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...

for when it happens... {letters to my four}

there are some things i've learned as i come to the mid point of my life,  and should i be given another 37, almost 36 years, i'm sure i will learn a lot more.

i could come to this place in my life and focus on the one thing that seems to dog my every step,

you will mess up.

not if.

not maybe.

but when.

there will be a myriad of reasons, sweet ones. there will be circumstances beyond your control and there will be details that are very much a part of you and the action you take.  

it's just how it is.

and you can take a look at your mess and feel hopeless.

like you have messed up so badly that there is no way to fix it.

i think i was there.

no, that's not true.

i know i was there.

you may know beyond a shadow of a doubt that God has placed a call on your life.  made it clearer than anything and you keep taking the next step forward each day because you know, eventually, you are going to get there.

and then, you trip. 

you land flat on your face.

you drip with the mess you landed yourself in.

and the one who deceives, he comes close and he whispers those words that sink deep and your heart will sink deeper still.

failure

worthless

un-usable

and you may think that all you are good for is to be placed high up on that shelf of the broken,

the useless,

the screw-ups.

and that focus? the one that zeros in on the mess? 

it will keep you there.

my bible study leader, miss sue, the one who keeps placing me at her table each session, she finds me and tells me to come again for the next one. who cares that i have a newborn! didn't i know how many arms would hold her?  

so i go, and i soak it in. i soak in the message of mercy and i let God get to the tender places that fester with hurt and pain and, dare i say it, anger.

but still i believed, no matter how wrongly, that sure, He can get to those places, heal them and clean them up, but now i'll just be a cleaned up, healed up, broken and useless screw-up saint high up there on the shelf.

right?

that's how it works, isn't it?

oh - i pray that i show you differently.

i pray that you all see it differently than i ever saw it.

because He is becoming what i crave - i can't get enough of Him. this Jesus who continually takes your mama-who-messes-up every. day. and He keeps bending down in the sand and writing out that plan.  He does.  He really does. 

and this is what i learned in that study on james: 

 he was one of the Lord's brothers who mocked Him and called Him mad. 

he was the half-brother of Jesus who didn't believe, but became the head of the Early Church in Jerusalem.

he messed up.

all those years, growing up with Jesus, living life with Creator God and he didn't see. he didn't see His Savior standing shoulder to shoulder with him.

instead, he called Jesus crazy.

but even then, God had a call on his life.

even then.

it never changed.

it never wavered.

"for I know the plans I have for you", declares the Lord, "plans for welfare 

and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope. then you will call upon Me 

and come and pray to Me, and I will hear you. you will seek Me and find Me 

when you seek Me with all your heart."

jeremiah 29:11-13

you aren't going to take Him by surprise when you mess up.

He already knows.

His plan covers all that.

no, it probably would have been best if you don't make the choices that you will, that maybe you should have looked a bit closer at the path before you tripped and fell, but where you can only see a bit of the road ahead,  He sees the whole world held in His Hands.

if you find yourself dusty and hidden high up on a saintly shelf, know this - Jesus didn't put you there.

you did.

so climb down - wrestle with Him if you have to, let Him work out in you what needs to be worked out. you may find yourself limping afterwards a bit, but keep walking, little one.

keep walking.

the path ahead of you is all part of His plan...

before...

before the husband and the vows and our two lives becoming one and all of the trails that our one life has taken us on,

before i knew what it meant to become a mama and all that breaking and the changing and the transforming that this name change has brought,

there was her.


born in the full bloom of august i remember taking her in my unpracticed arms and trying to hold her so that she would stop crying

and maybe like me

if even a little.


she is the one who changed me from who i was and made me something more.


she is now the only one who i willingly let call me by the name i detest, because when it comes from her, aunty kimmy doesn't sound so bad.


her mama, she's known me since i was 16 - she's known me in my crazy days and in my rebellious days and in my broken days and in the joy-filled ones too. sometimes sisterhood doesn't need blood to bond.  sometimes all it needs is two hearts that fit - because He formed them to.

she comes with my niece and nephew after his mama and sister and our two nephews leave.  a mama and sister who sacrificed many days because i thought zeruiah's day was near and they wait and they clean and they encourage and they stay even though my older three are so sick. they come during the hard days of grief and we get through them together...

and i find myself surrounded by women whose dna doesn't match mine, but whose hearts love beyond scientific things like that.


but now, they have all left.


there is a bit more room in these walls, but the extra space is loud and empty...

