Choose Life, Speak Life

The difference between experiencing life and death today can be as simple as the words that come from your mouth.

Death and life are in the power of the tongue: and they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof. – PROVERBS 18:21

Deuteronomy presents us with two choices: “I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses.  Now choose life…” (30:19).

These options are not difficult to understand, but there are only two.  There’s not a third option to search for or a compromise where you get to pick both.  A simple black and white.  Although the world is rash and careless, it is important to recognize how much power – that of life and death- our words contain.  It’s something the world is used to, but something that is incredibly important to the LORD and is found all over the Bible.

1) Notice the imagery that is paired with things like lying, flattery, pride, slander, cursing, etc.  It is full of death.  Pretty serious stuff.  2) What comes from the lips shows what comes from the heart.

• My enemies cannot speak a truthful word.  Their deepest desire is to destroy others.  Their talk is foul, like the stench from an open grave.  Their tongues are filled with flattery.  -PSALM 5:9

• A lying tongue hates its victims, and flattering words cause him ruin.  -PROVERBS 26:28

• He who rebukes a man will in the end gain more favor than he who has a flattering tongue.  -PROVERBS 28:23
• To keep you from the evil woman, from the flattery of the tongue of a seductress.  -PROVERBS 6:24
• And the tongue is a fire, a world of unrighteousness.  The tongues is set among our members, staining the whole body, setting on fire the entire course of life, and set on fire by hell.  - JAMES 3:6
• Rumors are dainty morsels that sink deep into one’s heart.  -PROVERBS 18:8
• Do not spread slanderous gossip among your people.  -LEVITICUS 19:16
• Help, O LORD, for the godly are fast disappearing!  The faithful have vanished from the earth!  Neighbors lie to each other, speaking with flattering lips and deceitful hearts.  May the LORD cut off their flattering lips and silence their boastful tongues.  They say, “We will lie to our hearts’ content.  Our lips are our own – who can stop us?”  -PSALM 12:1-4
• Their talk is foul, like a stench from an open grave.  Their tongues are filled with lies.  Snake venom drips from their lips.  Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness.  -ROMANS 3:13-14  [Why would you want to identify yourself with someone whom God describes as being DEAD, DECEITFUL, and full of POISON?]

Here’s something that I have found very convicting.  Read this verse:

• As he loved cursing, so it is come unto him: As he delighted not in blessing, so let it be far from him.  As he clothed himself with cursing like as with his garment, so let it come into his bowels like water, and like oil into his bones.  -PSALM 109: 17-18  Cursing in an unhappy situation or to prove a point might not seem like anything… until we realize what this verse is really saying: God keeps people unhappy BECAUSE of their speech!  It basically says don’t expect God’s blessings when your mouth is filled with cursing.  Again, speech holds an incredible power. 

 

 

But as for us, the Lord says, “You must be holy because I am holy.” (1 Peter 1:16)  As sons and daughters of Christ we can choose to put on the crown of Life and let people know Who we belong to.  Be serious about your purpose, identity, and high calling over your life.  Look at the alternatives that are presented here.  The following are all addressed to the Church:

• So then what partnership has righteousness and lawlessness?  Or what fellowship has light with darkness?  -2 CORINTHIANS 6:14
• Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving.  -EPHESIANS 5:4
• Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear it.   -EPHESHIANS 4:29
• Now put all of them away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth.  -COLOSSIANS 3:8
• If anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his heart, this person’s religion is worthless.  -JAMES 1:26
• Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.  -PHILIPPIANS 4:8
• In the same way, their wives must be respected and must not slander others.  They must exercise self-control and be faithful in everything they do.  -1 TIMOTHY 3:11
• Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.  -ROMANS 12:2
• Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others.  Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves.  -PHILIPPIANS 2:3  Every Christian has the duty to deny his own desires and seek to edify other Christians with what he chooses to say.
•  So then, let us aim for harmony in the church and try to build each other up.  -ROMANS 14:19

 

Glorify Christ with what comes out of your mouth.  Worship him with the conversations you have.  Claim to be a son or daughter of the Lord and then show that you mean it.  Please love enough to call me out when I mess up, so we may produce good fruit.  Let the only One who can tame our tongues take control, and begin to experience freedom!

We have the privilege to speak life into a lifeless world.  Rather than wasting worthless words as is so common, there are other words that are full of value – ones that empower others to make life-changing choices and point them to Christ.  Love, encouragement, genuine kindness, thanksgiving, and wisdom. 

Obey the command; accept the invitation to be who you were meant to be and take the narrow path that leads to Life.

COLOSSIANS 3:16-17

Let the words of Christ, in all their richness, live in your hearts and make you wise.  Use his words to teach and counsel each other.  Sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs to God with thankful hearts.  And whatever you do or say, let it be as a representative of the Lord Jesus.

