The brave break

Most things break, including hearts. The lessons of life amount not to wisdom, but to scar tissue and callus. (The Spectator Bird, Wallace Stegner, 1976)

We saw each other in the context of our dreams: a wife busy in a farmhouse kitchen with toddlers playing at her feet in the sun; a husband who could protect and care for a family, legitimize a lost girl by making her a wife. Friendship ripened into love and love flowed quite naturally into marriage and four babies and the making of a family. This was my dream from the time I was small - a man like my father, to know and be known, to birth babies and raise them in a farmhouse on my family's land.

Childhood was full of other people's dreams. It takes the shipwrecks of life to chip away the façade I'd helped the world construct around the real Genevieve. As pain continued to flow as constant as waves on the ocean, I was tossed and tumbled until the sheen of my soul began to shine through. I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror of therapy, in the wake of my own early exit plan. I was overthrown by a vision of life that I'd never imagined. A life in which I was important, and beautiful, and whole.

Life changes us, for better or worse. There were decades I was sure I was being broken, used up, stamped out. Hindsight is 20/20, they say, and so it is: all that wreckage was just the shellac of that shell I'd adorned for the sake of others, although at the time I thought I was donning it for myself. I thought I was setting myself apart, keeping myself holy, doing what had to be done - my duty as a woman and a follower of Christ.

I've been living naked, without the lies, without other people's truths, for 3 years. It's scary to choose your own path when it means walking through the woods away from the highway you were set on as a child. Yet wandering alone to find my place, to find myself, reminded me of the little bits I'd salvaged of Genevieve along the way: a preponderance toward lone wolf, the small unexpected joys of the universe cherished close to my soul, the love that used to pour out of me as naturally as blood courses through my veins.

It has always been in the desolation of the wilderness that I come face to face with my own soul. I wish it weren't so, because it is a lonely way to find yourself. I was taught, in a thousand different ways, that it is only through the sharing of ourselves that our lives have meaning and purpose. What I've discovered in my personal wastelands is that life itself is precious and very beautiful. I have no doubt now, finally, that if I were alone for the rest of my life, there would still be something to live for. This breathing in and out that is a daily miracle beyond our understanding is the greatest gift we ever receive. A gift that often gets highjacked by expectations, norms, social patterns. From birth to the grave, it is possible to live never knowing yourself at all: for our strengths are often cast as weaknesses and our weaknesses as possibilities, and we push, push, push to be better, to do better, to be different so we can be the same as everyone else, to be right...do we forget to pause and reflect on what is glorious about ourselves in this very moment on our constant quest for perfection?

It was just a footpath through the woods I stumbled upon at first. The people who had walked this path had tried to leave no trace of their existence. There were no ghosts of campfires built to keep themselves warm. There were no groups of tents pitched in community. There was no other life visible...just an almost imperceptible line weaving through the underbrush far out here from the highway where there is no background noise save for the noises of the earth. Here, on the unbeaten path, the footsteps finally match my own.

I had to leave people behind on the highway. I had to wave goodbye, and it was the hardest goodbye I've ever said. For three years I would hike back to the highway after a while, but I left my trail marked. I retreated to the woods when the din began to drown out my thoughts and my own voice in my head. I showed my children the trail, and it turns out they love being in the woods with me. They have hated the highway as much as I have. And although there are times when we all miss the ease of walking on a paved road with big glowing signs and mile markers, we've come to peace with the fact that we're not highway people. We remind each other through the fireless nights, that we are strong, and we are brave, and we can do this together. I never expected my own children to be my encouragers. I never expected them to love the paths I love or the person I am. But as I slowly shed layers of the world's myths about me, my kids fell in love with me in a brand new way, a much deeper way. They see me in ways I can't yet recognize my own reflection.

And so I've said goodbye to the wife my husband saw in his dreams. I've said goodbye to the husband I used to see in mine. The truth at the center of the heartache is that there is something between us that may just stand the test of time...four little hearts that beat a mixture of our blood, his and mine. All the mistakes we've made together are being transmuted from suffering to awe. I see the truth of him now in ways I never could see clearly when I was standing next to him. He sees me for who I am, and even when it is not who he wants desperately for me to be, I can see the truth reflecting bright off his pupils, and perhaps it is because truth is undeniable that he has been able to loosen his grip on those dreams a little.

I live today in a small apartment by myself. There are days it is filled with the noise and chaos of the family I helped create. There are days when I find my path in the woods waiting for me at the door when I walk into the quietness of my own space.

..............................

I suppose all of this is to say a very simple yet petrifying truth: I am going through a divorce. I am going through the wreckage of old hopes and shattered moments, I am sifting through waste looking for long-lost treasures. I knew there would be a moment when it was time to tell the world. I am not the person I thought I was when I was 23. I cannot dance to the music played by my small world. I will not watch myself disappear into the dark night without struggling to keep breath in these lungs and fight in this body. I finally care. I finally want it, life - like I've never wanted anything ever before.

Here, amongst the wreckage, I am discovering that I never did fade away into nothingness. I just quit speaking, I quit feeling, I quit dreaming, I apologized profusely for the very things that make me, drive me, inspire me. What I found at the end of a marriage is the beginning all over again. I can no longer make amends to the world for being who I am. I can no longer go under the surface just to keep the world afloat.