and if i'm honest, i may have cried in the shower this morning.


there is something so needed in the life of a mama -

and there are so many voices willing to share -

willing to pull in so many different directions.


where are those voices that pull a mama's heart straight to the Heart of God?


before zeruiah's coming and before my home became a bit more full, before the laundry was caught up and my kitchen was scrubbed, i received a book in my inbox and i loaded it onto my kindle.

i settled down to read in the quiet spaces and i found two voices that ushered me straight into the throne room of God.


circumstances can shift and change and lead you away from everyone you know. you can find yourself making a space not only for yourself, but for your family, for your little ones and it can all become overwhelming and maybe a little bit tiring.


but like the ones that come and love and then need to leave, or like the ones who He gives as friends in the unknown places - the ones who become as loved as family, or even those found in the pages of a book, the ones who have walked this road and who have gasped for air in the hard mama-moments and survived and turn around to point you back to the Source of all Strength, they trace the face of Jesus for you when you can barely lift your hands, He provides His Hope everywhere, can i just be willing to look?



she sits on my couch, the one who 11 years ago filled my arms and now the one, the last one, who filled my belly lies curled up on her lap.

time flies and i can't even imagine where all those years have gone.

and the question resonates loud, the one that seems to be whispered all around me, where are the older women? where are the older women to gently guide the young mamas to the feet of Jesus? 

she is going to need one, someday.

walking this road, this sometimes desperate road is in a sense more than walking it for myself...

it means walking it for my daughters, for my nieces, for the younger women He may bring along the way.

because it's not about turning out well-mannered, well-behaved, well-adjusted children. that could happen, and it could not...

it's about Him - about taking the joy-filled and the hard-fought and the completely shattered moments and letting Him use it all for His glory.


so, let's not do this alone, let's fight in the trenches together - let's speak words to each other that are full of grace and life and point us always and pull us in all ways straight in to the very heart of Jesus.

when they walk away...

i don't think it matters.

i think i'm becoming bold enough to say those words.

i don't think it matters...

you came home this evening and fell onto the bed beside me, as though the day after turning 38 had felt the need to add some extra weight onto your shoulders.

you began saying their names quietly, one after the other. i felt overwhelmed by the number...i hadn't realized they were all related.

and then you said it,

their dad decided that he was done this weekend.  he left. up and walked away...

i don't think it matters...

whether you are six years old or edging closer to forty,

when a parent up and decides you are no longer worth being there for,

nothing compares to that ache.

i didn't hear the gunshots this evening, i only heard the sirens...i saw them all crowding on the front steps and huddled close together.

i was trying to find our three because it was time to go home and i still had one more stop to make.

i got to the door and it was repeated to me, gunshots had been fired, i needed to stay inside.

i knew you were inside,

but the last i had heard, our three were out in that playground.

my kids!! are my kids in the playground??

even i heard the desperation in my voice.


and i felt them all press in close, those children who deal with situations like these on a regular basis i'm sure, as though pressing in close presses in comfort and i was moved back into safety while another went out to search for my own...


they were inside, near you. at least, they knew where you were and they felt safe.  we got out to our van while the police lights were still flashing, while streets were blocked off and i drove away and you stayed behind.

you stayed behind and learned of one more family who has been rejected by a parent and you carry it home.

you stayed behind and listened to the brokenness and filled hands with food to get them through the next few days.

you stayed behind...

 and where can it go but at Jesus' feet?

because it can't go anywhere else. it can't. 

we can't make the parents around us fight for their children,

we can't make dead daddies come back to life,

we can't make mamas stop wandering to circle around and come back home.

you lay beside me in the bed we share and we aren't immune,

our children have experienced their own deep losses,

we wrestle with our own questions and bewilderment.

and in the silence you turn towards me and you say with an intensity i know is stamped with your integrity,

i'm not going anywhere.  do you know that?  i. am. not. going. anywhere.

and i know.  i know, tony.


because you could have walked away at any point. you asked if you could pursue me 2 weeks before you turned 26 and i know what you have faced choosing to stay with me. 

walking away would have been the easy and understandable thing to do.

you turned 38 yesterday and gunshots were fired today and i know that nothing short of death would ever cause you to leave.

and yet there is loss all around us and this is what your life is teaching me every day:  death can be walking alive among us because bitterness eats the living whole and when i begin to turn inward to what hurts, you cup my face and you turn my eyes back to Jesus and remind me that they only way i can walk as one living is to walk with my eyes focused on Him. 

