The Appassionata and The Pain

        When I was a freshman in college, eight hours away from home and in a totally new environment, I took advantage of a rare opportunity.  I attended a piano concert.  

This was a very daring thing for me to do at the time.  I was on a very strict budget, and just like middle school, you didn’t dare do much on campus unless you had a “bud” along with you.  But, when I saw the poster of the well known pianist scheduled to play one of my favorite Beethoven pieces, I knew I had to go.  I also knew that I would sit as close as I could, right in front of the pianist’s hands.  I was going to go no matter what.  

This was an exercise in great courage for me.  I was fighting for my own identity, and I was losing more than I was winning.  The young man I had thought I was going to marry had “unfriended” me, I went from being an A student to a meager C student, and I was lost in every way imaginable.  

You know you’re low when some of your favorite times are mopping stairwells just so you can be alone to pray and sing and cry.  God, in His providence, had taken away everything that had been a comfort to me.  And I am so glad that He did.  

I found myself living on the international floor of an old all girls’ dormitory, surrounded by missionary kids and students from all over the globe.  Whining and complaining took on a whole new meaning for me there.  How can you cry about a boyfriend when you know your room mate is the only Christian in her wealthy Japanese family, misunderstood, mocked, and left to her own loneliness?   God surrounded me with people that knew what real suffering was like, and more than that, they could identify the lack of maturity in me. These young women could speak with great care and love.  No “preaching” here.  Only quiet grace and solid faith exhibited in the midst of trial and hardship.  Nothing can shame you faster than when you see your friends that you know have already been persecuted for their beliefs, have love and compassion for you when you turn into a puddle of mush over stupid stuff.  

So, on the night of the concert, I put on my usual Baltimore Symphony finery and bravely walked to the concert hall on my own.  I opened the double doors and walked down front, sitting right in front of the keys on the left hand side of the stage.  I irrationally felt like every eye was boring into my head and every tongue was whispering.  “There’s that girl.  She was dumped.  She is so desperate.  She is so far from home.  So lost.  So unwanted.  Stay away from her.” 

Our piano at home; one of my daughter's favorite places to be. 

But, as the concert began and the notes that were so familiar to me filled the air, my soul began to soar.  I closed my eyes, when I wasn’t watching the pianist’s hands, and took in every beautiful note.  It was as if all of the love and strength that I needed poured into my being and a glimmer of hope began to grow.  I remember wishing that the concert would just go on forever.  That it would never stop.  That I would never have to get up and walk out when it was all over.  It did end however, and I did get up and walk out.  But, I did not walk out alone.  I saw one of my dear friends from that old girls’ dorm and she met me with a smile.  We walked out into the night and I found that I was ok.  I found that I could have hope and I could heal in ways that I did not think were possible.  I found that facing your pain is easier when you have the notes of “The Appassionata” to guide you. 

My faith was being tested and tried.  I was on that all too familiar path we call sanctification.  Being sanctified is hard.  Everyone knows that becoming like Christ is not easy.  It is hard work.  No one wants to do it; it comes to you and you either resist or submit to where you are led.  Often sanctifying comes through suffering.  Suffering is never a friend we like to see come to the party.  Everyone says, “Who invited him?”  We are faced with a decision; will we be humbled or will we be hardened by the presence of suffering in our lives? 

My daughter free rock climbing. 

        I vacillated between hardness and humility that year.  But, my prayers were answered, and humility won out.  No one likes to be humbled.  You feel naked, laid out on the floor, too weak to move, but you just don’t care anymore.  You have surrendered, and you have no more fight left in you, only pure surrender to the Healer of your soul.  And that is where I found myself.  Humbled and laid low.  This was my first real taste of hardship and suffering.  Bitter was the bud, but far sweeter was the flower.  A new kind of blood was pumping through the veins of my faith.  A new understanding that my faith must be built on nothing less than Christ.  

I have tasted trials and sufferings in my life that compared to most would be minuscule, but to that timid eighteen year old girl would have been unthinkable.  That eighteen year old girl began a journey down a road that few have chosen.  She learned that there cannot be any glory without the pain.  

       Life can burn with a refining fire, but if I have learned anything about refining, I know that I do not want to be removed from its work.  So, why?  Why do I not want to leave the flames?  Why am I not afraid of being burned, incinerated?  Because Someone is with me in that fire, Someone who has already walked through the fire and come out on the other side.  These fires must do their work so that we can come out “like silver refined in a furnace, purified seven times.” Ps. 12:6  When the impurities are burned away, we come out different, clearer, changed.  In those refining fires there is a sweet mercy that overwhelms and quiets my soul.  I did not say there is no pain.  But there is a glory that far outweighs the pain, a pain that can be forgotten in the presence of a Savior. C.S. Lewis has said, “Mortals misunderstand. They say of some temporal suffering,”No future bliss can make up for it,” not knowing that Heaven, once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory.” 