It may seem like the most selfish choice in the world - and perhaps it is, at the very core: I cannot live in the life I chose at 23. It is brave and hopeful and revolutionary, to choose life over life for others. What I have learned through all my suffering is simple: life for others can never be lived until you choose your own life first. Most people don't know this because most people never hold a knife in their hands and push it down into their own flesh. Most people don't understand choosing life because it is a default decision for them. All they see is the crooked and thorny path that leads off the highway, full of danger and unknown. To them I say, you don't have to understand and you don't have to know. I do. This is my life I'm talking about. Although it may seem scary and fraught with threats, I will say it again: I am brave and hopeful and I am a revolutionary. I will find my way. After all, this is my home and these woods wanderers are my people, and here I am finally NOT afraid.

If it is on this path that you find yourself? It doesn't matter how slow the going is or how alone you may be. There is sunlight filtering through the trees and eventually you will come to a clearing where you can spread your arms for the very first time and welcome yourself home to your body and your awareness. Don't lie down in the cold and agree with the world's assessment that only the hopeless wander off into the woods alone. Be brave. Be hopeful. Be a revolutionary.

Because the revolutionaries of our times? They aren't wielding weapons on a battlefield of wrong and right. They are seeing through wrong and right to beauty and truth. They are the ones who are smiling because the breath is still entering and exiting, and they are the ones who know the preciousness of seeing yourself clearly. These revolutionaries might turn out to be the visionaries, and they just might be the ones living best for others, because they've bandaged their own wounds and learned how to heal firsthand.

Maybe the road less traveled is for the faint of heart after all: here, in the stillness, we can remember our heart's rhythm and nurse ourselves back to bravery and strength and, most of all, love.

Get help if you are suicidal

Small portions of belonging

"You never belong until you believe you do. And it’s only when you believe you belong, that you believe you are beautiful." (Ann Voskamp, guest posting for Lisa-Jo Baker, "The Gypsy Mama")

Sitting on the dugout bench at a baseball game, alone on the far edge, listening to the jokes the boys made of my hairy legs. Not having the bravery to join in my brothers' latest exploit, and that sense of dread mixed with shame like an angry sea roiling inside me. Playing with my dolls all alone, creating a fantasy land where I belonged and others belonged to me.

But worst were the whispers of an abuser who told me I was "different", "weird", "disgusting", that the world would be better off without me. 

When your soul is still a blank slate, those words begin to define you. Deep-seated self-hatred and self-doubt lead to misery even on the best of days. Sing-song of the schoolyard on which I was also a foreigner - homeschooled before the cool kids did it - "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me." Sing-song of the tormented lobbed back at tormenter as she stitches another plate of armor around her soul. 

Maybe it should be sung, "Stick and stones may break a bone, but words will never leave me."

20 years later, I am waving goodbye to 10 years of friendships that are now in the rearview mirror. If I had difficulty trusting before, it is almost impossible now. Relationships become a constant waiting game, anticipating you leaving me. It is only in pairs that I can relax, breathe, open up the armor and let you in.

It has been said that belonging is our foundational need. Perhaps being grown up is realizing that belonging happens in small slices. It is not a universal experience that occurs in every group, every team, every congegration. The few that have known you and loved you anyway give you enough belonging to float through seasons of isolation.

And there's always the hope, hanging like a juicy carrot, perhaps unrealized until our final breath - for the time when 

...you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility...that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace... And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near. For through him we both have access to the Father. So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. (exc. Ephesians 2, ESV)

"Belong"

We belong to the light, we belong to the thunder

We belong to the sound of the words we've both fallen under

Whatever we deny or embrace for worse or for better

We belong, we belong, we belong together

~Pat Benatar~

A puddle in a pew

A girl, a rock, the vast expanse of water that goes on for as far as the eye can see. Here I see God. Here is where I can listen and hear the whispers in the waves and the laughter of children lilting over the windy shore, see Him in the moss-clinging rocks and the millions of brilliant stones cast upon the shore just because. Just for Him. All this beauty. And just for us. A whole world created just for the glory of God.

If I were being perfectly honest, this will always be my church. My family is where I first found God and it is where I meet Him most authentically daily. It is where I work out my faith on my knees, and it where I feel the thrill of Him most often.

Katy receives her 4th grade Bible during "Children's Church", when all the children of the church go to the altar and worship for 10 minutes in front of the congregation, then receive the blessing of the congregation before dismissing to Sunday School.

But for my children, Sunday after Sunday spent at home with family as church was not enough. Pain fades so much faster when you're a child. I was still in the middle of a mental breakdown after our expulsion from the evangelical church when our kids started begging to go back. We found a "hospital church" for a while - a church in our hometown that specifically ministers to people recovering from abuse, broken hearts, and faith crises. There, in the dark of the worship hall, I could hide my panic attacks and hear a few words or stanzas of comfort while my children came back to life in the Sunday School rooms brightly lit and colorfully painted.

The children added their names to the Church's "heart" during Family Worship this Sunday.

Then there came a time when God winked, and we went to hear Handel's Messiah at Christmas at a church we'd never heard of, a Protestant mainline church we normally would never attend, and suddenly, we were home. Under the huge oak beams 150 years old, with the warmth of the pipe organ filling the rafters, and a choir singing hymns I remembered viscerally from my youth, every sinew in my body that was trained to be taut as wire in church relaxed. I was in a puddle in a pew.