 

 

take heart, take courage again

I have this faulty way of thinking that has surfaced once again just recently.  And here it is:  asking for things.  I don’t know how to do it.  And the worst part of it is that I always expect to get a “no.”  I expect to be disappointed.  Why?

Even since I was a little girl, this has been going on.  Whenever we would be in the store and I would see something I liked, I would be too scared to ask for it – for no real reason.  My little brother, being my complete opposite, would ask for everything.  Because he asked more than I did he was told “no” a lot more often in comparison, but there were also a lot of times that he was told “yes.”  And in the times that he was told “yes” I would wish that I would have voiced what I actually wanted because I totally would have gotten it.  Instead I would always wait until my parents or grandparents would invite me to want and urge me to, “Go pick something out,” because I was afraid that wanting too much would make me greedy or high-maintenance or something.  And this was me as like a four-year old.

I still have a hard time with the idea of asking for favors, imposing, or being “too much.”  I don’t know why it is sometimes hard for me to believe that God wants to give good gifts.  I always feel like I’m imposing too much by asking.  Is that even possible?  To impose “too much” on God?

It was only until last spring that I was shown a little bit of God’s heart in abundant giving and actually understood it from His perspective.  I was working at the Rec Center at the time… and let me just say that their hours are not ideal.  On Easter weekend, they were to remain open normal hours (even though an overwhelming majority of college students go home to visit family on this particular weekend).  This meant that we still had to be fully staffed.  Naturally everyone had requested that weekend off, but our boss couldn’t give it to everyone.  I was scheduled to work the closing shift that Saturday night – right in the middle of a weekend in which I had already made plans with my family, and they were really important to me.  I was very disappointed, but I didn’t expect anything to change.  Then out of the blue, my coworker, Chris, took that shift from me.  Not only that, he also took everyone else’s shift for that entire weekend.  He sat there at that desk all weekend long, for twelve hours each day, so that everyone would be able to visit their families.  I cannot even begin to say how much I appreciated that!  I could not express my gratitude enough, so as soon as I got back I wanted to do something nice for him.  Knowing that he loves food and sweets, I told him that I would make him anything he wanted, and I really meant that.  I love to bake so I really would have made him anything, and I would have enjoyed it doing it.  I asked him, “Chris, what do you want?”  At first he said, “Oh, nothing.  You don’t have to go out of your way to do that.”  After assuring him that it really was no problem, he finally said that he would actually really like some brownies.  Of course I made them for him, but I was a little disappointed that he had asked for so little.  I can make some pretty great stuff sometimes, and anyone can make plain old brownies.  It could have been better, but he didn’t ask.

Receiving starts by asking.

In my own life, by not asking, I realize that I am claiming self-sufficiency, which is just another form of pride.  Saying “I’m-fine-as-is”, in essence is settling.  Being self-sufficient robs you of the opportunity to ask for more.

I think when the Lord asks us, “What is it you want?” we settle for much less than what is really in our hearts.  Somehow thinking that by asking for less, we have a smaller opportunity to be disappointed.  However, God does not disappoint.  Or we think we want too much and then feel guilty.  Wrong again.  Killing off what you want doesn’t make you less greedy.  It just makes you numb and apathetic and purposeless.  Don’t kill your desires to make you more ”holy.”  Desire is actually what compels you to act and accomplish great things for the Kingdom!  It draws you near to God.

I think that we don’t ask God for enough.  Why not ask Him for everything that comes to mind?  Why not be fully dependent on our Creator?  Why not expect abundance as sons and daughters of the King?

Sometimes we forget this identity.  Notice the absolute language Jesus uses when teaching his disciples about prayer.  Jesus says:

“And so I tell you, keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for.  Keep on seeking, and you will find.  Keep on knocking and the door will be opened to you.  For everyone who asks, receives.  Everyone who seeks, finds.  And to everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.

You fathers—if your children ask for a fish, do you give them a snake instead?  Or if they ask for an egg, do you give them a scorpion?  Of course not!  So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him. “  [LUKE 11:9-13]

I don’t like asking for money from my dad, even though I’m sure he would be willing to give me a lot more than I ask for.  The girls in my family are totally wrapped around his finger.  My dad adores me, and loves to come through.  So does God.  That being said, God has so many more children than he does, yet He lavishes His love far more brilliantly.  He has greater love and also greater ability and creativity in his provision.  And through His acts of abundant love He is glorified.  I don’t want to be a princess acting as a pauper because I didn’t understand my Father’s identity.  My Father is the sovereign El Elyon – the Most High God.

God must listen to our pitifully small acclamations, expectations, and petitions in prayer and want to say, “Are you talking to Me?  I’m not recognizing Myself in this conversation.  Are you sure you have the right God?”  -Beth Moore

Ask for more.