My children learning to follow a trail.

When the crushing blows of life come again and again, I cry.  I ask why.  I wish I did not have to feel the pain.  But my mind returns to those moments when God has provided a song for my soul to sing and I become like that eighteen year old girl again.  I remember being changed from that shy timid girl into the one who could laugh and smile through adversity.  For, if the soul would not be consumed in the fires of life’s pain, than it must be purified by the Master artist of man’s souls.  And once purified in the greatest places of pain, the soul can sing. It is then that the agony becomes a song of glory.  

May your soul find the most glorious of songs to sing,

Your Fellow Sojourner

Psalm 66

Shout for joy to God, all the earth;

  sing the glory of his name;

give to him glorious praise!

  Say to God, “How awesome are your deeds!

So great is your power that your enemies come cringing to you.

  All the earth worships you

and sings praises to you;

they sing praises to your name.” Selah

 Come and see what God has done:

he is awesome in his deeds toward the children of man.

  He turned the sea into dry land;

they passed through the river on foot.

There did we rejoice in him,

 who rules by his might forever,

whose eyes keep watch on the nations—

let not the rebellious exalt themselves. Selah

  Bless our God, O peoples;

let the sound of his praise be heard,

who has kept our soul among the living

and has not let our feet slip.

 For you, O God, have tested us;

you have tried us as silver is tried.

  You brought us into the net;

you laid a crushing burden on our backs;

  you let men ride over our heads;

we went through fire and through water;

yet you have brought us out to a place of abundance.

 I will come into your house with burnt offerings;

I will perform my vows to you,

 that which my lips uttered

and my mouth promised when I was in trouble.

 I will offer to you burnt offerings of fattened animals,

with the smoke of the sacrifice of rams;

I will make an offering of bulls and goats. Selah

 Come and hear, all you who fear God,

and I will tell what he has done for my soul.

  I cried to him with my mouth,

and high praise was on1 my tongue.

  If I had cherished iniquity in my heart,

the Lord would not have listened.

 But truly God has listened;

he has attended to the voice of my prayer.

 Blessed be God,

because he has not rejected my prayer 

or removed his steadfast love from me!

The Farmer and His Field

      Every summer morning that I spent at my grandparents’ home was marked by a common scenario.  I would sneak into my grandparents’ family room and sit on the couch right across from their Goliath of a television set, and wait.  I waited for one thing in particular, my grandmother’s entrance into the kitchen.  This always meant two things.  First, she would always ask what I wanted for breakfast and secondly, that was the understood signal that yes, I could turn the television on.  Sometimes however, if I had awoken too early, I would go to my grandmother’s pantry, open the door, and just take in the aroma.  Still to this day, there is nothing like the smell of Golden Grahams and Bran Flakes, heaven. 

My grandmother reading to one of the twins. 

As I would await my grandmother’s entrance, I always seemed to forget that I often encountered someone else on those mornings.  I would hear a slight foot fall in the foyer and then hear the coat closet door open.  After taking down his choice of hat for the day, my grandfather would come around the corner.  With a look of surprise on his face he would ask, “Katie, is that you?”  

“Yes, Pop Pop.”  

“Now, what are you doing up so early, Katie?”  And he would have a smile from ear to ear.  No matter where he was headed, he would stop and chat with me before heading out the door.  Sometimes he would head to the garden, sometimes the church, and sometimes out on an errand.  Then a few hours later, I would see him come back into the kitchen long after we had had our breakfast of waffles or pancakes or cereal.  This was my cue to pull up a chair to the little table at the end of the galley kitchen.  I loved to sit across from my Pop Pop, just to watch him eat.  A bowl of fresh cantaloupe, a piece of toast he would care fully spread with apple butter, and a jelly jar of milk or juice was a standby for him.  He would just let me sit there and stare at him.  And to me it was one of the most beautiful conversations I ever had as a child.  

          I also noticed that if I had done something I shouldn’t have, I would feel guilt about it at those moments.  Not because my grandfather would ever scold me, but because he lived such a pure life.  I knew he wasted nothing, not his time nor his resources nor his words.  I wanted to be like him in that way.  And so, if I had wasted anything, I had a tinge of guilt.  I would purpose to get up early like him and be productive and not wasteful.  After my grandfather had had his breakfast he would be on his way, on to the next thing in his day.  And I would be onto mine.  

My grandfather passing on the game of chess. 

I always knew the times and places I would see my grandfather.  He was always there and he never hurried away.  He was constant in his work and faithful with his time.  Any time I would talk with him he always listened.  He would nod his head and have a twinkle in his eye and say, “Well now, Katie…”  And I loved him, because he was just like a farmer should be.  And so, that is what I always thought him to be. 