There are moments, still, when I am overwhelmed. I live in fear of being discovered. I don't want to be anything but a face in the pew. The children, on the other hand, want to be in everything. Youth choir. The pageants and dramas. Vacation Bible school. Family worship meetings. Ministries to the elderly.

I am happy for them, these little girls in their blue choir robes. Part of me weeps for the fact that I never experienced this rich heritage as a child. Part of me shudders in fear that this blossoming hope they have for church will be crushed someday. I pray that they can be like thousands of people I've brushed shoulders with over the years - people who've been at the same church for 60 years and never missed a beat. I can't imagine that kind of life, that kind of fortune. But I dream of it for my children...pray for it.

That someday, their children, and then grandchildren, will be dressed in these same blue choir robes. That maybe, finally, we've started a new tradition that will last for a few generations.

_____________________________________________________________

I am excited to announce the publication of an anthology on Finding Church: Stories of Leaving, Switching and Reforming, edited by Jeremy Myers. I contributed a chapter on leaving church in the age of social media. The book is available for pre-order through the publisher here, and will be available via Amazon and other major booksellers December 1.

On finding beauty everywhere: Why I turned Christian radio back on

I suppose I could take photographs for money if I wanted to. But I don't. There's two simple reasons. One, it only seems to work for me when there's true love involved - that relationship flowing back and forth between subject and photographer that makes the photography session a synergistic hour of magic, laughter, and a time when true beauty shines through and unequaled joy is shared. And two, because I refuse to discard the outtakes: you know, the photos that are out of focus, not quite perfect, or unphotoshopped to perfection.

I see beauty in the rough edges. I see real life in the raw. 

We sing hymns at church these days, the old kind, those written pre-1900. Sometimes you have to listen hard for the raw. The pentameter is perfect, everything rhymes, and the music is classical perfection. One of my favorites, written by Helen Lemmel, based on Hebrews 12:2, was inspired by a simple line from the writings of the impoverished and embattled missionary Lillias Trotter, whose writings on suffering have brought comfort to many on the hard path marked out by our Savior. Lillias wrote, “So then turn your eyes upon Him, look full into His face and you will find that he things of earth will acquire a strange new dimness.”

Helen recalled that the melody to her hymn, Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus, came into her head immediately upon reading these lines, and the lyrics were perfected within 2-3 days, with what she felt to be the obvious direction of the Holy Spirit. In the lyrics you hear a rawness of reflection on the brevity of our life here and a bittersweet comfort found when focused on the hope we have in Christ, although Helen doesn't record any particular suffering in her life history as a gift concert pianist, voice professor, composer, mother and wife.

O soul, are you weary and troubled?

No light in the darkness you see?

There’s a light for a look at the Savior,

And life more abundant and free!

Turn your eyes upon Jesus,

Look full in His wonderful face,

And the things of earth will grow strangely dim,

In the light of His glory and grace.

Christian radio offers up more rawness than I hear on Sunday in the meticulously practiced performances of a concert choir accompanied by a professional organist and pianist. There are the dissonant diminished chords of rock music, the harshness and brashness of unpolished solo voices, lyrics about the realness of 21st century Christian life. For some time after I left the Evangelical Church in 2010, all of this, so familiar to me that I had most of the songs memorized, grated on my soul like rubbing course salt in a fresh and bloody wound. I switched my radio pre-sets, and my kids listened to Kidz Bop instead of Jeremy Camp. I was on a search for Jesus in the lyrics of the lost on pop stations and in the rock anthems of my dad's hippie days.

But I still wake up, I still see your Gospel
Lord, I'm still not sure what I stand for
What do I stand for? What do I stand for?
Most nights, I don't know...
(Some Nights, Fun.)

The past two months have been tough. My schedule is busier than it's been in many years. There are days when I feel like I am failing at everything - mothering, my job(s), my friendships, my relationship with my husband, my duties at home, and any semblance of caring for myself. I have friends wading through some serious hard stuff. I can't seem to focus for 5 minutes, let alone let my mind still long enough to hear a whisper from God. I'm gritting my teeth through Bible reading, and prayer feels like a disciplined work-out rather than a conversation of souls.

That's why I finally turned my radio back to Christian radio. Yes, I still think most of it is pretty bad, musically speaking. The poetry is forced, every third melody sounds virtually the same, and I'm generally unconvinced about the worth of any of it. But it seeps into the cracks of this dry ground of my soul, and every now and then a word catches..."Ancient of Days"..."You were the first, You are the last"..."Here I found my home". For these few phrases, I'll let it be the chatter in the background when I'm in the car. The songs are mostly new, and the wounds are mostly healed. And He is speaking to me again through the musical "outtakes" that make up most of Christian radio.

What's your station tuned to?

When your dreams get lost in the mist

There have been many starry-eyed beginnings on this long journey to becoming a professor, but today was not one of them. On the last eve before I face a roomful of 100 or so starry-eyed students, sophomores and juniors entering their first semester of the nursing curriculum, I found myself much less excited and much more afraid than I had dreamed. It was an eve of many tears as I realize just how ill-prepared I am for the first day of this journey.

I go out to the porch swing, my personal sanctuary, at 2 a.m., when I should be sleeping, as those students await me at 8 a.m. sharp, with their skills lab packets, ready to begin their pre-testing for which I am the somewhat clueless evaluator. Instead of sleeping, I am shaking in my boots.

