letting go...{day 30}

i started out to write 30 posts about letting go...

and my computer stopped a few - odd connection issues refused to connect and so i'd wait for a few minutes and then head to bed...trusting that maybe my silence was better than my words.


because in the silence, He worked in my heart.


and i don't think i've come to any earth shattering conclusions about what letting go truly means...because letting go isn't earth shattering.  we are called, as followers of Jesus, to lay down our lives, to pick up His cross and follow Him - and as my hands empty they simultaneously fill as i choose to do what He asks.

the purposeful act of letting go of what holds me back or drags me down or pulls me away is needed and continual but worth it because of the treasure i find in Him.


during this past month, i've finally joined the bandwagon and picked up this book and started to read. and it's these words that i read late last night that i keep coming back to throughout this day,

walking in genuine intimacy and full surrender to God requires great faith.

"what are you doing right now that requires faith?" that question affected me deeply because at the time i could think of nothing in my life that required faith. i probably wouldn't be living very differently if i didn't believe in God...

life is comfortable when you separate yourself from people who are different from you...that epitomizes what my life was like: characterized by comfort.

but God doesn't call us to be comfortable. He calls us to trust Him so completely that we are unafraid to put ourselves in situations where we will be in trouble if He doesn't come through.

francis chan - crazy love

to let go -  to truly let go of my dreams, hurt, pain, anger, unforgiveness and even wishing that i knew the why of some situations - is hard. it's messy and i seem to make a mess of it even more...

but throughout this month, the one thing i have kept coming back to - that everything always seems to come back to - i keep coming back to Jesus.

i keep coming back to the freedom found in Him when the only thing i'm holding on to is His grace.

so i stand at the edge of another december.  another holiday that is missing so many.  days leading up to the days that still hold so many questions and so much hurt.  and almost three years after the fact, after the shattering and the suicide and the most unhappy of new years, i am feeling the joy again, the anticipation of celebrating that moment when Emmanuel left His heavenly home, wrapped Himself up in our fragile, dusty skin and became God With Us.

And now, O Lord, for what do I wait?

My hope is in you.

(Psalm 39:7 ESV) 

so what do i wait for? do i wait for the dark days to overwhelm and discourage again - or do i push back by looking up...to Him?

because that is the only way to be able to let go, i think.

the only way to truly let go of it all, is by lifting up my eyes to the One Who bled grace on the cross and  clinging to Hope in Jesus with everything i have...

letting go...{day 29}

we had tried for those ten months because we had that nagging feeling that our family wasn't complete yet.  we made the decision to place it in God's Hands but after almost a year with no second pink line, we figured that we were mistaken and rested in that thought and were happily content with our family of five...

only, by the time i was fully content with that decision, she was and the agenda i had already begun to craft and feel comfortable with, excited about, was suddenly out of my hands and i was stunned.


He has made a habit of doing that in my life...

maybe yours too?


i think back to that last winter there, where everything was falling apart and i had no choice but to open up clenched fists and whisper yes to what He had planned.


i remember screaming into my pillow at the God Who i thought had let me down, Who surely must be mocking my wants and wishes and dreams...

i remember driving away from what i had so desperately wanted and heading towards the big and vast empty space of Unknown.


i had never been more terrified.

i had never felt Him so near.



this past week, i feel as though every emotion i possess has been ravaged - i wrote to my sister, my friend, that all i want to do is claw out of this skin that i find myself in, to somehow escape what i have seen and what i know and how, how can all of this brokenness be possible?


the hair that hangs long over a face punched purple and green - the pain in those beautiful eyes and the smile she still manages to share.  and while i ate thanksgiving dinner surrounded by warmth and beauty, she was being beaten.

the sobs i hear as i enter the restroom, a broken girl crumpled on a cold tile floor because she just found out a loved one is dying...a loved one who walked away all those years ago.

of the dark alley i found myself in, trying to open up shut gates while danger is heading right towards us - and why can't there be more light? more light for the dark places so children don't have to be scared to walk home alone?

of that young boy, bullied and mocked and made to feel less-than - of the tears he tries to brush away and hide.


and i am angry because i get to drive away. at the end of the day, i drive away to my home safe and locked with every window secure and in place.  in place.  and i know of children who sleep in rooms lacking this simple luxury - there is nothing between them and the cold air that has settled in for this season and as i fall asleep, there are young eyes plastered open because who knows what can slip in during the dark of the night?