          He had left his Kentucky boyhood farm for Washington D.C. to care and shepherd a family.  And by the time I came along, he was only a few years from retirement.  I don’t remember him as a working man, but as a dutiful man who watched over his household.  He would tell me about his fruit trees and his bean plants and his cantaloupes.  And to me, his big garden and little orchard was a full fledged farm!  But, he cared for me and my grandmother and my mother and everyone else in my family in the most important ways he could have.  He lived what he believed with pure faith.  He prayed like no one I have ever heard.  He sounded like a pilgrim to me, addressing his Lord and Master with thees and thous.  To eat before that prayer would have been unthinkable.  I would savor each word of his simple mealtime prayers.  

          And Sundays were like no other day of the week.  He was dressed in a tie and sitting in front of his radio by the time I was out in my Sunday dress.  He would have his Sunday School lesson in his lap as he listened to those old gospel bluegrass quartets.  I knew that when he had gotten up out of that chair that it was time to go to church. He waited for no one - we always seemed to roll in at the end of Sunday School and find him there later.  

      I imagined my grandfather on the morning of his departure from this earth as a young man walking through a field.  Eyes steadfast on what lied ahead of him, hands stretched out over fields of wheat or barley.  Eyes twinkling with the prospect of tending another living thing and to watch it grow.  I smiled through tears of joy. 

Me attempting to garden this past spring.  

      You see, my grandfather will always be a farmer, for the farmer is a watchman first and foremost.  A farmer will watch and wait and plot and plan and dream and pray over what has been entrusted to his care.  And now I understand why my grandfather always asked me what I would be growing each year.  I hated to disappoint him with my answers.  Nothing, or a few tomato plants and squash.  But, now when I hear him asking me that same question, it has a far deeper meaning.  “Well, what are you and Chris planning on growing this year?”  And I want to tell him that we will be planning a garden full of plants that need a lot of tender care.  They will need good food and water, sun and air.  They will need shelter and time.  Time and the opportunity to grow in the way they were intended to grow. 

        We want to invest in the souls that God has placed in our care and hope to raise them with just a hint of the faithful watchfulness that my grandfather had for all of us.  This year, we will look to our fields, put our hands to the plow, and like my grandfather, we hope to never look back.

~ Your Fellow Sojourner

"In the Sweet By and By"

by Sanford Fillmore Bennett

There's a land that is fairer than day,
and by faith we can see it afar;
for the Father waits over the way
to prepare us a dwelling place there.

Refrain:
In the sweet by and by,
we shall meet on that beautiful shore;
in the sweet by and by,
we shall meet on that beautiful shore.

2 We shall sing on that beautiful shore
the melodious songs of the blest,
and our spirits shall sorrow no more,
not a sigh for the blessing of rest. [Refrain]

3 To our bountiful Father above,
we will offer our tribute of praise
for the glorious gift of His love,
and the blessings that hallow our days. [Refrain]

I Thought You Might Could Use This

           We all tell ourselves that we can’t possibly “do it all”, yet we still try to overcome the odds.  And if you are a stay at home, mother of five, homeschooler, and married to a bi-vocational pastor… well, you are always trying to “beat the odds”.   And then we throw in Christmas, New Years, and Birthdays all in one week. 

            Things like the power going out, a super tight budget, and sickness don’t help and can even cause complete break down in “the system”.  However, I thought we were doing pretty well this year, that we were in fact “beating the odds”.  We were moving right along, even if Chris and I were pulling late night after late night.  Then yesterday morning, the morning of yet another packed day, I did not feel well. 

            I finally waved the white flag after our church service and told Chris to take me home.  I would not be able to be a part of the next two gatherings scheduled for the day.  I fought with the “should I just push myself and see” thoughts. I prayed, asked Chris, and knew the smart thing was to stay home.

                                                                     

Winston, Elias, and Liam on Christmas Eve 2014.

            At first I was relieved.  I could rest in some peace and quiet and hope to bounce back quickly.  But then, in an empty house surrounded by piles of clothes, unwrapped gifts, toys, and a less than satisfactory kitchen, my mind started to roam.

              I ended up lying down to read and then closing my eyes after I couldn’t read anymore.  As I closed my eyes I became agitated and couldn’t sleep.  My mind would not rest.  I thought of all the things to do and all of the people to see and all that will shortly resume. 

            As I was lying in bed on a Sunday afternoon, what bothered me the most was missing the people.  What would they think?  I am surely letting them down and I don’t want to hurt anyone.  I realized after a little while of thinking through all of this that my heart was pounding.  I had worked myself up so much that I was experiencing an anxious heart, literally. 