And, as He has so many times before, God matches the internal pendulum of my thoughts and fears with a picture in nature to comfort me. The very trees I treasure are hidden from view as a pea-soup fog rolls over our valley and clouds the night in an impenetrable white of hidden hopes and dreams, darkened landmarks of comfort and familiarity. I take a deep breath of the humid, heavy air and I know that the fog will lift in the morning - from this landscape I love and from these dreams I hold so dear and so close.

I remember my affliction and my wandering, the bitterness and the gall. I well remember them, and my soul is downcast within me. Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.” The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him; it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord. It is good for me to bear the yoke while I am young. Let me sit alone in silence, for the Lord has laid it on me. Let me bury me face in the dust— there may yet be hope. Let me offer my cheek to one who would strike me, and let me be filled with disgrace. For no one is cast off by the Lord forever. Though he brings grief, he will show compassion, so great is his unfailing love. For he does not willingly bring affliction or grief to anyone. (Leviticus 3:19-33)

 You have my heart

And I am Yours forever

You are my strength

God of grace and power

And everything You hold in Your hand

Still You make time for me

I can't understand

Praise You God of Earth and sky

How beautiful is Your unfailing love

Unfailing love

And You never change God You remain

The Holy One

My unfailing love

Unfailing love

You are my rock

The one I hold on to

You are my song

And I sing for You

And everything You hold in Your hand

Still You make time for me

I can't understand

Praise You God of Earth and sky

How beautiful is Your unfailing love

Unfailing love

~Chris Tomlin~

When dreams come true

When I was in college to become a nurse, I used to faint all the time, sometimes 20 times a day. I have a heart condition that is worsened by stress, affected by diet, and drastically influenced by the amount of sleep I get. As you can imagine, I wasn't very good at managing any of those factors as a college student. As a result, I suffered fluctuations in blood pressure and heart rates that caused me to faint all the time, and several times I nearly died because of it. From that point on, I lived life holding my dreams loosely, never knowing exactly how much time God intended me to be on this earth.

"There is surely a future hope for you, and your hope will not be cut off." (Proverbs 23:18)

Years passed, and I got better at living a heart-healthy lifestyle. I was also helped by advances in medical science that directed my cardiologists how best to treat my condition using medications, and finally, in 2010, a pacemaker became available that had a special function specifically designed for people with my heart problem. Life with my heart condition gets better with every passing year, and it looks like I might live a long and healthy life, as far as my heart is concerned.

One of the dreams I harbored deep in my heart, in a space surrounded by tears of grief whenever I fainted and the dream seemed to fade in the distant and perhaps unattainable future, was that of someday obtaining my PhD and teaching with my father at the very university I was a nursing student at.

 "But as for you, be strong and do not give up, for your work will be rewarded." (2 Chronicles 15:7)

Last week, my father carried boxes of books up to office 204 in the nursing building on the campus of the University of Wisconsin - Eau Claire, a short 5 minute walk from the building where he has worked since 1984. The very building in which I fainted all those times, but grinned and bore it, and, by the grace of God, graduated on time in 4 years with my bachelor of science in nursing. This was one dream, one of the dearest to my heart, one that sat right next to my longing to bear children and raise them, that God did plan to help me fulfill.

My office looks out on the historic Council Oak Tree that is on the University seal, and Little Niagara creek.

Today, with a heart that felt more like bursting than giving out, I began orientation to become a full-time professor at my alma mater. I have already been welcomed warmly by some of my old teachers and mentors, along with new faculty who have arrived in the 12 years since I graduated and embarked on my career as a nurse.

I return now with something more important than any career aspirations constantly in my heart and on my mind - a husband, a home, and four beautiful souls who are dearest to me of anything I have on this earth. They have already fallen head-over-heels in love with UWEC, in a similar way as I remember falling for it as a child, entranced with everything from my papa's hands that smelled of chalk-dust to the peaceful cool of his office, and the constant trickle of youthful energy in the form of the students who came to ask questions or talk about their ongoing projects. There is something incredibly synergistic about the education process, especially at the college level, where most students have honed in on an interest all their own, and are deeply invested in their own success.

My children love my office (perhaps partially because they are allowed to watch unlimited hours of Netflix movies on my 2nd monitor while I squeeze in some work). Caleb loves to work the lock on my door and unlock and lock my file cabinet, desk drawers, and explore the inner workings of my printer. Katy has set to work reading a text on philosophy (I do mean to get a shelf of more age-appropriate books set up - but perhaps it is better for her to read the college texts??). Rosy is busy creating art to grace my corkboard. Amelia likes to arrange my textbooks largest to smallest and then redo her work in the reverse. And they all love the trips to the vending machine, simulation lab, library, and colleague's offices, where they are always greeted with smiles and pieces of candy (note to self: get a candy jar for my office!). Caleb is already a building favorite, as he doesn't differentiate yet between acquaintances, friends, family, and gives each of my colleagues a hearty hug and kiss upon leaving!

Oh, how richly my Lord has blessed me! I am thrilling with excitement, waiting for the beginning of classes after labor day, when I will finally get to meet my first group of students in the four classes I will be teaching! I will still be homeschooling, as I was able (again with God's grace! and pray for me as the semesters go by, that I might be able to continue this?) to block my schedule so that I am gone from home 2 days a week, 3 days a week for one week per month.