it's all. so. dark.


and my agenda...

my silly agenda.


so often i think i know what's best, and i beg for what i think is best, and i fight for it and i pout over it and more often than not, i sadly get my own way...


until He allows it all to be shaken - for my heart to be shaken - for my life to be uprooted and replanted and for my eyes to be opened to what i need to let go of so that He can make use of what little i have to offer.


and i wrestle with feeling like i'm drowning in a sea of what-if's - fearing that i won't be able to manage it all with a newborn and homeschooling and going down to the mission everyday like before.  and how do i maintain friendships and parenting and keeping our home a haven - let alone clean?

how do i manage the big emotions that still rise up over broken relationships?  and how do my girls always seem to manage to ask the really hard questions while i make the drive from our house to the mission - questions like, why did papa die and how did papa die and do you ever think you'll see your family again, mama?

i don't know how to do it all...

and maybe that's the point.


it's that verse in the book of james that's been dancing around my head all afternoon, the one that seems to caution against agendas and that very human tendency to think that we may know best after all,

Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”—yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.”

(James 4:13-15 ESV)

and it's the simple and so very complicated act of letting it all go, opening up clenched fists and giving our plans, our pain, our questions, the reality of our very uncertain tomorrows over to the One Who knows what our next breath holds ~

if Jesus wills, tomorrow, i will get up and make breakfast and i will get through as many subjects as i can with my children.

if Jesus wills, tomorrow, i will love my husband well and pray for him as he faces the realities that this job holds.

if Jesus wills, tomorrow, i will laugh with my children and pray with them and prepare our hearts to love the ones who are so very unloved.

if Jesus wills, tomorrow, i will drive down and i will listen and i will wipe tears and i will be His Arms to whomever He brings my way.

if Jesus wills, tomorrow, i'll trust that He is holding all my future tomorrows and He'll lead me and show me how to be a mama to 4, a wife to one, a friend to my friends and a keeper of this home He's given to us...

because my haven and rest isn't found in these four walls...

my refuge is in Christ and Him alone.

and so, if Jesus wills, tomorrow, i'll keep letting it go...

letting go...{day 28}

i'm entering into the last few days where he'll be my youngest...my baby boy.

only, he hasn't been a baby for quite some time and yet, there are those moments when he climbs up on my lap, curls his body around my belly and buries his face in the curve of my neck.

these are the moments that i long to hold onto...


he sits beside me the other day, his plate full of his lunch - my mug full of my coffee and he reaches out that little boy-hand, the one that will someday grow large and strong, and he rests it on my shoulder and with his other he reaches for another slice of banana and he says all quiet and soft,

i sit by my friend, i sit by my mama, and i not go anywhere. ever.


he may not realize it, but this mama does, that someday he will go somewhere, whether near or far, and the hand that i hold, the small boy that i snuggle, the sleepyhead i sing over will be precious memories that i will long for.


and these hands of mine - the ones dry and rough from the washing and wiping, Jesus created them to open and close.  and they do one or the other or even both for whatever season i find myself in...


and these little ones that He is filling our home with - they come near and press in close because they long for these hands to close around them in comfort and safety.  they don't understand the selfish-mama-heart that in the chaotic (and yes, my more childish) moments longs for order and quiet and space and why at times i cross my hands blocking them from coming so close... they don't understand because that's not what these hands have been created for.

but my hands, the ones that try to clutch close the moments that fly by too quickly, the ones with joints and bones and muscles that all work together to peel back these fingers one by one, no matter how much the opening hurts this heart...

keeping them open, and positioned towards Him, is the only way i'll know how to walk this fine balance of keeping them close and letting them fly...


and it always, always comes back to Jesus.  how in the letting go of ourselves, our agendas and what weighs us down, we are really lifting empty hands, waiting to be filled with Him...


because it is then that we love well,

friend well,

mama well,

wife well,

do life well.


and i wonder then, if that is when the  present moments because sweeter and the memories become dearer, because He is truly apart of it all...

letting go...{day 23}

it's in the last few days leading up to the busyness of the coming season that we've been talking a lot about what it means to die to ourselves.  he and i, we aren't naive anymore about the tactics that satan takes to destroy families and marriages and friendships and testimonies.

no, we have walked through those waters.


so, it was when i came across this post that i started digging a bit deeper and began to focus on what all i needed to let go of...

Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of God is coming. In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.

Colossians 3:5-10 ESV

...before i could be filled up with all that is from Him and Him alone.

and we get up early yesterday morning while it is still dark and little ones are buckled in while still wrapped up in blankies and jammies and sleep. and we drive through the mountains and a bit of snow and clouds and green and we talk quiet and we pray and we focus on Jesus, because only He can take what we so desperately need to let go of.

and we arrive and walk into warmth and we sit back in couches and watch football and we visit and cousins get reacquainted and daddies get sleepy and obscene amounts of pie get consumed and it's relaxed. and the ones who are missing are missed, but it feels a bit different this year, somehow.

but it's as we leave, as we wrap arms around each other and say our goodbyes and i love yous that one by one, the women who are part of this family i married into, they place their hands on my belly to feel this baby move...

 i looked down in that moment, and i'll never forget the overlapping of hands and fingers over my filling.  a silent blessing over this little one who tumbles in my dark. 

because those few minutes, where we all held our breath waiting to feel her, i felt Him move...when we reach out, with hands emptied out, Jesus fills us with life.


and i am thankful.

letting go...{day 18}

this space sits quiet over the weekend...

a bit like me, i guess.


i've breathed through the days as i've looked at the clock, timing waves of contractions that come every 5-7 minutes for hours at a time and i whisper for her to hold on, quiet myself, will my body to keep her in for the next forty days.


and they space out as i breathe slow...

as i slow.


until this morning when everything seemed to shatter under the weight of my voice and my hurt and my anger.  when i found it hard to even keep up with my breathing, let alone my thoughts and as i chose to stay home while everyone else went to church, i found myself trying to breathe through each painful wave.


all those years ago, before tony and the wedding rings and the babies, she let me box up those tea cups from scotland that her man had purchased for her on their twenty-fifth wedding anniversary.

and it's here in this home that i finally unwrapped the last of them and placed them in that hutch in our kitchen.

and in moments uncertain and unsteady, you reach for what brings comfort and what i reached for in that moment was a left-over, fragile piece of my gramma.


and there is a stash of tea that i've made last for almost two years, given in one of the hardest times of my life and when i fail and life seems a bit shaky, i reach for this comfort and curl up around the wounds that settle heart-deep.

and she kicks.

steady and hard.


i place what i have left of my gramma against my hard and swelling belly and this baby? she presses back with a foot or an elbow or a knee...

i can't see either one of their precious faces, but Jesus formed both of them and me and whether here or there, we all sit in His presence.


and she pushes back...

we don't have to keep clutching, holding on to the anger, the hurt, the pain.

they are thorny bedfellows and the pain they drag with them only cause one to spill out a poisonous venom.


we can push back.


and maybe this is where i've wrestled the most - letting go of what has hurt deeply.

this small one, this baby-girl who will make her presence known at some point in a fast-approaching future, she needs to say wrapped up in my skin for a wee bit longer, but what i have clutched tightly to - the wounds that i have allowed to remain open - i need to let these go in to the Hands of The One Who Heals.

and the process - it's pain-full.

but letting go allows for new life to come,

allows for His Peace to course through and soften hard veins.

and so i sit, quiet - and breathe out prayers to the Only One Who can deliver me safely into the coming day where His mercies are new every. single. morning.

letting go...{day 14}

how do you write about a moment holy?

a moment miraculous and stunning?


they were just a small handful of women who showed up with a dinner to share.  they had prepped and planned and cooked for the set number given and they lined up behind that counter and lifted lids and took saran wrap off of pans and they waited for the prayer to be said.


the room was packed, each table crammed full and from where i could see, even more kids lining the hallway.  i didn't even think, i just bowed my head with everyone else and waited for our table to be called.


i watched these women as i waited - how their faces were warm with smiles and joy;  how each plate was filled and each child was loved on and how good the food smelled.

it wasn't until i was out in the hallway, waiting in the back of the line that i noticed - two extra rooms had been opened up so that everyone there could be filled.


i still didn't think much of it, as i tried to balance two plates in one hand and guide my girls down the line making sure they didn't drop their own.  thanked the sweet girl who took elias' plate balanced awkwardly against mine and made sure my three were sitting and eating when i was told what had just happened.

and it was in that moment, when seconds were being called that i found out...

these women had prepared enough for 50 people.

we had 74 walk through our doors.


and there was enough.

more than enough.

enough for some to have seconds.


and these women - they kept serving and as more children passed by, they kept trusting and when the food should have run out, they had enough and Jesus was in our midst and chicken alfredo became holy and ants-on-a-log were touched by His Hand and that rice krispie square sweetened our mouths with His Joy and how could such a simple meal ever be mundane?


i can become so sidetracked by what little i have to offer.