            I stopped myself and placed my hand on my heart and felt the fast pounding.  I made myself breathe slowly, in and out (thank you natural child birth classes) and began taking hold of my mind, speaking to myself. 

             I said, wait a minute hear, I am being physically affected by these worries and concerns.  This is not right.  What am I so worked up about?  The people, I don’t want to let them down.  Really, Katie, is that all?  No, I don’t want anyone to reject me; I want everyone to like me.  I want to walk into a room and know that I am ok with everyone in it – no fear and no anxiety with any relationship.  So, this is THE most important thing to you right now?  Yes, I guess it is and that is not right.  Then I started speaking the truth that supersedes all lies. 

            I am fully accepted in the beloved.  He loves me enough to die for me and keeps my reputation.  I do not want to fear man more than fearing the One who made me, who knows my heart and mind.  I want to love people with no strings attached.  And I know that if my motivation for going to see people is to make them happy so that I am accepted and thought well of in return, than that is not real Christ like love.  That mind set is only a selfish love that seeks to control and manipulate.  I feel the seeds of this selfishness growing in my heart.  Forgive me, Lord.  Help me to let this go. 

            I felt my heart again – totally calm.  No more anxious pounding.  It was gone; and I was not tossing and turning anymore.  As I lay there I asked out loud, “Then what should I do now?”  The answer came in the words from a friend. 

                                                                            

 

Jackson and Bella  light Christmas Eve candles.   

            Just that morning, a dear friend of mine stopped me in conversation, looked me in the eye, and said, “Ask the Lord what He wants you to do and do it.  Find out His will and do that.” It was almost like she was saying, “Here, I found this truth and thought you might could use it.”

          Yes, I can use that!  “Anxiety in a man's heart weighs him down, but a good word makes him glad.” Proverbs 12:25 ESV   I should have listened while my friend was speaking this morning, but the words came back to me at that particular moment on my bed and they were like healing words to my soul. 

            In reading about people who survive great trials and live through extreme circumstances, most have something in common.  They  remembered something that they were taught through a prior experience, or remembered something they had read or seen or heard that helped them to make it, to live. 

            The soul is alive and real and needs to be fed good, real food just as a physical body needs good nutrition.  Without good truth to chew and meditate on, the soul wanders like mine did, to easy irrational thoughts that can steer a person’s mind to unsafe and treacherous waters.

           Pride is the great enemy of the soul.  I find that I can easily tell myself that I don’t need as much truth, that I don’t need to listen to good counsel, that I don’t need to avoid certain kinds of input because surely I know better and I will be fine.  But, the enemies of our souls are real and they will attack. 

            So, I rested for a while longer, and woke up with a new frame of mind.  I was at peace knowing that God was there with me and hears me and knows me. He loves me and loves my family and my friends.  I purposed then to go slowly and thoughtfully through the next few weeks. 

           As I turn over the calendar to the next year, I want to seek Him more. I want to be still and listen, to walk in His will and leave anxiety behind.  I do not want to be like King Asa, who when warned, did not listen, and did not seek the Lord with his whole heart.  He became angry and hurtful toward others because he relied on men. (II Chronicles 15-16)

            I will falter.  I will take my eyes off of the truth.  I will be swayed by my feelings and my thoughts.  But, I have One who will meet me in the moments when I stray, and just like the word from a friend helped to steady me, He will bring me back.  

          The key here, remain humble.  We need to know that we don’t know it all. We are wrong a lot, and we need to be teachable. 

                                                                            

My sisters and me at Christmas.

          Paul, that “super apostle”, said that God permitted him to “have a thorn in his flesh” so that he would not become conceited.  Ok, that’s harsh, but it makes sense to me.  There is nothing like something "prickly" to get our attention.  And what is even better is what God said to Paul when the apostle had his moments of heart pounding anxiety. “He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”  And that good word makes my often sorrowful soul, glad. 

May you find His power in all your weaknesses this year,                          Your Fellow Sojourner

It Took a Love Affair

                  My daughter was the best baby in the world.  She just was.  And so, on her 1^st birthday we all looked forward to her perfect baby cuteness growing and maturing into perfect toddler cuteness.  But she had a different plan.  Bella’s 1^st birthday was the day that her father’s wish came true; my little spit fire came out of her cocoon. 

                One of the most wonderful and trying things about little girls is their tendency to be verbal, and to do so very early.  Bella was very verbal, very early.  She could tell you anything she wanted and how she felt about it and why.  NO guess work with her.  And so I naturally thought, partly due to the fact that my first born was a boy, she would be a reading savant.  I had visions of her as a three year old being able to understand those words I would spell out loud to Chris, you know, the typical parents’ Morse code that is used in every preschool child’s presence.  I also felt badly for her brother.  Poor Jack would be surpassed by his sister‘s early reading. 

