearfully made, each of us, by His hands. He hurts as much, even more, than we hurt when we are falling to pieces.  He knows us and our needs even better than we do and he doesn't give us more than we can handle, even when we are eye-swollen, chest-crushed downtrodden.

So why doesn't He just fix it?  I don't know. I wail out the same question time and again.  I rant and rave at Him when I am mad at being broken because He knows I am and there's no use hiding it. I know full well that the deficiency is in me and not my perfect Creator. All I know is He knows what we need to accomplish His purposes in our lives. The rub comes when we'd rather our purposes prevail. 

We'd rather stuff our face with popcorn and sit at home watching a movie as soon as we get off work than take the risk of letting the girl who just missed the bus into our car, near our purse, with our kids. We refuse to forgo the few moments of peace we planned for ourselves that day to take her to her drug dealer's house (because that's where she was going anyway) and impart a few words of hope, of truth, a lack of judgement and scorn along the way.  She may have clothing on, a healthy physique, and a pocket full of money (intended to provide the only escape for a tortuous internal struggle that is her only reliable companion rather than her electric bill) but her need is greater than ours and we can take a few minutes to offer, without pressure or disdain, a greater hope.  We can offer her our heart broken for her trouble.

In the end, I still have problems. I still feel lost, alone, burned alive in anger, and have breakdowns but in retrospect they are nothing compared to what I've known, which is why I seem to have it all together.  Besides, I have a true companion, though I need to be reminded sometimes.  My true struggle is how to know where to help, how to offer someone the stability I have, how to ensure my life is not pointless, how to make them see the one true God has given them a comforter, a counselor, a hope that can succeed even when everything else falls apart, a hope that returns when you've lost it all and this is a problem that never goes away and never stops hurting.

Successful a thousand times a day

Most of the moms I know strive to be superwoman: to cook, clean, raise the kids, smile, make some money, be crafty, smile, make friends with everyone, help others, please our husbands, and day after day plaster on that infallible- uncrackable- strain the corners of your mouth till it hurts smile. I want to say to you as well as myself the one thing we fear to hear the most, the one thing we feel we could never willingly do: give up. 

I don't mean get in the car and drive away or sit on the couch all day until your man comes home and wonders why the lights are off and the kids have painted the walls with toothpaste and eaten poptarts that were obviously thrown over the baby gates into their rooms.  I mean stop pretending.  When someone asks you how you are, stop saying "fine" when you feel like you'd like to tear your hair out and scream profanity at everyone you know until they think you may be possessed and either call the pastor or have you committed.  Every now and then I say, "I'm  not answering that question today" and yes, people give me weird looks. So. 

Some people don't want to hear that I was just shaking with rage and may have been screaming like a banshee five minutes ago because my daughter poured coffee on my keyboard and destroyed what few moments of escape the Internet was expected to provide that day. "Frustrated" will suffice.  You see, when we pretend to have it all together, other mothers who are losing their minds feel like they have to pretend as well because why would they want to seem like the only one on the road to insanity.

I'm not encouraging pessimism. I have to remind myself of all the good in life on a minute by minute basis sometimes to remain collected. We all do.  But we need to open up and be real.  Yes, it may let some people in that we would rather not have peering over the edges of our fortifications into the delicate ticking of our hearts but it may also deter some who think it's horribly disgusting to let your three year old eat that gummy bear that's been unknowingly living for months beneath the couch.  Let's be honest.  Their kid is probably sick a lot because their immune systems don't get to play "Conquer this substance" on a regular basis and you'd rather not have the worry fanatic as your friend or their child's constant stomach virus playng on your kids' toys.  Don't misunderstand. We all know that if there's something growing on it, or hair, or the couch was really at the doctor's office you should probably take the candy. But who doesn't benefit from a good mouthful of dirt now and then? And who needs everyone to be their friend?

That seems cold? Mean? Rude? No. Real. The people meant to be in your life will be there even when you tick them off sometimes.  Trust that the lessons meant to be shared between you and another for betterment, despite the fact that your living styles are as opposites as oil and water, will be transferred more easily if you are who you are.  If you LIKE cleaning all the time and are scared to death of germs, good for you.  I am not. Good for me! You probably know the fastest way to get mildew scum from under the suction cups of the bath mat and I could REALLY use that tip.  I, in turn have the healthiest kids on the planet so you're safe inviting them to your sanitized house.

We are going to keep trying to be superwomen because, listen closely, WE ARE SUPERWOMEN even when we feed the kids cereal for dinner and expect a cup of coffee to work for our breakfast and lunch.  Don't worry you'll eventually get back on track.  I mean, soon the lack of nutrition will make you pass out (almost been there) and you'll actually have to eat more than a few bites of the kids' PB&J's while you wipe their fingerprints off the wall. 

Some poor woman out there needs to know that the only reason you get there early and your kids are clean is because you fed them in diapers and strapped them in the car seat to keep them in one place while you bathed them with wipes, then put their clothes on five seconds before she walked up.  Plus you'd been driving around the block for ten minutes because you couldn't stand to stay in a house that had so much work taunting you with lies about your imperfections.  We are successful a thousand times a day and to be that we have to let a handful of expectations go.  Now we need to stop letting those "failures" trick us into thinking we are not fanTASTIC. 

The things we miss are not failures at all, they are the less important stuff disregarded to chase grasshoppers and hear our babies laugh.  I am pushy sometimes.  Some people need a push and I can be your go to.  Some days I need a meek friend to influence me to shut up, take a breath, and really SEE the afternoon.  Now and then I need a person I don't like very much to make a valid observation so I can be MORE of a superwoman later in life, or a friend to do the same.  Sometimes I even need to feel a little down so I can hear those I love tell me things they may never otherwise reveal.  Everything builds us and life is full of beautiful things, ugly moments, profanity, personal triumph, aggrevation, impatience, love, snot, embarrasment, and hilarity.  In case you don't already know this, God loves you in all of it and so do most of the people you hold dear. Don't be afraid to color the world with you.