Lately during the times that I’ve really sat before the Lord, talking his ear off about things that stress me out that I want to commit to him instead, I get to the end of my list and I hear him say, “Nope.  We’re not going to end there.  Why did you just tell Me all of this if you aren’t going to ask Me to fix it, to redeem it?  We’re not going to settle in staying there.  Think about it.  What is it you want?”  Putting your desires into words before the Lord is something that takes courage, but again He says, “Take heart.”

I think God waits to give things to people a lot of the time simply because He wants for them to first realize what they want and then take action by asking Him for it.  Realizing their need for Him, recognizing that He is the only way, and trusting He will follow through.  This is Christianity.

Think of the thing that is too good to be true.  What is it?  Let’s be real.  The thing you tell yourself you don’t actually want because your scared of what the implications of admitting that would be.  Ask him for the thing you don’t ever see happening.  Why not go out on a limb and trust God with the thing you think is impossible?  Why not?

That’s the mindset I believe God wants us to embrace.  One in which we acknowledge that He’ll go above and beyond anything we could imagine and gladly provide an abundant life.  Life to the limit.  From the wedding wine to the overflowing fisherman’s nets to the leftover loaves and fish from feeding four and five thousand men, Jesus’ miracles were characterized by abundance.

“Since he did not spare even his own Son but gave him up for us all, won’t he also give us everything else?”  – ROMANS 8:32

“Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think.”  -EPHESIANS 3:20

Stop expecting “no” as the answer.  Quit giving up prematurely because you expected to receive a “no.”  Have the courage to want.  And have the courage to ask.

 

Que Será Será

Being a junior, being in the ECE program, struggling to cram everything into the next two semesters in order to be “on track”, I have felt so much pressure building up on me regarding the future.  Everything I do at this point has future implications, and it can be really suffocating.  What do I want to be doing (and will I even have a choice)?  I’m terrified of ending up doing something I only kind of enjoy.  I’m terrified of settling.  I’m terrified of decisions by default.

But because of this fear, I have found myself doing a whole lot of panicking, freaking out, having a 1/5 of a life crisis every other day, etc.  I’ve also found myself trying to extract every piece of circumstantial security from God.  But that’s where it contradicts itself:  my security is in God, and not in circumstances.

Let me explain this a little better.  The other day, my baby sister, Gianna, turned seven years old.  As a result, my family found ourselves taking a long weekend away.  The day of her birthday, the five of us were walking around Breckenridge enjoying the warmth of the sun shining and the insanely gorgeous backdrop of the snowy mountains.  At this specific moment, we were all emerging from a toy store in which said little sis had just gotten to pick out a final gift as well as a bag filled with her choice of assorted candy pieces.

She says to me, “Can we play Battleship when we get back?” 

I say, “Sure, we can play Battleship sometime today,” which is all good and fine, I mean it is her birthday. 

But then she says, “When we get home?” 

I say, “We’ll see,” and reassure her, “Maybe not first thing, but we will play.”

Then the attitude starts to kick in and she says, “Just tell me!”

Trying to remain patient, I say, “I already said ‘yes.’” 

And then the little Chinese Firecracker explodes and goes into whiny mode, “Why?!?  Why can’t we play when we get back?  I want to play Battleship!”

At this point, I just get really irritated (because this was not an isolated incident and always tends to happen in the middle of good things) and say, “Gigi!  Stop it!  I already said we would play.  We will sometime tonight.  Let that be enough!  There’s not always a ‘next thing!’” 

Well, amen!  I didn’t know that’s how God would speak this weekend, but his sheep know his voice and that was it.

Here’s the thing.  I had never said explicitly that we would not play Battleship right when we got back.   Maybe I would have.  But I did promise that it would happen.  The more she pressed it with a bad attitude, the less I wanted to do it at all.

I see the same thing in myself.  1) I tend to interpret the “not yet” as “no.”  2) I want so badly to feel secure that things will happen just the way I want them to that I end up trying to force God into agreeing to prearranged details and my own conditions.  And I definitely don’t need to coerce goodness out of God.  I do myself more harm than good in any of that.  The most important thing is that he did already make a promise to me.  I have a hope and a future.  I can count on that.  Is that enough?

God is faithful – He’ll follow through without me constantly pestering him for details.  But on my end, he simply wants an attitude of thankfulness.  I have a million good things occurring at any given moment, but I seem to use the whiny voice when I become afraid, and when I begin to question God’s promise.  That is when I ask him what’s next, what the future holds.  (Plus, when I dwell in worry, I’m only ever half-present with people.)  As I make a list of things I am thankful for each day, I see I’m not actually in want.  Not in the slightest.  There doesn’t always have to be a “next thing.”