            But a funny thing happened with Bella.  She picked up a pencil and paper as a toddler, but not to write letters.  She drew, and she colored.  She painted and sculpted.  Her world was all about what she could create.  Reading was not even a thought for her as a preschooler.  She loved being read to, but never showed any interest in wanting to read herself.  She just wanted to make things.

            I was not worried about Bella’s disinterestedness in reading and writing, just a little surprised.  And so we let Bella work with her hands and she loved it.  Year after year went by and the books remained on the shelf while the paint, beads, and paper littered her bedroom floor and every table in our home. 

            When Bella turned ten I began to get anxious.  Will she ever read and write beyond a beginner’s level?  What should we do? 

            We tried many different strategies to get Bella to love the printed page, but nothing seemed to help.  We continued to surround her with good literature, hoping the beauty and wonder of a good story would lure her into reading.  Nope, not,Bella!  And I began to feel like we were the only family in the world with a now eleven year old who did not like to read. 

Chris in front of one of our beloved "stacks".

            Then I ran across an article written by a well- known children’s author in the doctor’s waiting room.  In this author’s true confessions he spoke of his own ten year old son who did not like to read.  I immediately felt his pain!  God bless this man!  I wanted to know, what did he do?  And as I read I realized he would not take “no” for an answer.  No matter how long it took, he would keep putting good books in front of his son.  Eventually, it would have to take.  And it did.  No special program or formula, just good books, for a good chunk of time, every day.  That is all he did.  I felt empowered!  If he could do it, then so could I!    

            I let me daughter know that we would all be reading good stuff every day.  She was not impressed but went along with the new plan.   I waited for the change to come.  Weeks and months passed with no monumental change in her attitude toward reading.  I began to give up.  Maybe she would be one of those, who just read when they have to and not for pleasure.  I shuddered.   

            And so, as her twelfth year was looming on the horizon, we trudged through her school work as if dragging an iron ball behind us.  Each reading assignment was a chore.  Then, for some odd reason, she got it in her head that she would like to read Anne Frank.  I discouraged her as much as I could. “Good, all the more reason for me to read it, Mom.” And so I agreed on one condition.  She could read Anne Frank as long as she committed to finishing it.  I knew the “wines” would come very quickly with this choice, and I wanted her to push through the slow beginning in order for her to know that she could read a book of this caliber.  She agreed.

            Within a week she was begging me to read something different.  But I did not give in to her request.  She realized she would have to finish what she had started if she was ever going to read anything else in her life, and so she kept at it.  Week after week she read Anne Frank.   Then I found her reading on her own without being told.  She began talking to me about what she had read and how it made her feel.  She was identifying with Anne.  Bella was being pulled into the story and was liking it!  After a long, slow reading of Anne Frank, Bella had come full circle.  She ate, slept, and breathed the book.  She was hooked. 

Bella at the Book Plate

            She reminded me of someone who had just fallen in love.  And so she had, with a book.  Then she asked me what else she could read and so I pulled one of my favorites off of the shelf and put it in her hands.  She read this one without much prompting.  This time she really liked the book and wanted to read more by the same author.  The domino effect had begun.  One good book gave her the confidence to try it again, and again, and again. 

            If you had told me two years ago that my daughter would be holed up in her room for hours each day reading books, I would have choked on my coffee.  But that is exactly what has happened.

            A few months ago, my daughter found out that she too could express herself with words, not just through the visual arts, and she began to write.  She would write a page or two of a story she had begun to form in her mind on paper or in a journal.  Eventually, she started typing on the computer and saving her little stories.   Then she decided that what she really needed in order to be a better writer was her own typewriter.  That’s right, a typewriter.  No computer or iPad, just a typewriter please.  I thought this would be a passing phase, but it became more and more important to her and I began to give this idea some real thought. 

            As I was walking through a second hand shop one day, my eye spotted an old typewriter in its case.  I asked to try it out and behold, it worked!   A couple of weeks later we both traveled to the second hand store to see if the old machine was still there.  When Bella turned the corner in the store, her eye caught sight of the typewriter  and she just stood still.  I knew then it was coming home with us. 

Bella and "Max", her typewriter.

            Now we hear the typewriter at all hours of the day.  We have all received typed letters and notes.  And she has begun a new story on her typewriter, the longest one to date. 

            I am remembering my little one year old girl, and all of the words she had stored up in her little life span, spilling them out all over the place.  Now, as she is on the cusp of young adulthood, words are still gushing out, but this time they are coming through her fingers and seeping into her mind. 

            And her older brother, well, let’s just say, we had nothing to worry about.  Jackson reads far more than I ever hoped to at his age. 