Jesus has allowed me to walk through hard moments, but this culture i find myself in everyday is foreign...what i have to give can seem so small.


i keep coming back to that small boy with his small offering of 5 loaves and 2 small fish...

that widow with only a small amount of flour, a small amount of oil...


it all seems to begin with something small.

and something small let go into the Hands of God can suddenly feed multitudes, can keep pouring out as long as is needed.


when we let go of our little,

He can do the miraculous.

letting go...{day 12}

one of the saddest days of my life was when my mother told me "superman" did not exist. 

cause even in the depths of the ghetto you just thought he was coming...

she thought i was crying because it's like santa claus is not real. i was crying

because no one was coming with enough power to save us.

geoffrey canada, waiting for superman

it's that quote that has stuck with me all weekend long - read in the pages of a book that i thought would help me understand a bit more of what our kids down at the mission face everyday.  i thought it would help me understand a culture that seemed so foreign...


but the reality is, those words could be said in the depths of the ghetto or in the safest, most secure community on the far side of town. aren't we all looking for a superman with enough power to save us?  

what it all boils down to was found in the pages of another book that i'm reading - me with my nightstand piled high and precariously with all sorts of books - 

it is vital for a healthy church and an effective witness that we understand aright the core of God's revelation as the Holy One. i fear that many are quick to make God in their image rather than understand we are made in His...many people's vision of God owe little to scripture

and much to their psychology. at worst our imaginary conception of God 

is little more than an idol with a few proof texts to clothe it.

simon ponsonby, the pursuit of the the holy

could this process of letting go actually begin with this step - letting go of what i have imagined God to be and to dig deeper to discover Who He Is?

letting go seems to be stripping me of what i held dear - my ideals, my perceptions, even the *good things* that seemed to be so right. 

it's disconcerting, really.

and yet, i want to know Him - not the superman i imagine, or even want Him to be.  

i want to have answers for my little ones when they ask Who God is,

i want to be able to explain who we are in comparison and why it is that we so desperately need Him.

in letting go, i want to let go of everything that hinders my relationship with Him - not to appear pious or "religious" but because i want my life to glorify Him.  

no matter how many years He gives me to live, they are nothing more than a vapor in light of the expanse of eternity...

letting go is letting go of the false and grabbing on to what is holy and true - 

it's only and always about Jesus...

letting go...{day 9}

letting go doesn't mean that one has given up.

doesn't mean that one has lost hope.


it means that the eyes have shifted from what this moment holds, to what Jesus could be doing behind it all.


it's been said how many times before: that every story has two sides and more than ever i am finding out that one side is what i see before me and the other is what He is doing all around me.


letting go doesn't give up hope - it captures more of it.


i let a bit more of my life-story go this afternoon,

released it into a quiet coffee shop and a broken heart sitting across from me.

she spoke out the words, everyone tells me to wait for the best, but how can i get the best if i'm not one of the "best"?


letting go releases hope into the one who needs to hear His Hope the most.

it reminds a hurting and broken world, community, young woman that He died for us all and that it doesn't matter whether we see ourselves as the best or not - He gave His Best to heal what's been shattered deep in us and He is enough.