Let me rest in my security.  I serve the Most High God.  He wouldn’t ask me to serve him in a way void of passion.  He is my passion.

 

The LORD will work out his plans for my life – for your faithful love, O LORD, endures forever.  Don’t abandon me, for you made me.  –PSALM 138:8

Who can command things to happen without the LORD’s permission?  -LAMENTATIONS 3:37

We know how much God loves us, and we have put our trust in his love.  –1 JOHN 4:16

Why spend money on what is not bread, and your labor on what does not satisfy?  Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good, and your soul will delight in richest of fare.  –ISAIAH 55:2

Always be joyful.  Never stop praying.  Be thankful in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus.  –1 THESSALONIANS 5:16-18

 

It is enough.

lest we forget

Lately I’ve taken it upon myself to go back through my old journals.  The collection is currently comprised of the eleven that were worth keeping.  I don’t really care how long it takes, but I’m guessing it may take a while.  They are all very different – some are prettier than others, some are just raw, and some I might rather have burned… But regardless, as I look at each one, I see the exact same thing.

Having only ventured about ten pages into the first, the overwhelming theme in all of this is God’s unbelievable FAITHFULNESS.  Overwhelming is an understatement, I’m sure.  More and more, I am reminded of how much God has done for me, how much He has always provided.  I love how He comes through for me!  In every small detail and every monumental dilemma He has always spoken a word and given a solution.  Within these pages are hundreds upon hundreds of prayers lifted up, and each one was met by a Shepherd who made my paths straight.  Even in the times that seemed random and chaotic, He was always teaching something with eternal significance.  Always healing, always making things new.  And I wonder where I might be right now were it not for Jesus.  The thought is terrifying.  The more I shuffle through all this I experience Christ’s redemption all over again, as if it were all happening for the first time.  It’s treasure.  My heart can’t help but turn it back.

I think that through thanksgiving, you set yourself up to be doubly blessed.  Once- by the way God is generously giving and enhancing your life in the present time.  And twice- as you go back and recount it all.   It’s the key to keeping your blessing, and it makes it even sweeter as time goes by.  The blessing moves into something long-term and lasting.  It becomes more powerful.

Recently I’ve learned a little bit about the Feast of Tabernacles.  My cousins go to a Messianic Jewish church, and I find it all fascinating.  Now, I am not going to pretend like I know very much about it, but from what I understand, it all ties back to this same idea.  According to custom, every autumn, Jewish families create temporary houses in which they eat their meals, sleep, and live for a week.  All this is to remind them of their ancestors who wandered around in the desert for forty years in these non-permanent structures.  They recognize that, even in that, God provided for their need.  The day the manna stopped coming to them was the day they entered into the Promised Land.  As they celebrate, for an entire week, they recount in stories every single way that God has been FAITHFUL to their people, the Israelites, as well as specifically to their individual families, so that they never forget.

There’s something beautiful about remembering.

It’s important to claim these blessings, promises, and revelations over yourself.  More important than we can understand.   And not only for our own sake – also so that our future generations will receive even greater blessings than we do now, so that we can leave behind for them a rich spiritual inheritance.  Deuteronomy 29:29 says, “The Lord our God has secrets known to no one.  We are not accountable for them, but we and our children are accountable forever for all that he has revealed to us, so that we may obey all the terms of these instructions.”  Deuteronomy 6:7 says to, “Repeat them again and again to your children.  Talk about them when you are at home and when you are on the road, when you are going to bed and when you are getting up.”  How better to love and worship the Lord together than from a grateful, joyous heart?

I believe with everything in me that a grateful heart is key to experiencing an abundant life.  One that not only fulfills, but stands out from among the rest of the world.  Luke 6:45 says, “out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks.”  How attractive that is to heaven!

Realizing how needy and desperate we are for a Father who provides every good thing is the source of peace beyond understanding.  I love that I am a daughter of the King who controls every resource I will ever need.  And if it doesn’t exist, He can create it just for me.  The thing that makes it all the more awesome is the simple awareness of how much I don’t deserve any of it.

Entitlement needs to die before I can ever experience blessing.  On the other hand, gratitude attracts goodness, mercy, and all things miraculous.   But it might take a week of storytelling.  Remembering… until it has an effect.

In John 7, Jesus finds himself at a festival celebrating the faithfulness of God.  On the last day of the Feast of Tabernacles after hearing men recount story after story, he stands and shouts, “Anyone who is thirsty may come to me!  Anyone who believes in me may come and drink!  For the Scriptures declare, ‘Rivers of living water will flow from his heart.’”  In the context, this promise is by far greater than every story of faithfulness and miracles previously spoken in those past six days.