 to lay what hurts down at His feet.

to press in close ~ to each other, to Jesus ~ because to press in close presses in comfort and pushes out what will kill our souls.


i could have celebrated you yesterday and lost you today and yet He gives us one more day together. one more day to walk through and work through and learn to press into.  

and so, even with the heaviness that this day has brought, with the hurt and pain that we walk into everyday, i want to say how thankful i am for the chances that He gives everyday to celebrate you.  

happy birthday, my tony.

i love you.

from their yard...

i hear them before i see them, that brother and sister with their hands intertwined and something clutched between all twenty fingers.

i hear their laughter before i see their smiles and as they come around that corner, their bright faces light up my own.

it takes me a moment to realize that what's held so tightly is for me.

we picked this for you. it's from our yard...

and suddenly my hands are full of bright pink petals and they are gone before i can say thank you.


i sit across from another mama and her sweet friend this afternoon - cups of hot coffee between all of us and i watch their faces soften as they share...

and this mama, she was up all night with her sick little boy and i hear her heart, see the tiredness in her eyes...

i was eighteen when she was born.

she was fourteen when her arms were filled with her small son and i look at both girls and i want to cup their faces and tell them how beautiful they are, how strong they are...

and how much Jesus loves them.


i want a cup of coffee to be strong enough to fix everything broken and wrong.

i want it to be strong enough to heal broken families and keep kids out of gangs and bring back runaway mothers and keep daddies out of jail.

an hour of time doesn't seem long enough...


and it never will be.


it never will be long enough until He is invited into each moment and i choose to be emptied...

i think of that little boy, the one with the five loaves and two fish who allowed his hands to be emptied of what would fill him, placed it all in the Hands of the Creator and watched Jesus feed over five thousand hungry bellies.

aren't our hearts more ravenous than our stomachs that need to be continually filled? aren't they starved for Him?


it's as I'm sitting outside while the playground is swirling in chaos around me, as my three get lost in the bedlam and my fourth nestles in close under my heart, it's there that i open up my hand and catch the full picture of the gift i've been given ~

broken and imperfect and lovely and achingly beautiful, it's a picture of each one of us.  we can choose to remain hidden away, clutched close because of what we lack and what's missing, but i am learning that those places that are gaping and wounded deep in us are the ones He tenderly offers to those who walk gaping and wounded around us.


each petal missing, each loaf of bread that seems to be lacking, that fish that seems to be too small, those sixty minutes that fly by too quickly - He uses it all.

He uses us ~ 

miracle in and of itself...


and in the middle of it all, when i find myself up in the dark of the early morning because my heart is heavy with the knowing. when what i have carried on my thirty three year old shoulders feels like it will break me and how do fifteen year old shoulders bear up under it all? when He hears and makes sense of what i can't even voice and holds each tear that falls over children that have filled my heart with love straight from His Own - i can sense it, how in the unfurling of my fingers over wounds clenched tight to protect, He intertwines the pain and beauty and cups it all together with joy...

a letter for my three...

it's the first of october and by now, i would have thought sweaters and socks and red noses would have been a part of our days.

i even brought out the hot cocoa to the front of the cupboard for those "just in case" moments that call for something hot to warm you up.


you all keep asking to have daddy make the wood stove work,

we even have the comfy chairs and blankets in place...

i've looked forward,

no...

i've longed for autumn to arrive and as one calendar page gives way to the next, summer wars with autumn and the hot-tempered one of the two seems to be winning.


it will come, i'm sure, when the season is ready.

but until then, we wait,


expectantly.


i sat in the quiet of a service yesterday, sat in the back with your daddy and leaned into the comfort of him.  our arms brushed and our hands intertwined and he would whisper sweet nothings at the most inopportune times, but then your baby sister began to move...the one who had been so still all morning, the kind of still that makes a mama begin to pray for a kick to the ribs.

soft movements started, like ripples in the water, as though she too needed to be still and quiet.

i understand those moments.

each one of us needs them.


and as a mama to the three of you and this one-to-be, there are times that i wait for them...

expectantly.


and it's not yet halloween and not even close to christmas but the stores have already intermingled the two and maybe it's for that reason that mary was on my mind for much of the day yesterday.  christmas will find me heavy and aching, ready for the release that your little sister will bring, but for now, i hold on to these moments...the moments that are full of just you three.  the moments that will most likely by the last of so many things...