Dutiful

I keep the warm in with tattered cuffs,
and a zipper that once knitted the teeth of a wind breaker.
I am an eyesore among blazers and self important suit coats,
Begrudgingly sobering amid fairy wings clutching after daydreams.
World worn, I gather firewood and drape the aching bones.
Beloved of broken hands, sweat starched and faded,
I am the everyday.

The sun not scorch them

I can remember adults laughing and encouraging children to scream profanity at one another and "fight back". It was so ingrained in us that by the time we were teens it was a kill or be killed environment in our homes, at school, even in our friendships.  I was a master at keeping everyone at arms length while finding their cracks so if ever the need arose, I could take them apart subtly, over time, with well placed, poison laced, barbs of humiliation aimed at their most personal, deeply hidden, insecurities.

I was a master at subterfuge but now I am changed, a God kind of changed, and had I even bothered to remember the names of all my conquests I would scarcely be able to make up for the level of emotional torture I caused in my sick quest for power and self importance.  I am, frankly, aghast at the person I once was.  God has changed me so much that it seems I only read about that villain in a twisted novel in which evil was written the leading role.

Today, I marveled at the fact that at a year and two months old my daughter can hug me and say "I love you". That she tells people "thank you" and my son is the most beautiful little man I've ever known, when he isn't hitting his sister.  As my husband was tying up the trash bag, I bent down and picked up an empty bottle that had fallen and added it to the collection before the knot was finalized. 'Riah said "Thank you, Mommy." and I asked , "What?".  He said, "You helped Daddy".

For a moment I was dumbstruck at the implications of his expression of gratitude.  He was appreciating my kindness for someone other than himself?! at nearly 3?! I am overcome by thankfulness for the love in my life.  God has changed me so efficiently that I am writing on these blank little slates He's given me and they, in turn, will show the world a love that my universe never knew growing up.

Just before bed I asked 'Riah, "Who made us?", thinking he would be baffled at the question but wasting no time he responded, "God".  And here, between God, Cornerstone Family Church, and us at home is where my prayers are answered because David was a man after God's heart but many of his children fell away. The cry of my soul is that my life would be such an example and that God would see fit to put such a helping of His spirit in my babies that for generations my lineage would sing high the praises of the most high, that long after I am dust and gone even from memory my heritage know His love. I don't want to be famous or publish a testament to my own literary skill. I don't need fifteen minutes on TV or any personal luxury or glory. 

Every fiber of my being aches to be an example of selfLESSness and love and to plant seeds that will bear fruit delectable to my Maker long after my name is not even a whisper on this earth.  Today some of those seeds pushed up out of the ground and unfurled their tiny little leaves and I pray the sun not scorch them, teenage years not trample them, and I never tire of feeding them good example even when I am so tired I'd rather close the door and take a bath instead of teach my tantrum throwing kids how to be kind to each other with long suffering persistence.

To wear a life that fits

I finally feel comfortable in my own skin.  I was going to post this as a Facebook status but then, after pondering my disappointment at the lack of commitment the "like" button provides or friends' attempts at one liner empathy when they really had no clue what I was talking about, I decided that this statement held far too much gravity to be so blithely presented to the world. It's like the way we sometimes turn being born again into a Christian catch phrase that demands people jump on board even when they're on the fence because we've made them too ashamed to admit they really don't know.

I used to burn inside like my skin was a prison and I was meant to pierce a hole in it so the real me could fly out freely, invisibly, into the air.  Like I was meant for more than disease and rotting flesh or the restrictions of femininity, age, intelligence or any other social boundary. Spiritually this was oh, so true but there, in that time, it came out wrong in translation. I felt tied to the pavement like a helium balloon tugging to be freed and doomed to lunge against my string until the day I would run out of strength, wrinkle, and sink.

I didn't know Christ. I heard God speak to me, urging me to seek His truth.  But I felt I was abandoning "good" people to an eternity of suffering. I was their executioner and by believing in Jesus I was throwing the lever, dropping the floor out of the gallows. Even then, while half of me wanted to deny Him and all of me was running, I wanted to be like Him.  I wanted to offer myself as the bridge, sacrifice my eternity for all of theirs but I didn't want to pledge allegiance to a God who would let them burn.

So in my teenage lusts I lost myself.  I made up my own system of right and wrong and dove headlong into driving passions. I lived the street life, not to its extreme but close enough to cast my lot.  I was set on fire inside, voracious, ever eating, never full. I was a pack animal and I fought my way to the front. 

I have always been victorious on the paths I chose.  Inside me lives a warrior who rarely tires.  I'm the kind of fighter who will drag themselves up, down in the fourth round and bleeding freely, and fight like life itself was the prize.

These days my skin fits like it was made for me because God put me in my true purpose.  Now I fight for a reason. The fate of other people isn't up to me.  I am a light. I am a leader. I was meant for this life.  It is the only one like it that I have. There is a mission to be fulfilled before eternity in this form. I am called and I will not wish it away. 

I do not long after the rapture because it will come in God's time and I will be there.  Were it to come now, there are those that would not stand and they are meant to be among us. So I will fight for them because God himself has called us to tug the arms of our brothers and sisters as they follow a tantalizing but deceitful scent. Some will jerk free and go their way, like I did for a time.  Many will try to tug you along, but a few will wake, as though from a haze, blink the past out of their eyes and run with us.

Some days I am still afraid for others. Every day I want to jump in and take their place. I see their cages and watch them try to scratch free of their skin and I wish they could know how it feels to wear a life that fits.