It’s greater, too, than each victory, both large and small, that God has accomplished for me.  I want to always speak of what my God has done in my life, what He has rescued me from, and what He protects me from that I’ll never even know about.  I have found that a grateful spirit truly makes my joy complete.  And if all other gifts fail, I will still be able to thank Him for Jesus.

sowing the baby seeds

[just an attempt to process]

 

This week I lost a whole family.  Not of any blood relation, but so very dear to me they might as well have been.  If you asked me to count the number of tears I have cried, the times they’ve crossed my mind, or the prayers I’ve prayed over these children over the past two years, I wouldn’t be able to.  The whole thing was a privilege and an honor.  It was an honor to become a part of something not my own – seeing myself drawn into the crayon representations of this family that the kids were so proud of.  It was an even higher honor to be entrusted with the most precious of all cargo.  And higher still, being able to shine the light of Jesus and sow the baby seeds.

This time of year has been hard for me in recent years, but this time the loss is deeper.  I’m grieving the loss of my little kids, because if I’m being honest, I don’t know if there will be a next time or another part to this story.  Those four sweet Mexibabies meant the world to me.  I’ll miss the continuous stream of thoughts that went something like: “This is so hard,” followed by, “This is so perfect.”  The two always seemed to go together, never one without the other.

1 Timothy 6:20 orders us to “guard what God has entrusted to you.”  I loved every minute of that, but the hard part is figuring out what to do now it is no longer physically entrusted to me.  It’s how I love and how I serve, and it’s all I’ve known for the past three months.  Now that I have four days of summer to myself, I’m not sure I really know how to be a normal person.

I miss them all so much.  I’ll miss arriving to a friendly stampede and a chorus of “Caitlin’s” and leaving to, “I wish you could stay here for 100 days.”  I miss spending the forty hours, and sometimes more, each week with them.  I had a key to their house (as if I didn’t know the secret way to get in if I ever happened to be locked out).  I’ll miss constantly exchanging vehicles, children, and car seats.  I’ll miss taking the older two to baseball practice and cheering with the babies on the bleachers.  I’ll miss pouring into the fifteen-year old stepsister and driving her all over Denver in that boat of an SUV.  I’ll miss being someone the mother could relate to.  I’ll miss cleaning their house and getting them ready for their birthday parties and buying them treats whenever we’d go out.  I’ll miss the day trips and small adventures that we shared. The nanny zoo pass is still tucked inside my wallet. I even miss the hard parts: the discipline and the diapers and accidents and potty training.  Those cute toddlers!  I learned how to carry two of them at once, one on each hip.  That was a little psycho.  I’ll miss coming back from a weekend, when they would say, “Why weren’t you here?  We missed you!”  I’ll miss the crazy nights when I did stay, and being woken up at 4 in the morning by a dog and a baby crawling into bed with me.

Inside all of this we’d work through life lessons together about struggles that they shouldn’t have ever had, which would always lead to answering about Jesus.  Curious Carlos would always challenge with,

“How do you know that?”

“Because it says it in the Bible and the Bible is always true.”

“You know a lot of things about the Bible.  How many things do you know?  1,068?”

Mostly I just loved them.  That’s all.  Only now I don’t know if I’ll ever be back with them.  So that’s the hard part.  Going back to my happy town without being a little sad, knowing this.

Here I was, each day thinking that the sacrifice was the hard part, when really, the ending, the goodbye, was a million times more trying.  The grief left me with a mix of emotions that were so many and so changing that most of the time I just ended up feeling confused and trying to distracted myself in some way.

To say I dealt with it well would be a lie.  I was both a wreck and a minefield.  One day I’d borrow my brother’s iPod and go on runs to some weird screamo music (why?).  The next, I’d burst into tears of sadness without warning during the announcements at church, while receiving concerned looks from strangers.  Those days were exhausting.  It took me six days before I even had the smallest desire to bring it before the Lord (dumb).  But here’s what He said:

He told me to think of these past three months as a mission.  One in which His strength was proven through me.  Then He said that He was pleased because I had seen it through to completion, just like He knew I could.  He said He “considered me trustworthy and appointed me to serve him.”  Somehow those words made it all better.  The pain didn’t disappear entirely, but the burden of it was lifted as the mindset shifted from temporal to eternal.  And all of a sudden I’m okay.  I still treasure my time spent with those kids, but there are more missions ahead and I can’t lose ground because I got stuck along the way.  As this one wraps up, I need the mindset that it is time to keep pressing on.

It came down to realizing that even being away, I can still guard what God has entrusted; they’ll always be just as much mine to guard spiritually.  So I pray for the next person of spiritual influence.  That there will always be a continual stream of these kinds of people.  The ones who will really live it out as a model for them in the next season.

He also left me with the promise that there will be more sweet, beautiful children in the future.