i sometimes wonder at all the emotions that motherhood brings - the desperate need for order and space and quiet and yet,

yet...

the fear that all of it is moving too quickly and how in the world do you enjoy it all while you are barely surviving it all?

so i type it out in with this cursor that races ahead, hoping to catch the snippets that will sink deep into my heart; memories that will stay close when you have all flown away.

because you will, and my life will slow and yours will speed up and what you have lacked now i will try and provide and the foundation we lay now will become something strong for later and it is those moments that i wait for with hope...

but for now, my sweet and crazy three, i catch the quiet while i can, sit still with Jesus so that what i offer you will be full of Him and try and live fully in these moments,

expectantly.


i love you...

~mama

1537. brushing their hair in the early morning

1538. the light of a full moon

1539. feeling her foot against my ribs

1540. the way Tchaikovsky makes my heart thunder

1541. the violins moving like the waves of the ocean i crave

1542. jonah and what he reveals

1543. expecting fall

1544. expecting Him

1545. a call to place Him first...

1546. ...and realizing in what area He means

1547. victories, no matter how small

1548. tony

1549. that i get to experience life with-in one more time

1550. that i breathe for 2

1551. that i eat and drink for two

1552. that my heart beats for 2

1553. a fourth baby and the relationships they will all form

1554. that He orchestrates our lives

1555. none of it is out of His control

1556. i can trust Him. always and in all ways

1557. the dog hair everywhere

1558. for the calming that mercy brings

1559. for the way they are growing and maturing...

in the wrapping around...

the sun is setting earlier and the air is turning crisper...

i leave the windows open to let fall sneak in.


and it was on an evening that was already dark this past weekend that i heard the laughter out front of our house, filling our bedroom, filling the living room, filling every nook and cranny it seemed...

curiosity got the better of me and i peeked out from behind the curtains to see the cause when i saw it.

nothing funny or absurd - something rather plain actually, but a family wrapping coloured lights round and round a post and just enjoying being together.

i caught that glimpse of them as they finished up and stepped back to admire their handiwork - backs were slapped and hugs were shared and some went one way and others went inside,

but i kept standing there.


it's amazing to me, how in the dark of the night a light can draw one's gaze and hold it captive.


he chased our van last week - that little boy who wants a new identity.  the one who told me what he wished his name was and then asked to come home with us.  i knelt down in front of him, looked into those old eyes in that young, sweet face and had to tell him no.

 but he kept pleading and i had to close the door on brokenness.

he chased me as far as his little legs would carry him and i wanted to stop that van and make everything better.  i wanted to make what was shattered in his world, whole.

i wanted to fight the pain inside.


i had to leave early on a different day, and the one whose name is full of promise asked me why we had to go...couldn't we just stay 5 more minutes?  i wrapped my arm around her shoulders and told her i couldn't, that we were already late, but i would be back the next day and she could come and sit with me then.  i heard her go up to tony as i buckled my little boy in...

she asked if she could go home with us too.

she didn't chase the van,

but she watched us with her eyes and why does there have to be so much pain and so much hurt?


he whispers in the dark to me of that young man who carries school and work on his shoulders, the young man who finally grew strong enough to fight back and stop the beatings of his mother, his siblings...

himself.

the one who has a wicked sense of humor and a quiet steadiness and is now the sole provider for the family he is a part of.

and it can easily overwhelm.

i didn't expect to love the children who come there as much as i do - i thought i would care, yes, but heart-expanding, aching love?

no...

smiling faces can hide so much, but it's always the eyes that give the pain away.


and He asks us to go into the dark places, the places void of Him.  He asks us to trust Him and to do the hard thing and to believe that He will carry us each step of the way.

it's the only way i can go back everyday, to stand beside tony and bring our Father's Love.

the only way...


and my twinkly lights may still be packed away, but He doesn't need them anyways...

because the True Light is His Son and the current to bring His Glory, the Holy into the forgotten and despised areas is your heart and mine.

so we stand in faith, and we surround the children He brings to us with the Light of His Love...

choosing to see Him in all of this dark...

1511. wide awake at 4:30am
1512. quiet hours before the day starts
1513. moments alone with Jesus
1514. that this small one inside is a girl
1515. watching her wiggle
1516. tony's grace
1517. tears in the park
1518. that he's home for the day
1519. that staff we miss

1520. a long awaited cup of coffee

1521. canadian geese flying overhead
1522. their song of home
1523. longing for the ocean
1524. mornings that are crisp and cool
1525. this amazing dog at my feet
1526. that He gives strength to a weary mama

1527. a kitchen mess easily cleaned up
1528. little girls who still need a mama's help
1529. the quiet of a sunday afternoon
1530. flower-glory
1531. the family He makes
1532. baby kicks

1533. the way elias absentmindedly plays with my hair
1534. kisses before work
1535 mornings and their early quiet
1536. watching my girls learn to read

when you weren't made for what you face...

it's as i'm driving home yesterday, turn right onto that loopy street when i look up at the temperature right there in the center of my windshield and about hit the brakes...

107 F.

mild, yes, for some parts of this country, but for me?  it made me whisper out His Name in a plea for mercy.


i keep saying it's because i'm canadian, despite the visa and the pictures and paperwork that are just one step closer to becoming amercian.  deep down, my roots have been planted deep in "the great white north" and over and over i tell myself that i wasn't made for this...



he fights the newest transition, cries and pleads to not be a big boy as the diapers are put away and the big boy pants are brought out and we sit for hours today in that bright and sunny bathroom, those cars he desperately wants, just out of reach.

we sing and clap and laugh and still...nothing.

nothing, of course, until he is in the kitchen and then, of course, accidents happen...but i begin to question that maybe i wasn't made for this...

and it's as that thought sneaks it's way into my mind today that another thought entirely counteracts what i have been telling my heart for years when things become uncertain and rocky...

but maybe you are...

no, the blood that runs through these veins may have found their origin years before me in countries like norway and scotland, ireland and russia.  and maybe, because of this, i will always long for -40 degree winds and snow that blows from the north just to steal your breath away,

but before He ever created me, before i was ever knit together in the dark and quiet, He wrote out my story.  every smooth surface and every detour that i have thought was going to be the end of me.  each mile my life will cover...and has covered... has been penned by Him first.

i may think that i wasn't made for the circumstances i face,

but He knows i am.


she placed the doppler yesterday morning on my belly that's starting to show and almost immediately that sound of a runaway heartbeat filled the room for a moment that was too short.

this one hears my heartbeat everyday...

all day.


and maybe ~ though, i could be wrong ~ all of the i wasn't made for this's could be quieted if we purposefully hide under His Wing and lean close against Him to hear His heartbeat that beats strong for His Own.

maybe...

because i think in the cadence we'd hear the promise that He created you and me because He has a plan, a purpose, that we get to be a part of...

and it will all bring Him glory.


so in the days and moments that you feel that you couldn't possibly have been made for this, dare to believe that maybe you have been.

.
because it's there, that promise of His that paul wrote down to calm trembling and doubting hearts, just in case you find yourself in the same place that my heart tends to go...

for we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for 

good works, which God prepared beforehand,

that we should walk in them.

ephesians 2:10

if He penned it, He knows the outcome.  

and He's given you all that you need for each moment that has you whispering His Name as you search for mercy...

on a night i don't care for jonah...

we are going through band-aids like they are going out of style.

it doesn't seem to matter that the temperature has dipped and spring has decided to act like herself ~ those three not-so-little-anymore-little-ones of mine want to be outside in the sun and the fresh air and fall down and brush off and bleed a little all over everything.

and i sit on that little patch of grass and i watch them - remembering those days of riding up and down, up and down, up and down that far away sidewalk, imagining all the things i could do or be on that hot pink bike of my very own.

they race each other on scooters and tricycle to that fire hydrant and back and they either all win, or all lose...or they all start the race at different times.

doesn't seem to matter though, because to them,

they are soaring.


until feet slip out from underneath because a sweet mind is far away in the clouds and earth pulls them back hard on scratchy cement and blood seeping out of skin reminds them of how fragile they really are.


there are moments that i wait,

stay curled up on that quilt...


because sometimes the falling is slow and kind and the sound that reaches my ears is laughter and my mama eyes trained on them get a thumbs-up from the fallen one 10 feet away.


but there are times that they run to me,

blood dripping as quickly as their tears,

and they collapse into my arms because it's not just a band-aid they need,

they need my heart.

he and i?

we laid down on the floor this evening,

him on his stomach with that bible laid out underneath his face.

me, all sprawled out on my back watching that fan turn around and around, listening to his voice read out the story of jonah.


i decided fairly quickly that i didn't quite care for the reluctant prophet.

not because of his foot-dragging ability,

but because tonight, his story, his attitude looked a little too much like my own.

i wanted that fan to break free of that ceiling and take me somewhere far away from the Word that was piercing so deep.


how very much like jonah.


and how very much like God.

a God who can use the putrid belly of a whale, or the withering of a shade-producing vine to speak into the heart of His runaway, grumpy servant...

a God who can use this same prophet to speak words into the heart of a city and cause them to repent and follow Him...

a God Who can use that same story of second chances and grace and mercy towards the deserving and the undeserving and remind this heart that He did the same for me when i was the most undeserving of all.