"Find rest, O my soul, in God alone; my hope comes from him." (Psalm 62:5)

A place to call home

In 2010, we were expelled from a church we'd called home for over 10 years. At first, the very thought of going through another set of church doors was nothing short of nauseating. How could we trust another church after being burned by the very people who professed to love us like Christ does?

The months passed, and the children asked every Sunday if we could go to church. Any church. For a while, we attended the church of some close friends. This transient experience was necessary both for us to heal and to start a conversation about what a comfortable church home would look like to our family.

I imagine there are others out there facing the same questions. Here is the process we went through when selecting a new church home. It is our hope and prayer that our careful approach to finding a new church will protect our family in some measure from the mistakes and wounds of the past. So, here's how we did it:

1. Make a list of necessities
• For us, this included the Gospel preached clearly and often; pastoral accountability; a grace-filled congregation where all were welcome; and a place that felt different enough from our last church that we weren't hit with a panic attack as soon as we walked in the door.
2. Make a wish list
• We hoped to find a church that was egalitarian, had high quality children's programming through which the Gospel was proclaimed, showed musical excellence, and followed a traditional liturgical style of worship
3. Lists in hand, start browsing church websites and their denominational websites to explore how well the church/denomination matches with your needs and desires. For us, this pre-screening process whittled a list of dozens of churches down to 3-5 that fit our style.
4. When you walk through the doors, you should immediately sense GRACE. Are the people welcoming? Are there tattooed, homeless, broken people welcomed in the pews? Can gay couples attend? Divorcees? People of color or a different culture than the majority?
5. How does the pastor interact with the parishioners? Is the shepherd serving the flock, or are the sheep serving the shepherd? A glance at extracurricular programming may help you answer this question and also shed light on women's roles in the church.
6. What are the sermons like? Does Christ play a central role in the teachings? Are the sermons about Biblical principles, or are they topical? Do you like the style of the sermons?
7. If you don't identify any warning signs, you can attend your "maybe" church for a few months.
8. Now is the time to meet with the pastor. Go to the meeting armed with your necessity and wish lists. Be prepared with a list of questions and if you've experienced poor pastoral care in certain areas in the past, be sure to find out how this new pastor would handle that type of situation.
9. One key question to ask: has this church ever had to use church discipline? If so, how was the matter resolved? Does the person who was disciplined still attend church there? Ask for the name and phone number of that person so you can hear their side of the story.
10. Attend a board or deacon's meeting to observe how the pastor interacts with the staff who hold him accountable. Who really runs the show, the pastor or the board? Who has the last say?
11. Ask for the name and phone number of a parishioner who no longer attends, and go out to coffee with them if possible. Why did they leave? Were there problems with the church that prompted them to seek a new church home?
12. Ask to see a copy of the church budget for the preceding year. What are the main financial focuses of the church? Are missions a big part of church giving? How closely associated is the church to their denomination in terms of financial giving? What local ministries does the church support?
13. Go to dinner at the pastor's home. How does he interact with his family in his normal home environment? What are his wife and children like? Who does most of the talking? Does the pastor share in household duties, or is he served by his wife and children?
14. Sit in for some of the children's church or events to see how children are treated and whether they are presented with the Gospel on a regular basis.
15. If you can't get a straight answer about major church theological/doctrinal issues, such as whether the church is egalitarian or complementarian, observe how those issues are lived out in church life. What are the roles of women in the church? How does the church treat homosexuals? 
16. If you are interested in ministry, obtain a list of duties lay men and women can perform in this church. For instance, are women able to read scripture to the church, pray for the church? Or are they segregated to women's groups or serving in the church kitchen?

Comfortable in my nakedness

Here is a call for the endurance of the saints, those who keep the commandments of God and their faith in Jesus. (Revelation 14:12)

We are the tree shaken loose from the snow to feel the warmth with her branches. We meet another, hurting under her burden of the winter of discontent, torn from her moorings and grafted into this field of a loveless church. I see her pain, bathe in it, remember the cold she feels. It is hard work, to enter back through that crooked door, to open eyes to see the crooked roots that can't grow in the rocky soil. I shake her tree with truth, and the snow scatters. The first breath of winter air is painful, burning the lungs. For a moment, we both wish we were still insulated from this brutal air frozen by falsehood and stagnant with intrigue. But then we move those branches, stretch our needles to the heavens, and we feel God's sun warming this quiet field that has grow deafeningly silent from the shunning as we stand naked in the sun. You shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free (John 8:32). There is no denying it is still winter. But we will never bury our branches again.

Closer I am to fine

Last night I spent 4 hours holding a beautiful baby. This morning, my car was enveloped in a storm of cotton from the trees, glittering in the sunlight. Lunch with my friend was a happy spot in my day. A coffeehouse, my Ipod, got some writing done to finance my upcoming trip to South Carolina. My husband put up a porch swing for me, and I am addicted (and ever grateful). We watched Amelia and decided that we are happy with our choice in naming our own Amelia.

In between were flashbacks and one horrifying nightmare. I am on the brink of checking myself back into the hospital to have my meds tweaked. I am thankful for every moment of today. And that's all I have to say!