Even though I’m a tiny bit broken on this side of it, I’d do it all over again in a heartbeat.  I don’t think I poured too much of my heart into them.  I love them so.

the Parker house

The Parker house had a sort of magic to it.  She knew it the minute she returned though she couldn’t quite pinpoint exactly what it was.  It wasn’t the house itself.  On its own it was ordinary.  So that wasn’t it.  Maybe it was just the sweetness that came with the calm and the knowing that this season would not last.

Here, she loved the slightly similar-looking people all characterized by their same quiet sense of humor.  She loved, too, the humility that came with merging Disney with Anthropologie.  It was truly a miracle that all of her things fit into the shared room.  Of course there were real struggles too, hard struggles.  The struggle of one became the struggle of all.  But they knew how to fight and they fought to win. 

The first afternoon family outing comprised of lawn gnome hunting from town to town, garden center to garden center, for the small joy and the laughter that it brought to her face.  She knew she was the treasure.  Here, she carried a new kind of cross.  One that meant picking at a second burger of the day because she knew how they had gone all out creating a beautifully elaborate outdoor meal simply because they knew it was her favorite.  She wouldn’t dare invalidate it by saying she’d already done similar with a set of friends.  Not a chance.

It was where she was reassured of all she was.  Constantly reminded.  Digging way, way back, all the way to the roots.  She was the same girl with the exact same habits and loves as before.  The same ponytail girl without a soul to impress.  It’s funny how it is when you let yourself remember.  This town… not in part but in full.  Embracing all the good that remained and letting go of the bad that no longer mattered.  It was a lighter feeling that way.    

She felt most alive in a pair of cargo shorts and a purpled logoed v-neck and of course that ponytail.  But as she ran out the door, she was reminded, “Where are your earrings?  What kind of girl would you be without them?”  She loved the paradox of this life.  One second, cooking and cleaning and singing and loving, the next playing catch in the park with the boys.  And the paradox of bright shiny newness sandwiched in between a country lined road and another comprised of pine trees and dirt roads.  BMWs alongside old farm trucks.

She’d wanted adventure in the great wide somewhere – a life of selflessness and serving and sacrifice.  To be honest, it’s all she ever really wanted.  She would lay down this life in a second.  That was the thing.  She adapted quickly and she’d trade Colorado for a kingdom much bigger.  She could never live for the comfort and she knew it. 

That’s exactly why the peace of those first days could not last…did not last.  There was more; always more.  But when she searched hard for it, it returned like an old friend.  And there was something to be said for the quiet.

Above all, she loved the rare days she would put on a favorite dress and sit out among the tulips so obviously not alone.  To her, those were the things that spelled richness.  The backyard had an enchantment that was maybe only accentuated by the fact that she could only enjoy it in the spare moments.  The early times when the sun was so new, and again in the alone times when it was nowhere to be seen at all.   Those quiet, still nights with the occasional fire and the occasional company.  But no matter what, the green remained constant.  If only for this season.

In this season, adventure could be found in the pages and pages that she had found quite by accident.  This surprise came in the form of a linen closet not full of linens at all, but books.  She didn’t know.  She’d only read about the things she loved so dearly this year, all the time expanding her passions and her heart.  This summer she’d just have to take adventure at a much more domestic level.  Oh, and she loved that too, but it came natural so she took it for granted.  It was as if the current domestic life wasn’t quite intense enough, but wasn’t quite sure yet how to one-up it.

If there was one thing that was evident from the beginning, it was this fact: nothing gold can stay.  So in the moments when peace felt closer than the storm, she resolved that here and now, she’d enjoy every minute of it.  The beautiful and strange peace that filled this garden, because she knew it might be the last time she would get to.  At least like this anyway.

“The fruit of righteousness will be peace; the effect of righteousness will be quietness and confidence forever.” – ISAIAH 31:17

you should be wilder.

 

Here we are again – arriving at a quiet park among the mild-mannered children dressed in pastels and their doting Wash Park mothers at their sides.  And then there’s us.  We make an entrance as the kids precariously perch themselves atop the metal merry-go-round (or whatever you choose to call it) and spin at break-neck speeds.  Right away, this is what they are drawn to – the most dangerous piece of equipment here.  (Kudos to that!)  Clearly this playground was built decades ago – you would never see such a thing in our world of safety and cushy childhoods.  It would be instantly deemed unsafe by a multitude of overprotective parents.  But this old park, filled with even older trees, has a character all its own.  We like to call it fun.

Strict boundaries and snobby HDFS classes don’t carry much weight in this space.  The instincts that come with early childhood training would not allow for risk, and I wouldn’t in a school setting, but this is home and the kids deserve freedom.  “We” consists of three rough-and-tumble boys and an eight year old little girl.  If they get hurt, they won’t do it again.  They are resilient.  I’m all about controlled chaos, and they’re all about rambunctious behavior.  We are a wild bunch.    

