changes...

are happening.

here and at home

and in us...


can't wait to share what they are...

when you find that you just might be free indeed...

it happens at a stop light.

i'm frazzled and they are all frazzled and to calm my nerves i try and say back those words from romans that are, for whatever reason refusing to become embedded in my memory.

it's as i'm whispering those words,

they have no understanding, no fidelty, no love, no mercy...

 i sit with my hands on the wheel and i'm nodding because it's me,

i've lacked all four today.

and the weight is heavy. 

that's when i looked up past the speedometer and the road to the van in front of me.

i looked up just as i got to romans chapter 8 verse 1 and there in the top left hand corner, just below the rear window was a small metal ichthys wrapped around His Name and He met me on the corner opposite that mcdonald's as i whispered out,

therefore, there is now no condemnation for those 

who are in Christ Jesus...

and there is a man on that corner most days, his sign says he's hungry and isn't there just someone who could spare a dollar?

i drive by most days without ever making eye contact...

i avert my gaze because sometimes it's just easier not to see.

and i wonder, how often do we do that with each other?

how often do we walk the hallways of our churches and don't really see? 

flash a quick smile,

shake hands and spit out a hello while barely making eye contact before we move on.

how often do we hear a sermon about reaching out to the poor and lost among us and smile and nod and assume someone else will do that job while we remain quiet and comfortable where we are?

we do we run from the hurting brother or sister instead of surrounding them and carrying them to Jesus?

we carry our hand santizers in pockets and purses and it's seeping into the way we deal with one another - and your mess is too messy for my life and so i just won't meet your gaze,

i just won't look,

i'll focus on how fast i'm going or the road i'm on...

but i wonder, when we look,

really look at the person who is stopped still in front of us,

stopped in the middle of a mess or broken heart or the deep pain of their broken humanity,

will we really see the mark of Christ on their life?

will reaching out past our fear and our aversions to the messy

be met instead with an encounter with Jesus,

and find that incredibly, in Him alone, we have been set free...

because she is *still* seven...

she stands so close to me,

our forearms touching.


her hands are absentmindedly playing with her dress.


and she asks if she can sit on my lap.


she's seven and when did she become so tall?

when did she grow to the point that she no longer folds herself into me?


it's all moving so fast.


too fast.


and she laughs at me when i whisper it,

when i ask her to stop growing.

when i ask her to make time stop,

or at least put an encyclopedia on top of her head.


her gap-tooth smile stretches wide across her face,

her freckles, all sprinkled, stand out against her fair skin -

and i want to cup these moments

and find a way to dam up the spilling of seconds that just keep ticking by.


but instead, she's one more day closer to eight,

one more day lived and passed through

and i'm not going to get those moments back.


i want those moments back,

if just to live them out better.


if just to remember to kiss the tip of her nose one. more. time.


tomorrow, i want to laugh with her more,

to read just one more chapter,

to pull her onto my lap,


before she doesn't fit anymore...

the long road home...

eugene and wilma moved out this past week.

they unloaded their house and hitched up their 5th wheel and sold their home to a young family whose u-haul is parked right outside their front door tonight.

we've got ourselves some brand new neighbours.

some of my walls still stand bare - we moved into these four walls 372 days ago and there are spaces that still baffle me.

it will come...

maybe.


and maybe home is close to my heart tonight because i don't necessarily know what the plan is anymore.


i think of all the times when i've demanded my own way of God. fighting Him at every turn - thinking that four walls meant stability and putting down roots meant being comfortable and safe and when i glance back at the road behind me, i can see the claw marks in the ground - the places marked with a desperation for control.

and they were bloody.

and they are still raw.

but if the scars have taught me anything, they've taught me to trust in a kind and tender Saviour.


what happens when the road to home doesn't lead to comfort and safety and tidy and clean? what happens if the road to home leads you deeper and darker into what pushes against everything that make sense?

we live on a quiet street with quiet neighbours and crickets that sing in the flowerbeds below our bedroom window. until this past week, our 4 were the only children on this road and the occasional grandchild who comes to spend the weekend at a grandparents house...

but then he takes that job on the street formally known as "the hole". where drugs and gangs and violence and drive-bys are the norm.