He's enough.


letting go is letting go of that search for that perfect self, the perfect family, the perfect parent, the perfect friendship, relationship, spouse.

because Jesus says He is all of those things for us - and when we take the pressure off of others around us, we can love them and live for Him well.


and like those rain clouds that started pouring as her tears were on her face, letting go of the search finds us filling up with more of Him to be emptied out for Him only to find ourselves full of Him once again.

it all comes back to Jesus

and how He fills my emptying hands...

letting go...{day 8}

and sometimes, when there are no words because the letting go is hard, there is song.

thank you, friend, for passing this on...it's been carrying me.

letting go...{day 7}

it's in the quiet of tonight, as she is moving deep inside of me, that i realize in just a few short weeks my body will be letting go.

that as far as we are planning and we are concerned, she is the last of our babies to take up residency inside this body of mine and soon, this swelling and aching and stretching and kicking will become a memory and this season of birthing our littles is almost, almost done.


my heart hurts a little at the thought.


and while i am still coming to terms with the fact that there will be a fourth little one sharing these walls with us, i know that He has a plan for her, a plan for us as a family - it's just a little hard to believe that these days that i dreamed about and wondered about and planned for will all come to an end when my body lets go.


i think letting go has the great possibility of being both bitter and sweet.


because being filled and holding close seems more natural, doesn't it? as though it's what we are always searching for...that one thing, or one person, or one experience that will finally make us whole.

letting go, being emptied, releasing almost seems unnatural.

isn't it the loner that is always picked on?


but maybe that is what these 30 days are really all about, more than anything...doing what seems to go against my natural tendency and accepting the release so that what i crave is only Jesus and what fills my life is more of Him and maybe, just maybe, it's okay to be an odd one, that person who chooses to go against what's expected...


what i do know for sure, is that there is pain in the letting go.

but there is life, waiting to be embraced, at the end of the labour...


with Jesus, there is always, always, hope.

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen...

(Hebrews 11:1 ESV)

letting go...{day 6}

and the votes have been cast and the next four years have been decided and i need to remember that not all of life turns out like that.


tuesday nights are nights that he stays late, leads a bible study and then prays with the guys who stay after.  and these young men - they are intimidating with their hoods pulled up and their hard eyes - them all lined up on the steps outside the door...

and it would be so easy to put them into a box and decide that they are destined for failure or gangs or crime.


isn't that what our inner cities are supposedly filled with?


 but could we just open our hands and let go of our preconceived notions of those who we may not understand?  because what we see today doesn't dictate what will happen tomorrow and the chaos of a moment is held still in very Hand of God.  and that person in front of you may be working out a very real faith in a very real way...it just may not look the way you expect.


i'm learning that a mold is meant to be busted out of and the way i see faith being worked out and figured out and lived out in the lives of these kids down in the dark makes me laugh out loud with joy.  what you see is truly what you get and i am willingly letting go of the ideal evangelical-cookie-cutter cut-out.

the dark is still so very dark, yes. and i sit up in the dark of the night praying over one who is so heavy on my heart, but even in the dark, He is quietly raising up a next generation to break through and to shine brightly and to be able to witness it from the beginning? it's worth everything He has asked us to let go of in the years leading up to today.

the lights of faith are flickering all around us - lets fan them with open hands and with mouths full of praise...

letting go...{day 5}

sometimes it's about letting go of the walls we put up around our hearts.

i realized that today.

there are times that i can barely keep up with all the information i am coming to know because my heart can't seem to take it all in.

the faces of these children that surround us every day...they are beautiful and they are lovely and they hide such brokenness.

i think some of their scars reflect my own too clearly and it's easy to want to shy away.


i hid in one of the stalls of the restroom tonight, tried to suck in more air into lungs tight with grief and i tried to close my eyes against the din of the noise outside, but all i could see was their need.


there's that old chorus that we sang in our little baptist church growing up that has been swirling around my head lately, they will know we are christians by our love...

and i have felt inadequate.

because i know what that ache in the pit of the stomach feels like, i know the fear a child feels when tempers flare and fists fly.

and these children, they reach out everyday in small and innocent ways.  i walk in and my belly is rubbed, my hands are held, my arms wrap around so many.


they are looking for someplace safe.


and i become fearful - what happens if i fail, if i don't give enough, if i say the wrong thing or overlook someone that needed to be seen?

what if?

and i can feel the walls starting to build, a "sure" protection against failure...


but knowing that i am a christian won't be what convinces these children and the young men and women, that Jesus loves them.


i need to let go of the thought that it's all about me and my ability to do this all correctly.


they will know the love of Jesus Christ when i let go of these walls and allow my life to be an open vessel for His love to pour out onto them - not so that i will win more souls for Jesus - but out of love and adoration for the One Who saved my soul out of my own sinful mess.


and maybe the key is found in that little passage in matthew,


Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’ Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’