We know how to have fun.  We play hard.  What starts out as a game of catch between CarGo and I manages, without fail, to transform into a game of baby baseball with all of the neighborhood kids.  “We” quickly goes from four to ten in a matter of minutes.  “You’re welcome for watching your kids for you…”  But really, I don’t mind.  I’ll take it as a compliment.  We have an energy that the rest are drawn to. 

We head home only to initiate another favorite pastime.  The kids hurry to the alley for the best part of the day – racing around at top speed on their bicycles as the dog darts closely after, and I stand at the sidelines acting as cheerleader.  (I knew those years in poms would come in handy somewhere!)

And so continues our “Summer Part Two.”

It’s so fun to come back, instead of chasing after the babies to make sure they don’t die on my watch, to step back and let boys be boys.  They are no longer aggressive and traumatized, now they are simply wrestling as play.  Now the baby is speaking clear and understandable phrases and is learning the concept of “gentle.”  I don’t need to worry.  I can take a step back and breathe this time.  I trust them all more now and the boundaries expand. 

We run and run and run in the heat of the day.  All so very lively!  And then they sleep.  The harder we play the longer they rest.  It takes a lot of work to separately wear out four small children, and I think I’m more exhausted than they are.  They go down easy.  Then come the guaranteed two hours of silence.

I could tell you all about Bowlby’s Attachment Theory or Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development, but the only thing I’m banking on with them is love.  It’s the only thing that still counts and it’s what makes every second an investment.  It’s a privilege to have a front row seat in seeing the fruits of Christ’s love unfold in them in the ways that they have healed and changed since I saw them last. 

I used to be lucky to even get a hug from the littlest one.  I would praise God every single time he felt strong enough to trust.  The baby who used to have the most terrible attachment problems already on the first day says “Bye, Caitie.  I love you,” in his cutest little babble.

Oh, my heart.  They are so precious to me.

It’s nice not getting kicked in the face while changing the diaper of this beyond-fussy baby.  It’s nice not having to break up fist fights every other second.  It’s nice not to be in a constant state of heart attack when one of the babies toddled a little too close to the edge of the staircase.  In its place, I now get to sit and let the big two read the words of story books to me while I help them sound out the harder ones.  Or help dress the little two in their favorite duck costumes and laugh as they waddle around the house. 

I’m finally seeing the seeds of growth and healing that I prayed over them every single day, while pushing the double stroller with an extra kid hanging onto each arm, on our way to this very same old park.  It was my Sun Stand Still prayer and God is faithful!  So much has changed in a year!  This feels so good!

 

I’m not saying everything’s perfect.  Some things will take years to work through.  Injustice isn’t easy to fight.  And so we fight harder.  If I wasn’t here to fight, I would be wasting my time.

I’m still praying for miracles.

part two

It’s an interesting thing, returning.  Being back in the exact same place doing the exact same things, yet somehow everything is different.  The change is all the more obvious as everything but time remains constant. 

I found myself unreasonably nervous in the days that preceded summer.  Not in the “oh-my-gosh-I’m-a-girl-and-I-have-butterflies-in-my-stomach!” sort of way; more simply a reoccurring uneasiness.  It wasn’t that I doubted myself.  I know I am more than capable- that wasn’t it.  It wasn’t that I didn’t want to be around the kids – I did more than anything!  And it wasn’t that I didn’t have a sense of purpose.  The Holy Spirit confirmed it with an undeniable, irrefutable clarity way back in January.  For so many, many good reasons!

What really did it was the idea of having to repeat something.  I didn’t want this to be a “here-we-go-again…” sort of thing.  My own selfishness tried to convince me that it wouldn’t be as exciting the second time around, and the fear of prior expectations and the comparisons I might make to the past crept over me.  All so very selfish.  For me, it’s easy to develop a sense of entitlement to great adventures in the three college summers – darting off to foreign countries or doing something super glamorous.  (I’ll be the first to admit I’m a little jealous of the certain friends who God is leading across the globe this summer.)  Of course, you can do God’s work anywhere, and I know that, but new and exciting is always something to chase.  And there’s nothing wrong with wanting adventure, I know that too, but the problem was the thought and fear of “mundane” found me.  It seemed to haunt me from the second I said yes to God months ago. 

I’m really wrestling here.  

It’s something I’ve had to fight going into these past weeks, and in doing so, God has slowly and faithfully extinguished it all with his truths.  He’s shown me even more of what it is to serve wholeheartedly, as though I am serving God and not people.  He’s shown me discipline and sacrifice in all areas of my life so that these kids can be my first priority.  Humility in work that is not flashy (especially when getting peed on twice in the same morning), but Kingdom work all the same.  Endurance.  And mostly, he has already taught me the tremendous worth of faithfulness.  That, in this, I am able to show the kids how valuable they are to me that I would make a point to return and invest even further into their lives – nurturing them while they are awake and praying over them as I tuck them in at nap time.  Those are things I wouldn’t trade for an exciting vacation.  My days are rich, each one at a time.  I am finding more joy in being physically spent, coming home from the long hours covered in dirt and sidewalk chalk and other unidentified things, than I know I would by simply investing my time in getting a tan.  For though I am selfish, I am not discontent.  He’s shown me his character once again.  Praise God for that!

It all may settle into routine, but it won’t become mundane.  He’s promised that to me, and mundane is one thing that is NOT in God’s character, ever.  I am NOT wasting my time- this is a big investment in my life too.  Regardless of anything, I need to remember that. 

“The LORD says, ‘I will guide you along the best pathway for you life.  I will advise and watch over you.’”  -PSALM 32:8

you’d never know

If you saw this room now, you’d never know.  At a glance, you would see a stripped-down bed, an empty bookshelf, and a borrowed red chair.  These walls (covered in flags silently telling tales of my travels alongside watercolor artwork, a gift from my favorite six-year old) offer the only real hint of the past ten months in this place.  Now, only the few carefully-placed photographs and Bible verses remain.  You would never know how they had evolved – how they slowly cultivated over the months and enveloped more and more of these walls as the friendships became richer and the trials became tougher.  Seeing this now, you would only see an empty end product.  You would never know about the messy journey that was had within these walls.  You might never know.  

It’s eerie now, completely impersonal.  My own little ghost town of debris that either didn’t make the cut or didn’t fit into my red Escape on the trip down.  This isn’t my home now, and I’m not sure if I really ever considered it to be.  This big old town that wanted me more than I wanted it in return. 

What is this place anyway?  Just somewhere I went off for two years and has a hold on me for two more.  It’s the town of the only school I applied to.  I can’t say if this is home, but it’s been good to me.  It’s taken care of me.  And for that I am thankful. 

It’s a little church with wooden pews and a preacher shaking hands out front.  It’s just another house with a beautifully designed backyard and a great big roof under the shade of a tree so many times older than us.  It’s a long morning drive – only to find yourself amidst the brisk autumn leaves and the sound of twenty happy shouts and a beckon to push the swings higher.  It’s the way the train sounds in a yellow house with decades of rat infestations that also happens to smell of feet (and coffee).  It’s a group of twenty-somethings crammed into a small room sharing and mulling over the Word while time stands still and cookies bake in the oven.  It’s a hallway of leaves, under which you’ll almost certainly find a happy few, each armed with a picnic lunch and a Bible.  It’s some dark, crappy bar that you may have never set foot in if your best friend wasn’t up there stealing the stage alongside some other wonderful people.  And somewhere in all of it, tucked away, is a group of seven who like to use the words “bogan” and “shitty” to describe the wonderful place of unity and the culture they have created there – one of selflessness and unconditional love.  I say that this isn’t home, and maybe it’s not, but how much of my heart have a left here?  More than I’d like to think.  It would have been impossible not to.  I’ve left it here in this place and with these people, hoping that it will be well taken care of while I’m away. 

If I don’t miss it in this moment, I sure will in the ones that follow.

But for now, closure is all I crave.  I can’t wait to close some doors for a while, maybe some never to be reopened.  We’ll see.  Time to go home-home!  I’ve been waiting for this summer amid the tests and the small drama and the weekend visits.  I’m ready to sleep in a room that has, in these past few years, been taken over by Tinkerbell sheets and more stuffed toys than I could imagine.  I’m excited to be back in a place where everything is seven minutes away from each other.  I’m ready for the comfort of small(ish) town memories, like the gazebo and the old baseball field, still just the same as it was fifteen years ago when I was all over the place and my dad was my first-ever coach.  And the kids – I cannot wait to see their faces!  I have more love in my heart than I know what to do with for my four sweet, sweet kiddos; it’s only multiplied and strengthened since August when I had to say goodbye.  What joy!  And finally, I’m expectant as I pray over and alongside my mother, such an incredible woman of God.  Waiting in the complete dependence that we have in the Lord, and waiting to be lifted up again in His honor.  I know it will happen!  Pushing with those Sun Stand Still prayers expecting big, big things as we serve Him.  I’m ready to fight through a Psalm 56 season.  This is a season of growth and maybe quite a bit of solitude.  Lay it on me.

So here’s to living life in maybes.  Here’s to one last look at my empty bedroom – and to yet another hello to a highway I could drive with my eyes closed.  Here’s to things you would never know and things you would never expect. 

See you in three months, whoever you are and whoever you will be.