the year before? there was an opportunity to go down there, before tony ever took the position he has now, for a harvest party in "that" part of town and i shook my head - there was no way. no way i was taking my children into an area that unsafe.


i don't know what happened...when that shift occurred. when i no longer felt scared.  we go down almost everyday and most days down there are just like our days here in the middle.


there's a sign at one of the main intersections in town that splits *that side* from *this side* and each time i drive by it i feel torn...


it's a sign that is supposed to make you think, but what it does is make me sad -

which road are you going on? it asks:

the road to heaven - which apparently follows the road leading back towards mansions and comfort and the safe part of town,

or - 

and i always look at those words as i reach for the blinker that signals which direction i'm turning:

or are you on the road to hell?


well then,

i guess i'm on the road that leads to hell everyday.


and instead of wanting to escape back here at the end of a long day, i find myself longing to be down there. down in the hellish nightmare of a world i still don't completely understand. and both of us? we agree - it's where we are feeling led, but the timing? it seems so slow but our hearts are burning and if we are saying to Him that our lives are His...that where He leads is where we will go, then we wait with open hands until He clears the way.


and so my walls remain bare.


but the restlessness - it rubs my soul raw and i look around at closets that need to be sorted and baby clothes that need to be switched out...baseboards that should be dusted and light switches that should be wiped down and i get overwhelmed with the everyday...

and after a long week of doing i begin to feel overwhelmed with the list that shouts out the needing to be done.

saturdays have turned into a chaotic heart scramble and the day off we have as a family finds me twisted up in a knot taut and ready to snap.

before we left for the green of vacation last month i began to pray about our saturdays - about the heart messes that find their way into a schedule already heavy with the housework that needs to get done and as we drove further away and closer to rest it's what i kept sensing...

sundays are a day for sabbath - a ceasing of work and allowing our bodies to rest;

but could saturdays become a day for sanctuary? a space hollowed out to become hallowed - as i clean the nooks and crannies around me, could my spirit find a place to breathe in His Peace? could the day before the day of rest be redeemed and made holy too?


i'm tired of the striving.

to be honest, my soul is weary...His call to find solace and rest in Him? i wonder if i can really settle down long enough to see if it's possible - but i'm willing to try.


this saturday will find me bent over in a simple, most basic step...


i'll be lighting a candle - one in each room. a reminder that He is the True Light - the One Who shines brightly in the darkness that surrounds..

.the One Who is really and always my True Home...

when i don't just want to sit there...chapter 5 {the grace series}

it is not the nature of what you do that determines the 

spirituality of any action, but the Origin of what you do.

~ major ian thomas

ask anyone who knows me and they'll tell you,

i don't think fast on my feet.


it always comes to me later in the quiet moments, when i've had time to process it all and sort through all the details - that's when i know what should have been said.


or, there are the rare moments that i say what i am feeling in that split second of time and i regret it for days following the incident...

there doesn't seem to be an easy middle.


i'm like that martha - all twisted up because so much needs to be done, but i don't know how to do it all...what starts out as joy-filled quickly becomes burdensome and suddenly, i'm more focused on what i lack than on Who Gives.

with that, i reveal what i truly believe about God and 

service and my own role in His story. i see myself as

irreplaceable when i think that the work won't get done

unless i do it. instead of looking to Him to provide what is

needed, martha rolled up her sleeves and took on respon-

sibility for things that may never have been meant for her.

grace for the good girl (pg. 63)

tony - his ministry involves many different facets and he seems to effortlessly move between talking with potential donors and sitting side by side with a child who is cutting and suicidal.  i respect my husband for many reasons, but it's this ability to connect with people at a soul level is one of them.

i'm the one who feels as though i'm floundering in these situations.

i found myself there today - 

found myself in that position where i'm sitting there listening to gut-wrenching pain. pain that i have felt - pain that i understand...hatred that i have wrestled with and through and her face is covered with tears and i begin to feel helpless because i should have the words...

if i've walked this path, then i should know what to say.

so i silently called out to Him,

Jesus, words! i need words! i need to know what to say! 

nothing.

silence.

and her words kept coming and she kept trying to wipe those tears away and i kept sitting fidgeting inwardly there, trying not to become panicked when i slowly began to sense His answer...

just listen.

don't talk.

just be.

i didn't want to just sit and be and listen - i wanted to have the answers and the solutions and not feel so helpless...

but that wouldn't have been about Jesus - it would have been about me.

i don't believe martha simply chose cooking or housework over the Lord.

when she begged the Lord to make mary help her, what she was really saying

was "notice me Lord!" she wanted Him to see her. she longed for acknowledgment

and love, and was willing to do anything to get it...it isn't that she wanted to be 

working. it's that she thought she had to....