I'm trying to tell you something about my life

Maybe give me insight between black and white

The best thing you've ever done for me

Is to help me take my life less seriously, it's only life after all

Well darkness has a hunger that's insatiable

And lightness has a call that's hard to hear

I wrap my fear around me like a blanket

I sailed my ship of safety till I sank it, I'm crawling on your shore.

I went to the doctor, I went to the mountains

I looked to the children, I drank from the fountain

There's more than one answer to these questions

pointing me in crooked line

The less I seek my source for some definitive

The closer I am to fine.

I stopped by the bar at 3 a.m.

To seek solace in a bottle or possibly a friend

I woke up with a headache like my head against a board

Twice as cloudy as I'd been the night before

I went in seeking clarity.

yeah we go to the doctor, we go to the mountains

we look to the children, we drink from the fountains

yeah we go to the bible, we go through the workout

we read up on revival and we stand up for the lookout

~from Indigo Girls Closer to Fine~

Overflowing grace

I just found a plank in my eye. (I'm sure it won't be the last.) At this moment in my journey with both my faith and severe depression, I have more trust in the clearly definable, like a palette of acrylics. Colors, amounts, which way the peaks pointed...I am having a hard time trusting the indefinable, the King of ages, immortal, invisible, the only God (I Tim. 1:17).

Don't let panic get you down,

How could we forget God's amazing love

Hear my tears

this is where

you'll shake the nightmares free

~Jon Foreman~

I've lived a long time believing that there would be some account or consequence for how well you lived Christ - bad decisions, bad consequences; good decisions, good consequences. The problem is that Jesus turned that whole paradigm upside down with His saving blood. In Romans 2, Paul writes that God shows no partiality based on race. Just a page later, in Romans 3, he again states that there is no difference between Christians when heaven come.

But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it—the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. (Romans 3:21-26)

Okay. Wait just a minute. I've known for a long time my good works did not earn me salvation (Ephesians 2:8-10). But I was pretty sure there were good Christians and bad ones. And equally as certain into which category I would fall when I reach heaven's gates. When God talks about my sin, I get two messages loud and clear. Confess and turn from the sin. And now it is "erased", "disappeared", "remembered no more". But that was just intellectual knowledge.

What I've never considered as that the richness of Christ's over abundant love for every person on all the earth may be so overflowing that it fills each of us right up to the top. No matter whether it filled in a small dip where a few sins are have been subtracted from a righteous Christian, nor if it filled in almost the whole cup for the believer who is missing God's will or deliberately disobeying it - the cups were filled!

I see Paul and Silas in the prison yard

I hear their song of freedom rising to the stars

Lord it's all that I can't carry and cannot leave behind

So I think of those before me who lived a faithful life

And when I'm weary and overwrought

with so many battles left unfought

I see the shepherd Moses in the Pharohs court

I hear his call for freedom for the people of the Lord

I see the long quiet walk along the Underground Railroad

I see Harriet awakening to the value of her soul

I see the young missionary and the angry spear

I see his family returning with no trace of fear

I see the long hard shadows of Calcutta nights

I see the sister standing by the dying man's side

I see the young girl huddled on the brothel floor

I see the man with a passion come and kicking down the door

I see the man of sorrows and his long troubled road

I see the world on his shoulders and my easy load

And when the Saints go marching in

I want to be one of them

~When the Saints, Sara Groves~

I turn today on the quotation of a prophecy fulfilled found in Romans 3: Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven and whose sins are covered; blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin. Today, a day in which I will surely sin, I am blessed because God isn't counting. He's not keeping track. There will be no favorites of Jesus in heaven. No "it" crowd. No cliques. I'm not going to be stuck in the corner barely dressed, flaws flaunted, while the faithful and righteous sneer at our shame while they walk by in spotless white robes.

In heaven, only one thing will matter - being in love with Creator of the universe. He will love us each equally and our focus will finally forever be on Him instead of His other followers. Let's turn this world upside down and quit counting the damage.

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Gratitude Journal, #602-648
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609. Wearing my own clothes
612. Emerging from the cloud enough to MISS MY KIDS!
629. Yellow theme to my mother's day gifts.
633. Stress makes me feel so alive
637. Facing Sunday and Monday, winning
640. Recognizing the difference between cultural lies and reality-based expectations
644. Brand new sand buckets and shovels = a day happily filled with kids digging

Trading in my cardboard crown

We listen to Grace Potter for a whole month straight, and I dream of cutting the foot pedals off one of my organs and building a revolving amp like the Leslie she had custom-made. (One of the major perks of being a famous musician has got to be the custom-made instruments. What a dream come true!)

We fire up the organ once a day and Caleb is always first in line. I'm not sure if it's the many buttons and slides he can manipulate to his little engineering brain's content, or the thunder of the bass pipes rattling the wall in front of him. Either way, I guarantee this kid is going to have a love of organs for the rest of his life.