Jackson reading to Elias, two years ago.

              My children amaze me.  I am learning to let them be and give them the tools they need to learn and grow.  In time, they take things in and make them their own.  I am watching them form a life-long habit of reading real books, of writing deeply and thoughtfully, and of learning how to express themselves in this crazy world.  

             May they meet their generation with a passionate desire to know the truth, to embrace the beautiful, and to tell a dying world that there is a hope that never disappoints.   Read on my children.  Read well, read deeply.  Your very lives may depend on it.  

~Your Fellow Sojourner

 Notes on the Art of Poetry

by Dylan Thomas

I could never have dreamt that there were such goings-on
In the world between the covers of books,
Such sandstorms and ice blasts of words,
Such staggering peace, such enormous laughter,
Such and so many blinding bright lights,
Splashing all over the pages
In a million bits and pieces
All of which were words, words, words,
And each of which were alive forever

In its own delight and glory and oddity and light.

Something Unspeakable

          Tonight we will celebrate crossing yet another threshold.  Our entire downstairs will be ripped up in the morning.  Water damage has ruined the first floor of our home and so it all must go.  I have a killer summer cold and yes, as my husband and children were about to walk out the door to have dinner with their Papu, a purple mouse flew through one of our downstairs windows.  (Yes, it really was a purple mouse.)  Not a bad start to an evening. 

            But, I am looking forward to spending this night with my husband.  It is a Sunday, and he has preached a sermon all day long, beginning with the kiss on my forehead and the prayer he spoke as he held my hand, leaving me and my cold in bed.  He has not stopped all day.  It is his way of pushing back the onslaught that comes after he steps out of the pulpit.  He keeps moving and giving and serving to keep the doubts at bay.  I love him for it.  And tonight is no different. 

            I will help him put the kids to bed and then we will lean on each other as we sit on the couch together.  This is the comfort at the end of the day.  To know that it will be quiet, the sun will fade, and the space will be empty except for him and me.  He will take my hand and one of us will say something like, “So, how are you really?” and the other will try to find words to tell the other where they are.  It is how we “find” one another again in our busy lives.  We have long since stopped dreaming of circumstances changing and bringing us that mythical “sweet spot”.  Then I will hear him snore and I will nudge him and we will tumble into bed.

 We will pray for one another and drift off the sleep.  I will try to pick up a book, maybe.  Lately it has been the Iliad.  I will dream of Odysseus and Achilles and Greek ships in a stormy sea. But the feeling of panic that may come in my dream will not be real.  My love is not at the whim of some human god, it has been written in eternity.  It is a living, human, and eternal thing.  It is as real as the floor my feet walk on in the morning and the pain I feel when I hit my toe against the wall. 

            It is a love not according to my wishes and demands, but a way of walking.  Chris is teaching me what it means to live in this world, to not run away from the hardness of it.  He is easing the journey I am on.  And he is preparing me for the next one.  

            And what of the life to come?   You will find me and my love there, talking, laughing, running, and singing in a harmony we can only dream of now.  It will be something unspeakable.  We dabble in a love that will one day be devoid of all the pain and bitterness we feel right now.  There will not be any floors to rip apart or windows to shatter or bodies that need healing.  It will be the healing balm our souls long for, and it will be for an eternity and a day.

~ Your Fellow Sojourner

"I am my beloved's and my beloved is mine;" Song of Solomon 6:3

Last night with the original floor.

Ancient Paths

             Our thoughts turn to change in the New Year.  We want to get out of the old ruts we have gotten ourselves into and find newer, better paths.  Out with the old and in with the new! 

            I like change and then again I don’t.  I have learned that change done well can be good, and change without thoughtful intent can be burdensome and a waste of time. 

            Most of us know right away what needs to change but we are fearfully aware of the unknowns that often come with change.  Change is hard enough on its own, and walking through unknown territory can be nerve racking.  It takes great faith to change course and walk a new path. 

            I sometimes wish that I could be transported a few months down the path of good change and see all of the benefits that new habits can bring.  But, I have not discovered how to time travel and so I must rely on faith.  Faith can come by hearing, and hearing from the right people.

            One of the most incredible graces that God has given me is the older, wiser people in my life.   People that have lived some life and still have a grace and a peace about them are beautiful.  To know an older man or woman who has a calm and joyful outlook on life is to find a real gem.  And in these gems one can mine for treasures of wisdom that can save us from heart ache and prepare us for the future. 

            As with many good things, we do not know how long we will have them.  Time is a precious commodity.  When I am in the presence of my elders, I go treasure hunting with prayerful grace and tact.   When they speak, I listen.  When I am with them, I slow down.  I open my heart and my mind and let their words of wisdom pour into the reservoir of my soul.

              In 1919, a couple in Kentucky had their first born son, my grandfather.  My grandfather will be 95 years old this year, but to me he has never changed.   I still picture him slowly opening the foyer closet, taking down his hat and walking out the door to go about his business, with a “howdy” and a smile on his face.  Slow yet determined, precise but gentle, steady and kind. 

            A couple of weeks ago I found a moment to sit down next to my Pop Pop and talk with him about life.  I had asked him what he had been reading and he told me he was still working his way through the latest Microsoft Windows manual.  I continued to ask him what else he had been reading and he said the newspaper.  I challenged him to find a book of some kind that he would enjoy.  He told me he did not have time for that kind of reading.  I laughed and so did my grandmother.  “If you don’t have time to read Pop Pop, than neither do I!”  But he was serious.  He needed to spend time working on the computer and so practical reading was all he could do.  But I continued to press him, ”How will the next generation see the importance of reading if they do not see you reading?”  And then I saw a glint in his eye.  “That is not my job.  That is the parents’ job, they bring up the children.”   I saw his point.  He knew where true jurisdiction resided.  And then the wisdom of his years began to be unearthed.

            “Parents need to make sure they are leading their children in good ways of learning.  They need to give them good opportunities to learn for themselves.   If you have a baby and there is garbage in front of him he is going to naturally go toward it.  But if a parent keeps steering him away from the garbage over and over again he will eventually learn to avoid it , to choose something else.“ 

           “But that takes time Pop Pop and so many parents don’t want to take the time to do that.  It’s hard, I know. ”  Then he placed his hand on my arm and told me how thankful he was that I take the time to teach my children.  I told him I don’t do anything special, I just do what I know I ought to be doing as a parent.  Nothing special in that.  “But so many parents don’t do what you do anymore.  It used to be so common.  You know people do what they have been taught to do themselves.   Like my parents taught me and now you teach your children.”  It was then that I knew I was on holy ground.  He was going back, not forward.  He was not directing me to a new way, but an old one.  

            “The most important thing you can do for your children is to introduce them to the Lord.  That is what my mother did for me.  She always had time to talk with me about the Lord.  From time to time I was allowed to look at and read a children’s Bible that we had, and when I came to something that I did not understand I would go and find my mother and ask her about it.  She would stop whatever she was doing and sit down and talk with me about what I was reading.”  I saw great emotion well up in his smoky blue eyes.  A great love for a woman I never knew, who had stopped her world to raise up a man who would be a model to me of a faith and trust in God that runs very deep.  

               “I wish you had known her, that you lived in the same time.  She was very much like you, you liked the same things.”  And with a grateful and trembling voice I told him, “We will Pop Pop.  We will live in the same time and it will be for an eternity.”  The biggest smile broke out on his face and he laughed. “Well, you got me there!  Yes, you are right, you will!”  I leaned over and hugged him and kissed the top of his balding head and I told him I loved him three times over.  And with all the strength he had he hugged me back and told me that he loved me too.  His words were more precious to me than diamonds or rubies or sapphires.  A man of so few words told me he loved me, something he never needed to say, I have always known that my Pop Pop loved me.  It was a moment of grace that I will hold in my heart for a long, long time. 

            As I walked down the stairs of my parent’s home I was filled with hope and strength for the days and weeks and months to come.  A simple word, but a true word, forged in the fires of the hard lives of my grandparents and great grandparents.  Our conversation held precious rubies, words of wisdom to help me find my way.  “Stand by the roads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way is; and walk in it, and find rest for your souls.” Jeremiah 6:16    

            I have not walked all of this path, but I do know that it is a good way, a way to find rest in a weary world.  Like my grandfather acknowledged, it is not an easy road to walk, but God loves the reformer. “Return to me, and I will return to you, says the Lord of hosts.” Malachi 3:7  What a promise, in returning He meets us.  There is no mention of perfection or having it all together, just return. 

            And so, as I take down my Christmas decorations and turn over a new calendar page, I am seeking more ways to return to paths that are ancient and old.  I may not be raising chickens and planting corn like my Grandmother Rhoda did, but I too find myself interrupted by little souls who are longing to know and understand who God is and what He has done.   I, like my grandfather’s mother, hope to set aside my dish towel, my laundry basket, my lesson plans, and die to myself, that another may live.  And when my granddaughter comes to me one day with her own questions about life, I want to smile and touch her arm and tell her of the paths that I have walked, not the new, but the beautiful and the old. 

~ Your Fellow Sojourner

Pop Pop's 90th birthday.