(gftgg pg. 64)

and it's when i think all those *i have to's* that i begin to become resentful - begin to question what He is doing. 

it's when i begin to think that maybe, just maybe, i know better than Him.

pride is such an ugly thing and trust flies out the window.

what would happen if we just let go - let go of all the trying and doing and just simply was before Him? 

i may never be as eloquent as my husband - i'm pretty sure i won't have the answers for children who live through hell...

i may spend the majority of my days changing diapers and making cheese quesidillas for lunch and simmering spaghetti sauce for the one millionth time for dinner this month.  the laundry will be never ending, the dust will keep piling and i will sit at the end of the day wondering what difference i am making in anyone's life, let alone the very Kingdom of God - 

but then He speaks my name - He speaks to the martha deep inside who so desperately wants to get it all right...

it's not about getting all the work done for Him on my own:

if what i do is done in complete dependence upon the 

Father, then it doesn't matter what that thing is, rather who

the one is doing that thing. is it me? or is it Him? Colossians

says that by faith, it is beautifully and mysteriously both.

"to this end i labor, struggling with all His energy, which so

powerfully works in me" (col. 1:29 NIV). who am i to decide

what is extraordinary? the Father has already decided. He

says He Himself is extraordinary. so anything i do as i depend

on and partner with the Extraordinary One, i suppose that is

extraordinary too.

(gftgg  pg. 61)

it's all about trusting that He can take the little I have and turn it into something that will bless Himself. it has nothing to do with the doing, but everything to do with the trusting. 

and this is grace - that He takes what feels like nothing and turns it into a faith that is active and strong.

when prayer changes...

it was over the noise and chaos of dinner the other night that i heard her familiar question asked around an unfamiliar table.

words were flying all over the place so i'm surprised i heard it,

but not really surprised she asked it...

if that makes sense.

our olivia?

she's bold.

her emotions, her voice, her actions, her frustrations, and even her sleep - it's all done loudly.

all of it.

i don't know how many times i have to remind her that she doesn't have to shout in my face - my ears work just fine.

or they did...

either way, if she feels strongly about something, it's done with strong emotion.

her love for Jesus?

strong.

and she has no idea how there is anyone out there beyond our four walls who doesn't love Jesus...

so she has made it her personal mission to find out just who those people are.

and why.

she could care less if it makes you uncomfortable, she wants to know the state of your heart because a heart without Jesus just doesn't make sense to an olivia that loves Him so.

so, when i heard her turn to her newest friend over hot dogs and hamburgers and ask the inevitable question, i smiled.

because when his little face beamed back at her that yes, he did know Jesus, her shoulders relaxed and her summer-bare feet kicked and she shouted right back in his face that she did too.

and her quest to know was stilled for another day,

but i was left to wonder...

i stood behind that counter on friday.

friday is ice-cream day and my hands were sticky from a melted mess and there was one guy who walked in with ear-buds blaring and cap pulled down and he leaned against the edge and wouldn't meet my eyes.

little ones i can talk to.

the older girls? there's always something to find common ground over - hair, clothes, make-up...

but a boy on the edge of being a man?

i am at a loss.

and really, i think they may be at a loss too.

i mean, i'm tony's wife and i'm a thousand years old and what do i know about what they know and so canipleasehavemyicecreamandgetthisawkwardmomentoverwithasfastaspossible?  thank you very much.

so i did what i do and made small talk about school and kept it light and laughed at my own jokes as i put that first scoop in the cone when he took out that one ear-bud and blurted out a sentence of pain.

and i set down the spoon and let the ice cream drip while it all poured out and he stood there at the end broken.

my first thought wasn't to ask him if he knew Jesus.

why did i stand there wishing that i knew how to make his pain stop when i know very well Who can bind up his brokenness?