He is the God Who sees me when i've fallen and i can't clean up the mess,

He is the God Who holds out His arms and lets me fly into them when the hurt is too great.

because, really, none of us is deserving of the grace and love He longs to so lavishly pour out on us all.   jonah, in all his pride, didn't realize how desperately similar he was to those ninevites he wanted God to destroy.

but God, because He is God, longed for all of them, jonah included, to turn and be found lost and captured in His Love.


they teach me that, in the midst of tumble-down days and scratched up knees and band-aids that seem to cover every square inch of tender, exposed skin...they teach me that a wound is nothing to be ashamed of,


but it is something to run with, blood dripping down and tears streaming free, straight into Arms wide and open to be found held close in His Love.

3 gifts woven together
1460. that scarf i keep ripping out
1461.those 4 who were knit together in my dark
1462. the way He's joined our marriage together

3 gifts inherited
1463. i am qualified to share in the inheritance of His holy people (colossians 1:12)
1464. gramma's bible
1465. her simple wedding band

3 gifts square
1466. that picture from the ocean
1467.their 3 faces captured and displayed
1468. thin slices of pepper-jack cheese

a gift stacked, stashed, stilled
1469. those school books finished for the day
1470.the hurried rush of laundry
1471. everyone sleeping (but me)

3 gifts close
1472. those clean sheets
1473.us five in these four walls
1474. words across the miles

3 gifts found in Christ
1475. i am reconciled by Christ's physical body...
1476. through His death...
1477. and i am presented holy in His sight, without blemish and free from accusation. (colossians 1:22)

3 gifts reflecting
1478. the way we see his papa in elias' smile.
1479. the haircut i'm trying to like
1480. them all captured in my camera

3 gifts fragile
1481. feelings
1482. memories
1483. vulnerable hearts

a gift cloth, steel, wood
1484. that new dress
1485. that old van
1486. that beat up piano

3 gifts moving
1487. lyla
1488. olivia
1489. elias

3 gifts "ugly beautiful"
1490. saying "yes" to the hard
1491. surrendering to the unknown of His Known
1492. holding a grieving child

3 gifts orange
1493. that early morning sunrise
1494. my favorite jam
1495. the tired, sleepy sun - a full circle of a day

3 gifts in dirt
1496. those pansies growing strong
1497. pumpkin seeds changing
1498. their early morning breakfast - all those birds on our lawn

a gift given, made, sacrificed
1499. his love
1500. those cupcakes
1501. His Life

when it's dark you can hear it...

the house was silent and everyone sleeping, except me and this keyboard sitting on top of my lap.  the tapping of keys pressed down rings out loud and i'm sure someone, someone small, will awaken to all the quiet noise echoing out in that 1AM dark. but they sleep - all three of them and that man beside me.

they breathe deeply of the cool night air from a window cracked open and it's a quiet i don't want to let go of.

because when something changes, turns, shifts or breaks, the slightest movement only seems to emphasize the shock.

i wasn't ready.


so i sat typing words in the quiet of the dark.

there is comfort there in the repetition of verses where only the fingers dance while a soul fights to still.


because it's on the grass outside that school where she finally broke down.

where she screamed low and guttural and all the pain and hope and anguish and dreams collided into one another when she realized,

we weren't going back.

that here really did mean home and roots and there was a chapter closed.

i think she thought, when that offer was put on that house clear across town that those four yellow walls complete with that white trim that used to bear the name home would actually be ours again.

the air was crisp that night too - and her face was flushed with grief.


and each night since then, sleep has been hard to come by.

and i sit up, after each one is finally breathing slow and soft and listen to the silence that only the dark can bring.

until two nights ago.

frogs, crickets, even those dogs all howling like crazy - they were quiet and the air seemed heavy with silence only broken by the soft click of my lamp being turned off for the night.

cocooned in my blankets i waited for sleep when i heard it soft and sweet.

starting out as though timid, the notes were stilted and slow until she picked up a tune, a rhythm, and that lonely bird warbled out a  lullaby wrapped up in the black of a midnight sky.