Matthew 25:34-40 ESV

it's not about me,

and really, even though in a large part it is - it's not really even about them,

it's all about letting go of fear and pride and doing all of life and love and ministry as an act of worship to Jesus.

and those hands i hold and those precious children i hug close and the respect i give to those young men and women hiding wounds with a tough exterior - i am learning that to do all of that for them, i am doing it all to Him

 and there are really no walls to erect after all...

letting go...{day 4}

it started during those words that our pastor spoke over us this morning,

us with those wafers of bread in our hands,

and Jesus, on the night He was betrayed, broke bread and gave thanks...

and i couldn't move past it.


i couldn't move past the breaking and the betrayal and the moment of thanks.  past the handing over of fellowship to the very one who would usher in His death with a kiss.


i think of all those areas in my heart broken...

betrayed and bruised...

all those places where i have been the betrayer.


and those Hands that hadn't yet been pierced by the nails, but Whose skin had been stretched over bone and muscle for that very purpose, they willingly broke and released the symbol of His Body so that the 12 around Him could be filled.

He let go of His Life so that we could find it and be made new...

He was willingly broken and beaten and betrayed so that when His sacrifice is truly grasped, He gets all the praise.

and letting go has nothing to do with shedding an old skin that has become too tight, or releasing dreams or hurts or pain...

but it has everything to do with bringing Him alone glory.


to let go is to open my hand to give Him whatever keeps me enslaved to my sinful nature and receive His Sacrifice willingly - 

to take up my own cross and follow Him.


letting go is releasing me and embracing Him.

no hidden agendas,

no ulterior motives.

i am just a woman so tired of who i have been and so very desperate for my Jesus.
 

letting go...{day 3}

 

so we buy a home and move in officially on the very first of june and i remember how i woke up to the sound of rain on the roof while the sky was still dark that night.

it seemed like a blessing of sorts, because He knows how much i love the rain.


and then the sky seemed to dry up. didn't let go of one drop for four long months and we finally let our yard go because i couldn't keep up and he was changing jobs and this little one changing the shape of me kept me in a state of green and i'm sure whatever colour that lawn lost was somehow permanently transferred to my face.


temperatures climbing up past 100 and the lack of moisture quickly turn what was thriving and growing into something brittle and bleached and it hurt to look at.

he heard that fall is a good time to seed, just before the cold of winter comes and spring is still so far away and i stand at the kitchen window and watch as he walks around the yard scattering grass seed while the rain is coming down in sheets.

he keeps sowing while the rain keeps pouring and by the time he looks up at me and catches my eye, that hood pulled up over his head isn't really needed anymore.


our lives can look a bit like that.

or...more accurately, mine can at least.


life can seem so full of blessing until suddenly that sky above is void of any moisture, any relief from the unrelenting heat of the sun.

death sneaks in and steals someone we love...

families are broken apart and that breech lays open, aching for someone to cross over...

words are spoken that can never be taken back...

friendships drift apart and no one knows how to close that gap...

misunderstandings spark an anger that can rage for a lifetime...


and suddenly, all that is left is a shell dry and brittle with patches here and there that are worn down to dirt by feet that carelessly run over.


it can hurt to look at,

hurt to be near,

and it can seem like irreparable damage has been done and what once was green with life will always be this dark and dull and you can either rip it all up,

give up hope and accept that this is how it will always look,


or you can fill your hands with a hope barely breathing in the waiting and release it into ground parched and hardened when the heat is done scalding and the cold winds begin to blow in...


because this whole summer?  while my body has been swelling with a girl-baby that is now stretching and climbing up my ribs deep in the dark of me, i have been desperately waiting for autumn.

i  knew the rain would come back.


i knew that to walk through each hot, dry day would bring the relief of cooler weather and the beauty of jeweled leaves and cozy blankets and warm fires to sip hot cocoa by.

the last two months, He has been asking me to let go of a number of things...


my wish for family has been one of them.


that part of my heart has been dry and brittle and bleached fragile for a while.

and it seems that whenever my heart would lift up my broken to Him, the heat would come even stronger and soon, it felt that there was nothing left to do but let it all go...

let the hot winds blow and ride it all out

and keep my eyes on that sky wide and blue and void of any clouds.


and I see Him now, sowing the hope that i let go of in all those worn and dirt-filled places.