Jesus, He is so easy to talk about with like-minded friends - with those you suspect just might know Him too. but when the faces across the counter will barely crack a smile...

i am ashamed at my lack of courage.

because why am i there if not to share the love of Jesus? why am i there if not to be His Heart to those places that are gasping for Hope?

my prayer changed this weekend.

olivia has the bold gene...

she didn't get it from me.

but the God Who can take faith, tiny and small, and move mountains with it? He can take my fear and grow deep and bold courage from it...

i just have to say yes.

and it was on a quiet weekend evening that i read these words...

scripture describes a radical, reoriented life for those who trust

Christ - one full of living for the invisible and the future. it is a life

fully surrendered to an invisible God whose agenda for my time here

is contrary to my own, a life very different from the safe, comfortable

one i was creating.

i started craving something that had never seemed acceptable to

me until that day...a reckless faith, a faith where i knew God was

real because i needed Him, a faith where i lived surrendered, obedi-

ent, a faith where i sacrificed something...comfort or safety or practicality...

something. but my heart raced faster when i thought 

of it, and something about it resonated.

stepping out wholly dependent on God to come through, step-

ping away from what is secure and comfortable exposes the holes

in our faith. and then if God comes through, it expands our faith.

something about stepping off cliffs where God leads allows God the

opportunity to move in greater ways. when we step off and He shows

up, we see Him differently than we would if we were standing safely

looking over the edge.

jennie allen - anything

my prayer changed this weekend...

and all He needed was my yes to begin moving and growing a boldness and courage that would terrify me if it wasn't for the fact that i said that yes to that risk in the first place.

and the gene that makes olivia so bold in her asking? it's in His blood that was poured out for her. 

for me.

for you.

sometimes it just takes a little longer to surface in some than in others...

For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation

 to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.

For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, 

“The righteous shall live by faith.” (Romans 1:16-17, ESV)

a gift picked up, put away, put back

2187. carton of strawberries

2188. end of the day mess

2189. laundry soap for another load

3 gifts about you

2190. desire for Jesus

2191. love of baking

2192. getting to teach my little ones at home

3 gifts found in His Word

2193. He gives direction and purpose

2194. it's all full of His breath

2195. hope that changes me

a gift in a box, a bag, a book

2196. 2 pies

2197. books bundled together

2198. glimpses of grace in the gift of family come near

3 gifts unexpected

2199. a reminder for sanctuary on saturday

2200. a day turned around

2201. a kitchen done and a friend washing my floors

3 gifts from your childhood

2202. memories of puppy breath relived

2203. love of quiet sunday afternoons

2204. that chocolate chip cookie recipe

a gift sweet, sour, salty

2205. a hug from my aunt and uncle

2206. a small bowl of yogurt before bed

2207. peanut butter stuffed pretzels

3 gifts found in little people

2208. imagination

2209. arms-flung-wide hugs

2210. trust

3 gifts that made you laugh

2211. coffee with a friend

2212. tony's protective eye-wear

2213. olivia's frog dance

3 gifts found in community

2214. bob - willing to hold zeruiah

2215. gane - sittin with lyla and her schoolwork

2216. christina - the way she loves olivia

a gift in a plate, pot, package

2217. cloudy day banana bread

2218. fresh roses

2219. canadian chocolate

3 gifts hard giving thanks for

2220. little one messes - it's only for a season

2221. an unknown - He knows

2222. risk taking - isn't really a risk in His Hands

a gift worn, white, whispered

2223. mama-weariness

2224. late spring clouds

2225. lyla-secrets

3 gifts found in church

2226. children's program

2227. a re-grounding for the week

2228. receiving communion

3 gifts in today's work

2229. cleaned home

2230. completed school work

2231. midnight nursing

a gifts at 8am, 12pm, 8pm

2232. everyone fed and dressed

2233. a home ready for guests

2234. one last story before bed

3 gifts blue

2235. zeruiah's blue eyes

2236. my favorite pen found

2237. the sky at dusk

3 gifts you gave today

2238. a listening ear

2239. a hug

2240. a bedtime prayer

3 gifts orange

2241. that new book

2242. washing lyla's giraffe shirt

2243. orange slices in my water

3 gifts funny

2244. liv boxing with jake in the church foyer

2245. tony's random songs

2246. she turned 5 months old laughing...