I look down at the walnut furl of the organ leg descending out of the cabinet, and I think about how Amy told me once that photography is the gift of seeing beauty in the little things, the romance that exists in your own life. I think about the book she recommended slowly drawing my heart back into prayer and praise, Ann's book tuning my ear to the music of the universe that plays everywhere, Serena's book finally bringing the light of Grace to the forefront of everything, as sin and hell and death finally get pushed into the shadows of my heart instead of the doorway. I look around me, at the table with the beautiful poinsettia embroidered red tablecloth covered with oatmeal from breakfast, and the laundry, with it's brief breath of summery freshness wafting, piled in mountainous heaps in the laundry room. I see the glisten of the professional wax on the 1950's linoleum tile glistening glints of my husband's love, borne with hours of labor on hands and knees. I think of those scabbed knees, and look at the Clementine peels and pistachio shells littering the floor, and I wonder that what glints through is love and not the endless labor that awaits a woman every time she opens her eyes to her home.

So I cut a neat slice from the center of the pie of this home, and look at my camera's display as a smile creeps over my lips. That smile is the thud as joy takes off from my soul like the sky-bound firecracker still encased in it's pretty paper shell, and then a moment later the explosion. It trickles down all over the room in a shower of colorful sparks, and here I am, soul abandoned to joy, in the midst of my toils of the day and the frustrations of it all. It is slowly dawning on me that He is so different from the rest of us, this God who tells me that He knows the plans that He has for me...plans to prosper me and not harm me, plans to give me hope and a future (Jeremiah 29:11). I think that means an easy life, an entertaining life, a blissfully happy life, a life of wealth or fame, perhaps. He whispers through these joy-moments that He's giving it to me, right here, in this messy house with these raucous children.

The "hall of fame of faith" in Hebrews 11 starts out by telling us that we need to have faith in two things to seek the face of God: that He exists, and that He is the rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. But what follows, in that "hall of fame", are not the stories of prosperity, but the stories of great suffering. Noah, who watched his whole world disappear in the flood waters and rebirth different and desolate; Abraham, a sojourner in a land of enemies, who twice sent his wife to sleep with other powerful men, was asked to sacrifice his only son, and never saw the promise God made him brought to fruition. Moses lost his family as a babe, was raised by the enemy of his people, led the most worrisome group ever through an exile in a desert. Rahab endured a life of prostitution before going to live as an alien with an enemy people. The end of this passage is a litany of what we might have in store for us: beatings, floggings, sawed in half by the sword; we might live as destitute, persecuted, mistreated people wearing skins for clothing and welcomed nowhere. It says again, at the end of the chapter, that all those listed where commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised.

Abraham lived in tents, abandoning earthly comfort for the hope of a city with foundations, whose architect and builder was God.  Trading prosperity here for prosperity there. A crown of jewels in heaven for faith through suffering here. Am I willing to join these ranks? These people who did not receive the things promised...only saw them and welcomed them from a distance... and admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. This is what I have faith in? Not worldly blessings and rewards, but heavenly ones? Is that what starts the thunderous firecracker of joy exploding in my soul? This giving up of everything that ties me down so my soul is free to see? See the blessings?

I am on the notorious middle ground that has bred discontent for the middle class in societies everywhere since the beginning of time. Who wants to be average? Surrounded by people just like yourself? There is that seed, deep in the soul, that begs us excel. Yes, our culture cries it, too, a cardboard-crown copy that says "be all you can be" and commands us to find our individuality and live it out limited only by how high we can dream. But that seed is common to humanity, and comes with the unique stamp of our soul that sets us apart from every other person on this planet. Did God put it there? Can He light that unstoppable seed of desire up like a homing beacon for all the world to see as He teaches me that this, the blessed wonder of relationship with Him that is known only to Him and I, is what makes me unique and precious? Not accomplishments, not the individual wonder of my talents, but, like the parable says, what I invest those talents in. Here, or eternity? This question calls from every blessing-dressed-in-ugliness that surrounds me today:

26: the laundry piles (that I have a machine to wash fresh and sweet)

25: the dishes piled (waiting for the automatic dishwasher to spray clean water from 100 feet underground)

26: the Clementine peels and pistachio shells (that fill my children's bellies with such nutrition my forebears never dreamed of in this barren, snow-covered wilderness)

And from earlier in my first week of counting the blessings up with a number for each one:
16: sweet resolution after an argument

15: my baby girl learned to button

11: wind whirling snow crystals into the dawn off the roof of our bedroom wing

6: waking to Rosy singing

3: PG Tips tea, caramel-colored by fresh cream

Unfinished made perfect

Her very first journal entry ever read sad.

It's fall 2010 and it's hard for me. My mother has cancer and my sister Amy has epilepsy. My brother Caleb is hard to take care of and Rosy is hard to please. September 28, 2010

 I talked to her about finding the silver lining. About thankfulness as a choice. Encouraged her to add a few lines. In red, below the black pencil of pain, another sentence is added. The sentence that really breaks my heart.

I'm thankful that my mother and Amy are still here. 