the landscape doesn't look the same,

i don't think that what will grow up in those places will look like what i expected,


but in lifting open hands to Him, and allowing Him to take what i had clenched so tightly, He is using those bruised and broken prayers to raise something beautiful up.



and the rain?

i stand with hands outstretched under clouds that are letting go and leaving me drenched...

o God, You are my God,

earnestly i seek You;

my soul thirsts for you

my body longs for you,

in a dry and weary land 

where there is no water.

i have seen You in the sanctuary

and beheld Your power

and Your glory.

because Your love is better than life,

my lips will glorify You.

psalm 63:1-3

letting go...{day 2}

we drive on the days he works late, out past the neighbours and noise and lights.

we drive out to the orchards and to the roads that wind up hills and we hush, all three of them and i, as the autumn sun washes everything in gold.

and there is one spot i drive to, because as much as i have fallen in love with this valley and the mountains that surround on every side, the prairies are engraved on my heart and though it's less often now, i still crave a flat horizon and a land that stretches out farther than my eyes can see...

and before i can do as paul did and forget about what lies behind and strain forward to what lies ahead, i need to take one long look back: because letting go involves releasing, with open hands, a very real part of me.

because to run a race well, involves running unfettered and running unfettered means letting somethings go.  things that were once thought to be needed.

and it's when i begin to take what was meant to be helpful and turn it into something indispensable, as in, more vital than Jesus,

i need to let it go...

or, those irreversible moments, the ones that i've cried over and wondered over and kicked myself over and how, how can it ever be fixed?

when those thoughts begin to strangle my hope, when my mistakes loom larger than my Lord,  

it's time to open my hands

and let it go...

because letting it go releases it to Him. and in His Hands our dreams, our needs, our failures and our very wants become something redeemable and it allows us to walk free, whether He chooses to give back to us what we've released or not...

and i can see, past that patch of green and that flat earth that soothes when my soul is restless,    

how the sun catches those mountains beyond,

how He has been leading me here all along...              

letting go...{day 1}

there's a tree that hangs low over the road if you keep going around our loop.

i thought it was a maple.

turns out i was wrong.


walnuts cover the road under those leaves, under our tires and they crack open as the weight of us pass over and shatter those shells..


and it hits me as the sun is beginning to set, they've let go...


this strong and sturdy tree has produced hundreds of encased possibilities and instead of hanging on tightly to what is "rightfully" part of it, taken from it's very own DNA, it allows them to drop.


and how many of those nuts are now wasted?  will never amount to anything other than dust and powder and quickly be swept away by the elements...

but there are the few, the ones carried by the wind or little woodland things and even swooped down and carried away by those birds way up high.


who knows where they will take root?


and it's there, in black and white on tissue thin pages that i read what my first step is on this path of letting go...

the Lord said to samuel, "how long will you grieve over saul...?"

1 sam 16: 1a

how long will you grieve?

grieve over lost loved ones, broken relationships, unfixable moments and unmet expectations...

how. long?

and like samuel, sent on a mission to search for a king, He has given me my own holy moment to find - but i need to be willing to take the first step.  to put down my mantel of grief and follow where He leads.

and it all begins with a free fall of letting go...

when you need to let go...

it was on that same front step last night that he spoke to me honestly.

looked into my eyes and said that he felt one of the biggest traps i'm falling into is keeping both feet in two separate spaces.

i need to make a choice.

and over and over and over again over these last two months or so, it keeps coming up:

what is Jesus asking you to let go of?

it hurts. deep down-in-my-gut hurts.  because to let go, to open my hands fully is an act of surrender.

and am i ready?

october seems to be the month for 31 days of... and last year i opted for the month of november instead.  made november my month of here.

i wasn't sure if i would do another. it's suddenly trendy, and i'm anything but.

but

in the face of startling clarity last night, when that one last thing broke my non-existent camel's back, and when i finally opened up to the possibility that in order for the new to be possible i may have to give up the old, an idea began to take shape.

so, i'll run with it...or write with it...i read somewhere once that pencils have eyes - and i'm pretty sure that keyboards do too.  and in order to see where He is leading me, the haze on the other side of that door needs to clear a bit. and that involves some action on my part...

november 1st will begin my 30 days of letting go...

maybe you'd care to join me?