{the grace series will continue on wednesday...}

to the one who hides behind *the fine*...chapter 4 {the grace series}

even in laughter the heart may ache,

and joy may end in grief.  proverbs 14:13

it's okay to not be fine.

it's okay to stand and say, i'm a mess. it's a mess...*life* is a mess.

it's okay to come out from behind the facade and sit bare and broken and bruised.

i know - it doesn't feel like it.

the last thing that anyone freely embraces is vulnerability - it's scary and open and intimate.

you have that reputation to uphold and that strength everyone seems to rely on and aren't you the one who always seems to keep the peace? make everything better?

make everyone laugh?

yeah...

that's you.

and her.

and me.

i sit surrounded most days, by the most vulnerable among us. 

my own children and other mothers children.

more often than not, there is laughter.

lots of laughter...

but there are the days when the veneer cracks just a little and you are let in to the broken places and there is nothing you can do but reach out a hand and try and cup around that hurt with the little you have and trust the God Who is big enough to be enough.

my own little girl,

her veneer cracked wide open this afternoon - the fine she was trying so bravely to hide behind wasn't strong enough anymore and she just needed to hear, needed to know that the heart she grew under would always beat strong for her - would never stop loving her. would never stop pulsing to the rhythm of her mama's love for her.

she needed to know that who she was behind her fine had worth.

i pulled her close onto my lap, wiped those tears away and she leaned her ear over this heart and she listened.

...so often, the idea that we have to keep it together no matter what is what keeps
good girls from coming out from behind our sweet, smiling exteriors. we believe 
that any amount of broken mess disqualifies us from useful activity for God, so
we determine to stay decidedly broken.  

grace for the good girl (pg. 51)

and being broken begins to take many forms,

conforming you to the ideals and ideas of the people around you until you either become hopeless or angry or both and then you spiral downward again because the good always take the middle - doesn't everyone know that leaning to the right or to the left, even just a little, is bad.

feeling scared meant i needed more faith. feeling anger

meant i needed more control. feeling confused meant i 

needed to get it together and figure things out. in theory, i knew

i was supposed to cast my fear, anger, confusion on the Lord.

but after "trusting" Him with my circumstances, i thought

it was my responsibility to change the emotions and keep

myself from experiencing them again.

gftgg (pg. 55)

around and around it goes and the cycle, it never is unbroken because the only thing truly broken

is you.

but you keep clinging to what left you broken, because that is the thing that defines you. that is what you keep coming back to, because that is tangible. and sometimes, even what is ugly can feel safe because it is what feels familiar...

it might be time to let go.

let go of the broken shards that leave you bloody and weak and instead cling tightly to the wild and unpredictable God Whose grace is pure and gentle enough to love you whole.

honesty before God is the only safe place, and i believe He is

wise enough and loving enough and intuitive enough to usher us

into honesty with people...only as i depend on and trust in and fully

disclose to the One Who knows anyway will i be able to discern when

i'm fine-ing someone who deserves genuine...

gftgg (pg. 56)

i've learned it the hard way - 

i've lived believing that in order to be truly authentic, truly vulnerable, one has to fully disclose to everyone.

i wish that i had known better sooner...

i've also learned, through the hard way, that Jesus - the One Who knit me together and ordained all my days - He is trustworthy. and as i've learned to trust Him more, He brings the safe and the trustworthy ones to love me in the middle of my mess.

and it is good.

and it is safe.

and He takes the fine and makes it healed.

or healing...

it depends on the day.

step out from behind the lie of the fine.

yes - there will be those that walk away, there even may be those that will make fun of your risk.

but you will find that it is good - really. it is.

you just have to take that first step...

our fluctuating humanness is there on purpose, to remind

us of our need and draw us to the One Who can meet it. we

don't have to figure out the whys and the origins of every

swinging emotion. but it is so important that we admit they

are there. to embrace the color and fullness of our emotional,

un-fine state is to open wide enough to receive compassion

and grace. only then will we be able to offer that same com-

passion and grace to others in honest and authentic ways.

gftgg (pg. 58)

His overwhelming Grace is waiting...