He wasn't lost on me, in that moment small yet holy ~ 

everything else can give way: the comfort, the light, the hope we cling to so tightly.  it can vanish in the blink of an eye and we are left stunned.  shocked.  unable to really even think.

He says that we are the light of the world, a city on a hill that cannot be hidden - that in the darkest moments we are to shine most brightly for Him because He, The Very Light of this World we find ourselves in, dwells in our very own darkness that He has redeemed.

the darkness, though heavy and confusing is the most beautiful contrast to the Life giving Light that He is because He cannot be hidden, regardless of the circumstances.  There is hope - always there is hope - our eyes just need to be opened to see.


and this i am learning, that the ones that can move my heart the most and lift my eyes to Jesus, are the notes that hover suspended in the pitch of the night.

so sing, even if what comes out of your mouth is broken, bathed in tears and cracking with pain.


He hears it - that love song of the brokenhearted that refuse to let go of His Hand.

the making of a home, a family...

they came back this spring, as slowly as this season appeared.

one by one they began buzzing circles around small bodies and little ones would cry and i watched those wasps to see where they would go...

and they returned.

they returned to that crack in the eave of the garage...just below the peak i watched them hover around that opening.

the one that opens up into a nest so large it cracked the beams of the joists in the framing of the roof.

the exterminator had been called last fall,

he had sprayed them all dead,

and now it's all buzzing with life again.


they are a nuisance.

they are aggressive.

but they are making a home.


and maybe it's because we are waiting for that closing date, waiting to unfold boxes and fill them up full.  pack up that moving van one last time, put down roots, claim our space and make a home.

maybe it's for a million reasons that i feel slightly lost in the middle.


for all those months before we left what was, i begged Him to let us put down roots there. begged Him to change the course that seemed to be heading in only one direction and when i finally surrendered, submitted to His will, i began to ask if He would allow us to put down roots somewhere else...

and i find myself trying to reconcile the loss of one dream and the realization of another while at the same time trying to figure out where home for us is...


it hits me, as i drive in the heat of summer that has decided to arrive in april - hits me that his home and mine are no longer ours to go to...home is where we will make it, where we will choose to dig deep and grow them all up...and it ached, that thought; as families travel towards each other, plans realized and memories made and lyla sobs before bedtime prayers and i feel helpless because it all fell apart before she turned 5 and i am her mother and aren't mamas supposed to fix everything and make it all better?

where are those wounds that can be eased with a kiss?


but it's in the middle of all that chaos that has graced our home for the last 3 days, chaos of 7 children 6 years old and under.  as we open that door and welcome them in - the friend that stood beside him at our wedding 10 years ago, the friend who was his best friend before me and willingly gave up that place.  his amazing wife who has become more than his wife, but a sister to me and an aunty to my three...

and when the air here becomes a little too noisy and we all pile in and drive across town and spill out into a yard of the house that has become a home all because of the one who cares for us like a father would,

this home that has become a place to land...

it's there, when i can barely hear myself think that i hear it,

i hear the sound of family.

it doesn't look like the landscape of what we left behind at all,

barely recognizable, i can understand why i would feel lost at times...

because this?  it isn't what i had planned out for my life.


could that be the point?


my life isn't my own - it's His, fully.  completely.

and it's His journey i'm following,

what i see as detours, He sees as part of His perfect plan for my life He established since before the foundation of the world was set in place.

and this journey is just that - a moving forward towards where my real Home will be.

it's a moving towards Jesus.


that house with the closing dates and the mortgage payments and the lawn to mow?  it's a place to rest until i'm done here...i can't lose sight of that, because that is what will keep a restless heart settled.  we are always moving towards something - so let me be moving towards Him.


11 years ago today, he got down on one knee and asked me to be his wife. me - the canadian girl used to the wide and open of the prairies, and there, with him, surrounded by the mountains of idaho with snow still on the ground and us all still intact ~

i looked into his eyes and said yes.


i didn't know what He had mapped out,

i didn't know how how deeply entwined joy and pain would become.


but i did know that i would love him until i drew my last breath and follow him anywhere

and He led us both to here.


here where the air is hot in april,

here where i feel lost and found,


here where He provides the family,

and here where we are finally home.