“Legacy”

I can taste the fruit of Eve
I’m aware of sickness, death and disease
The results of our choices are vast
Eve was the first but she wasn’t the last

And if I were honest with myself
Had I been standing at that tree
My mouth and my hands would be covered with fruit
Things I shouldn’t know and things I shouldn’t see

Remind me of this with every decision
Generations will reap what I sow
I can pass on a curse or a blessing
To those I will never know

She taught me to fear the serpent
I’m learning to fear myself
And all of the things I am capable of
In my search for wisdom, acceptance and wealth

And to say that the devil made me do it
Is a cop out and a lie
The devil can’t make me do anything
When I’m calling on Jesus Christ

Remind me of this with every decision
Generations will reap what I sow
I can pass on a curse or a blessing
To those I will never know

To my great, great, great grand daughter
Live in peace
To my great, great, great grand son
Live in peace
To my great, great, great grand daughter
Live in peace
To my great, great, great grand son
Live in peace, oh, live in peace

Remind me of this with every decision
Generations will reap what I sow
I can pass on a curse or a blessing
To those I will never know 

 ~ Sara Groves

When the Wise Become Fools

     Not too long ago, the wisemen came and took over my living room.  The wisemen had hijacked Noah’s ark and held baby Jesus hostage along with his mother Mary.  There was evil afoot.  Every so often, the animals on the ark would walk the plank, and only diabolical laughter could be heard as the ark sailed the living room rug. Jesus and Mary seemed doomed.  The wisemen had not gotten the memo – we are supposed to worship Jesus, not put him in the brig. 

     Even though my children had rewritten the story of Jesus’ birth, I consoled myself in remembering that God’s plan had not been taken out of His hand.  God has already accomplished all He desired without any detours.  No wisemen gone rouge could bother me. 

     There are no guarantees – all of life is a gamble- live today for tomorrow we die – live for yourself.  These ideas reveal what most of the world believes about life.  It sounds a lot like the wisemen taking over Noah’s boat and going for a joyride.  And even though I laughed at my sons’ revisionist history, I too want to take control of the ship and do my own thing.  I am afraid of not squeezing all that I can out of my life.  I want to be like the living room wisemen and write my own story.  I am ok with putting Jesus in handcuffs.

      But even if Jesus is all tied up below deck, He still affects our lives.   He really did live.  He really did die.  And there are too many resurrected people walking around for Him not to have lived again.  I know.  I am one of them.   But I spurn the blood that ransomed me.   I am unfaithful.  I leave Him.

     Every day I find my heart wanting to leave the home of my Father and go find my life somewhere else.  I am lured by the siren song of comfort and ease, of the perfect wrinkle free day, and of daydreams that are full of every imaginable thing.   I take my inheritance and try the road of my own desires.  And I never think of where my choices will lead until I taste the bitterness of the outcome.  Aloofness sets in and my heart begins to cool.  I must turn toward home again to warm my hardened heart.  Yet every time I go back to God I wonder.  Will He take me back again?  Have I wandered too far this time? 

     As He stands with outstretched hands I see that He has come not for the healthy, but the sick.  It is the only place I can go for restoration.  And this pattern is becoming more and more common for me.  The more I walk with Jesus, the more I see my tendency to want to walk through life apart from Him. 

But He has a love that is stronger than the death that threatens my soul and He has a jealousy that is fiercer than any grave that would forever bury me.   There is no place He will not go to rescue; there is no bitterness, no anger, no apathy that His death and life cannot heal. 

     What the wisemen on the ark forgot was that the baby below deck came to die for them.  He came to return blessing for cursing, life for death.  Like the pirate wisemen going back to the crèche to worship Jesus, God will resurrect the curses of my life and make them into the blessings He intends them to be.  This is Redemption’s song.  A beauty for ashes, a strength made perfect in weakness. 

     For that day, my spirit is longing.  And with the Spirit and the Bride, I say come.  Come and take the people of this world who think themselves wise and show them they are fools.  Come and give these fools the gift they need.  A humble heart surrendered to the Love that many waters cannot wash away.  And I, like all the other fools of the earth, will discover that I have nothing to give Him, nothing but my heart.

~Your Fellow Sojourner 

                 The boys reading by the tree (Noah's ark is docked under the sofa table.)

                                     In the Bleak Midwinter

       In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan,

               earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone;

               snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow,

               in the bleak midwinter, long ago.

               Our God, heaven cannot hold him, nor earth sustain;

               heaven and earth shall flee away when he comes to reign.

               In the bleak midwinter a stable place sufficed

               the Lord God Almighty, Jesus Christ.

               Angels and archangels may have gathered there,

               cherubim and seraphim thronged the air;

               but his mother only, in her maiden bliss,

               worshiped the beloved with a kiss.

               What can I give him, poor as I am?

               If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb;

               if I were a Wise Man, I would do my part;

               yet what I can I give him:  give my heart.

                  By Christina G. Rossetti