I have this idea in my head of who they are, these four children. I know this: they bear the image of God, they are full of creativity, passion, justice, beauty. And they live in a broken world, and side by side with the characteristics of the image of God they bear, there is pain, brokenness, confusion, anger, hopelessness and despair. While I want all my mothering moments to help them live out the path God placed them on, I have to accept it. As a recovering perfectionist, this is the hardest thing to be okay with: the fact that I will inevitably leave them with a hole for a Parent who is perfect, perfectly loving and good and constructive in discipline and criticism and fills them with love, joy, peace, patience, perseverance, meekness, humbleness, and a desire for self-control. I want Him to say of them what He said of the men chosen to carve the Ark of the Covenant:

I have filled him with the Spirit of God, with ability and intelligence, with knowledge and all craftsmanship, to devise artistic designs, to work in gold, silver, and bronze, in cutting stones for setting, and in carving wood, to work in every craft. (Exodus 31:3-5)

I want to take it back, what I said to her about the silver lining. This autumn of the Second Heartbreak has taught me about accepting where I'm at. Being okay with who I am today. Understanding that this person, the person of this moment, is the redeemed beloved of the everlasting King. Not the person I will be when I complete the tasks on my to-do list, or read the latest book I'm reading to understand myself, or finish my Bible reading challenge, or love my kids really well for just one single day (or hour, for that matter). This. moment. I. am. made. perfect. by. the. blood. I need to see that in my children, too - the hurting girl who should just be comforted for hurting. Not every moment is a teachable moment in the way I have conceived teaching. Maybe what she needs to learn in this moment is Grace. Undeserved favor. Maybe I need to teach her more about what it means to stand before Him redeemed, here and now, and less about the habits of character that mold a perfect little Christian. To see Christ in brokenness.

To my journal-wary girl, the one who hasn't yet written a second entry, I have something to say. Not a correction this time. I want to say to her, I see you. Just the way you are right now. And I agree with the Lord of the universe: I think you're wonderful, and worth my sacrifices, and beautiful in your pain. I love you more than words will ever say. More than life itself. You are my beloved, my Katrina.

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And because I can't resist, a few more from our late-night, craziest-parents-of-the-year skating session in the dark:

Linked to Ann Voskamp

An instant bedroom make-over

This is the only spot in my house that always stays clean. Two chairs. Sentinels amongst the piles, silently proclaiming that there is something sacred in this home. And that it's not any surface or spot or place or thing.

It's people.

The view from the chairs is pretty depressing. Every morning (well, almost every morning) since a fateful day in January, my husband and I have sat in these chairs to read our devotions together. We read the Word, we share the Word, and we pray. And are largely able to ignore the mess that we see from our two chairs.

Why is it, that two chairs buried in laundry and unpacked suitcases can be such a magical haven? Why is the view from there somehow less depressing than the view elsewhere in our house? Is there some potion in the aged sometimes yellow-sometimes green of the velveteen of this chair that makes the messes that nearly engulf it disappear?

There is. It's the view. (not the mess and not the laundry and not the unpacked suitcases and spiderwebs.)

The view from these chairs is the place where our beloved sleeps. His beloved. My beloved.

His mouth is most sweet, and he is altogether desirable. 
This is my beloved and this is my friend.
(Song of Solomon 5:16)

When our house was cleaner, and the laundry never piled up, and the meals were more on time, and more imaginative...that is how I defined myself as wife and mother. In terms of what I was able to accomplish. In terms of how good I was at being a wife and mom. I was a good cook. I kept things sanitary and clean. The laundry was never piled up in a mess of wrinkles. I ironed occasionally. The sheets were washed every week. The kids were bathed every other day. My husband came home to a wife in relatively clean clothes who tried her best to be flirty and fun. There was music on. Home-school was going like clock-work.

Sounds nice, doesn't it?

I miss it, all the time.

But does it sound redeemed?

Who was accomplishing things around the Thul household in the picture I just painted you? God? Or Genevieve? Who was taking the credit? Whose ego was being massaged with compliments? Who felt like she had it all together?

I have wondered, at times, whether it would have fallen apart so drastically, if I'd been more humble. If I'd learned quicker how to integrate God and His glory into a life that was running smoothly. I cannot extricate cancer and suffering from my life any longer. I can't figure out if I would ever have arrived here without it.

If my house had never fallen apart, if the wheels hadn't come off the family bus this badly, marooning us in our messy home with stresses beyond what we imagined threatening to crack the very foundation of our marriage, we would not know this love.

I could have always assumed that Aaron loves me because I keep his house clean, his meals cooked, his needs satisfied, and his bed warm.

Now I know for sure that is not the way he loves me.

I know he loves me because he sees my soul, because God brought us together, because he has allowed 36 years of seeking God to shape him into an amazing man who looks past the little things and the big things that distract him from seeing deep inside me - the woman I want to be, perhaps the woman I will never even become.

Do you think the woman in Song of Solomon was really the most beautiful woman in the world?

Does Jesus love us because of our perfection, or our brokenness?

By allowing me to suffer a messy, disorganized home in the wake of cancer and encephalitis, God has allowed me to experience Christ-like love flowing from my husband. Love that loves anyway. Love that loves with service. Love that heals brokenness.  Redeeming love.

That is the potential in your marriage. The potential in your messy house. The potential in you as failure.

When you feel entirely alone, lost, broken, bruised, battered, useless, weak, imperfect, sinful, abandoned...don't forget to close your eyes and turn your face upward, toward the One who is always silently present. He will redeem it. He will renew it. He will use your situation to bless you far beyond what you can imagine or desire.

The best preparation you'll ever receive for your most agonizing trials will be when you are the only student in class. In the midst of you deepest difficulties, have you ever looked around and thought, Where is everybody? Sometimes God reserves the right to withhold others, to pull you aside with Him, so that you can experience what David did in I Samuel, "David found strength in the Lord his God." ~ Living Beyond Yourself online Bible study by Beth Moore

Linked to Ann's 2011 pre-Valentine's series on marriage at: