Category: Choices

“There Is No There, There” (Shauna Niequist)-

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The besetting sin in my life would definitely be perfectionism. I’m task-oriented, uber-organized, a performer, a big fan of structure, routine and predictability. I like my spaces, relationships, and life neat and tidy. So many things in the past have spun out of control. Somewhere along the line, I learned to cope by controlling the things I could in my physical environment or at least attempting to do so.

 

But control is always an illusion. Life rarely fits into neat and tidy compartments.  I’m learning, of course, but it’s such a struggle for me to let go. When I can do just that, when I can stay in the moment, each one is a gift. I love what Abraham Lincoln said: “Yesterday’s history, tomorrow’s a mystery, today is a gift…that’s why they call it the present.”

 

Shauna Niequist has an excellent study entitled Present Over Perfect. That, my friends, is the goal: I want to learn to be present where I’m called to be, in each real moment, not continuously striving for an elusive quality of perfection that might even be termed destructive. There’s a phrase I learned through that study that often comes to mind when I find myself in one of those manic obsessive-compulsive drives: “There is no there, there.” North-American culture, as well as many others, can be so performance and appearance oriented. It’s as if we’re all striving to reach a perfect place where we will someday arrive, to find a euphoric Zen state to dwell in. But does it exist this side of heaven?

 
Shauna also talks about learning to flee a life where she was frantically searching for a diamond necklace, when all the time, it hung around her neck. Aren’t we all…just…searching? “There is no there, there.” A diamond necklace DOES grace each one of our necks. It was placed there by our Father God. His Presence perfects us, makes our present moments all they should be. The only way to be present over perfect is to accept that in His perfection, He made us totally right, made everything alright. He accepted us as we are, made us His own, and gave us all we need. May we each find the grace to receive the gifts we’ve been given, to open our arms and receive the provision that perfects our present.

Strong Hands, New Eyes…

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Oscar Wilde once said, “It takes great courage to see the world in all its tainted glory, and still to love it.” This truth often strikes me, for, on a daily basis, I am amazed by the beauty and kindness and inspirational perseverance around me. On an equally frequent level, I am confronted with woundedness, ugliness, and hypocrisy. To hold the tension of this world’s  “tainted glory” well takes great balance and skill. Whatever and whoever there may be in my own path, I am quick to judge, to praise or condemn, to choose a personal response that has the potential to fall on either end of the spectrum.

 

Whether in line at the post office or the supermarket, driving, walking in the beautiful mountain town where I live, or working, I cross paths with many I choose to ignore. How many do I encounter every day who are longing to be seen or heard or helped in some way? Most often, I choose to believe that my schedule is too busy, my hands are too small and weak. I allow my eyes to cloud over and my mind to wander back to its self-preoccupation.

 

But what if my small hands are strong enough to offer a drink to the thirsty? What if doing so is the water my own soul needs? As David Foster Wallace says in his graduation speech entitled “This Is Water,” “Sometimes the hardest and most important realities are often the hardest to talk about.” In the petty frustrations of day-to-day living with narrow-sighted vision, it is only in choosing to look around with compassion that we find our own paths enlarged.

 

Just as  Jesus did, we are called, “…to preach good news to the poor…to bind up the brokenhearted…to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor…to comfort all who mourn, and provide for those who grieve…to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair” (Isaiah 61:1b-3a). God says that “…if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the noonday” (Isaiah 58:10).

 

Spanish-speaking artists Marcela Gándara and Jesus Adrian Romero have a beautiful song entitled “Dame Tus Ojos” (“Give Me Your Eyes”). In the song, they ask God, “Give me your eyes I want to see. Give me your words, I want to speak.” The song is a petition to be filled with the Spirit of God in every step. As we become Christ’s body and His church, may we literally be His hands and feet, see with His eyes, love with His heart.

***Photo Credits: Brainy Quote

It Is Well…

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The past two years of my life have seen more change than the previous ten altogether. After a long waiting season, through an unexpected breaking process, God moved in both difficult and incredible ways. He asked me to release a teaching career that had been my passion and security in adulthood. He moved me back home and placed a man in my life to love and to marry. Then, the same month of our marriage, my husband’s mother was diagnosed with stage four ovarian cancer. Within four months, she passed away. We left everything to come to Puerto Rico, see her before she passed, and manage her estate. Months later, we remain here, searching for a solution for a disabled family member she cared for.

 

The more answers we seek, the more doors close. One slight move on the board changes the whole game, perhaps for the rest of our lives. We pray for guidance, but the heavens remain silent. I believe my Father is attentively at work in ways I can’t see or understand. I trust His hand, but sometimes, the weight of the unknown feels like enough to press me into the ground and bury me there. In the midst of it all, I feel ushered into the eye of the storm where one call is certain, “Surrender.”

 

The earth quakes and the storms come, and yet…it is well with my soul. I’ve thought often of the old hymn of that title, written by Horatio Spafford after he lost his family in an ocean storm. “When peace, like a river, attendeth my way, When sorrows like sea billows roll; Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say, It is well, it is well with my soul.” Bethel Music artist Kristene DiMarco recently rewrote the song with words that pierce my soul. “So let my soul go and trust in Him. The waves and wind still know His name.”

 

It Is Well
Bethel Music (Written by Kristen DiMarco) 


Grander earth has quaked before
Moved by the sound of His voice
Seas that are shaken and stirred
Can be calmed and broken for my regard
And through it all, through it all
My eyes are on You
And through it all, through it all
It is well
And through it all, through it all
My eyes are on You
And it is well with me
And far be it from me to not believe
Even when my eyes can’t see
And this mountain that’s in front of me
Will be thrown into the midst of the sea
And through it all, through it all
My eyes are on You
And through it all, through it all
It is well
And through it all, through it all
My eyes are on You
And it is well
It is well
So let go my soul and trust in Him
The waves and wind still know His name
So let go my soul and trust in Him
The waves and wind still know His name…

“The Room of Love…”

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As a new bride, I’ve thought a lot about the ways earthly love mirrors the love of our Heavenly Father. Without a doubt, marriage provides experience with the complicated mysteries and pressures of relationships, especially under high amounts of outside conflict and stress. It also allows us a window into the transcendent nature of love. Recently, I’ve reread a favorite novel that does a nice job of tackling both themes.

With an expert hand, Wendell Berry weaves the characteristics of a romance into his women’s fiction novel Hannah Coulter. Hannah remembers the pressures she and her husband Nathan were under within their marriage as they worked their farm, “The making of the place was the thing that ruled over everything else, for we were living from the place…. And as our work shaped our workplaces, our work and our workplaces shaped our days. Our work brought us together and drew us apart.” She articulates the tensions that came between them, “We had differences. There were the agreed-on differences of work. There were the accepted, mostly happy differences between a man and a woman. There were the differences of nature and character that were sometimes happy and sometimes not. Some of the things that most endeared Nathan to me—his quietness, his love of his work, his determination—were the things that could sometimes make me maddest at him.”

Most of all, however, Hannah focuses on the love that united them, “The room of love is another world. You go there wearing no watch, watching no clock. It is the world without end, so small that two people can hold it in their arms, and yet it is bigger than world on worlds, for it contains the longing of all things to be together, and to be at rest together. You come together to the day’s end, weary and sore, troubled and afraid. You take it all into your arms, it goes away, and there you are where giving and taking are the same, and you live a little while entirely in a gift. The worlds have all been said, all permissions given, and you are free in the place that is the two of you together. What could be more heavenly than to have desire and satisfaction in the same room? If you want to know why even in telling of trouble and sorrow I am giving thanks, this is why.”

I’m giving thanks too, for the room of love and the big mix that life and love are. I pray I can accept giving and taking as the same, embrace all in my arms and accept them for the gifts that they are.

***All quotes taken from: Berry, Wendell. Hannah Coulter: A Novel. Counterpoint, 2004.***

The Already, & The Not Yet…

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I swore I’d give up hoping for a husband at the age of thirty-five, and kept true to my word. Just before my thirty-sixth birthday, however, God allowed my path to cross with the man he intended for me. This wonderful guy exactly fit the bill for what I’d been praying for in the previous twenty years, and I continue to marvel at this. As it turned out, our paths had been crossing for almost seventeen, and we had even attended the same small college together without ever meeting. It’s obvious the Lord had has own plan and timing at work. We can both see ways He prepared us for one another, though the journeys we walked alone were lonely and long. What a wonder to have the opportunity to join my life to his this past December! I couldn’t ask for a better partner to share life with.

That same month, doctors in Puerto Rico diagnosed his mother with Stage Four Ovarian Cancer. The elopement we planned for New Year’s Eve took place three weeks earlier than planned, and I said goodbye to my new husband the next day. Though good friends made it possible for me to travel to spend the holidays with him and meet his family, I needed to return to work two weeks later. He remains with his mom and aunt, attempting to help and care for them. His mom is stable for now, but suffering. He hopes to return here soon, but so much of the future is unknown.
Despite being separated for these first months of marriage, I’m so thankful to have him as a part of my journey. Distance is a challenge, certainly, but he’s wonderful about prioritizing our relationship and times for us to talk. He adds so much to my life, and yet…I miss him desperately. In holding all of this, I’m struck by the reminder of the phrase, “the already, and the not yet” used to describe Kingdom of God. As believers, we have the opportunity to partake in the Kingdom here on earth, and yet, we must simultaneously wait for its full realization. As we choose to reflect Christ each day, we can help bring the realities of Christ’s Kingdom to those around us. It’s a beautiful mystery, and a great opportunity. We live in unity with Christ here and now, but an even greater unity awaits us. My Beloved is mine, and I am His. I am invited to give thanks for what is, and dwell here today. I am invited to eagerly anticipate the great day that is to come.

The Dance of Good Story-

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I’ve been struggling a lot lately with what a good friend calls “bad story.” Essentially, bad story is what I am under when I allow insecurities, lies, or the shadows of the past to dominate my thinking and identity, and convince me that I am anything other than the precious daughter God sees. In His sight, I am pure, prized, redeemed, righteous, and worthy of all the blessings He bestows on His children. This is the Gospel, this is good news, this is good story. This, my friends, is the battle of all our lives…to fight off the lies of the critics and the Enemy, and many times, our own. The loudest voice of all can be the critic inside our heads, and that critic can only be silenced by grace of God. I’ve learned I can only extend it to others as I learn to extend it to myself.

It’s a little bit like a dance, a simile I love to use for our relationships with the Lord and our journey through life. He takes a step, and we respond. The moment we step away or fail to follow His lead is the moment our dance loses its elegance and grace. The only way to continually stay tuned to Him is to practice looking in His eyes, following His leads, and choosing to believe His truth.

 
As Margaret Manning Shull of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries wrote, “Becoming a black-belt in karate or a seasoned dancer doesn’t happen instantaneously. Instead, each day offers multiple opportunities to practice whatever it is we want to become….If the grace-full life of Christ is the intended goal for those who claim to follow him, each day presents the opportunity to practice—to grow in the very grace Christ embodies. Each day brings circumstances and events that call for a response. Instead of fear, there can be empathy and hope. Instead of pride, there can be humility and hospitality. Instead of bitterness and resentment, there can be forgiveness or sacrificial giving. There is always a choice. And thankfully, there is always one who extends flawlessly the very grace we need ourselves.” I want to live under good story, to dance the dance of grace with my Father, and to help the world to do the same.

 

***Photo Credits: lovedoes.org

“I Like Myself Best When I Am Laughing” (Zora Neale Hurston)…

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I have a friend who loves to laugh.  She prompts me and others to laugh so beautifully. An entire wall in her home is covered with signs reminding her to do it… to laugh, and to keep on laughing. Her joy and amazing sense of humor are part of her spiritual gifting, a natural inclination and  talent that she has, a reflection of the joy and mirth in God’s own heart. But of course, life has tested and tried this pure joy. Circumstances and storms have attempted to destroy the very quality that most attracts those around her to Christ. She inspires me every day in her determination to resist these attacks and, as Proverbs 31 says to laugh at the days to come, but oh yes…she still has to remind herself.

 

Isn’t laughing such a reflection of a state of happiness, innocence, and lightheartedness? What a beautiful offering  to give to the world. Along with the childlike spirit it embodies, it seems to me it is also a symbol of trust and vulnerability, when we unabashedly present our truest selves to those around us and the world, just as they are, without holding back. Zora Neale Hurston said, “I like myself best when I am laughing.” Me too.

 

Unlike the friend I mentioned, laughing is not my natural inclination; I am more serious in heart and nature. But I believe it is a habit that can be learned, that must be practiced. I must learn to cultivate and love this voice and offer it to the world, for all its worth…for the glory of all He’s worth. Today, may God bring joy to your own heart. May you sense Him shouldering your burdens, looking you in the eyes, offering the twinkle in His own, and drawing out the beautiful laugh He gave you. After all, it’s like no one else’s.

 

***Photo Credits: lovedoes.org

Divine Interruptions…

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Sometime in college, a friend and mentor introduced me to the concept of “Divine interruptions”. She noticed that I struggled with unpredictable interruptions into my very well-planned and predictable routine schedule, but counseled that I had to stay open to the idea that God was allowing these interruptions in my day and plans. They could, in fact, be what has been termed in “Christianese”, “Divine appointments.”  If I could learn to consider them Divine, I could remain inviting and open to what God wanted to show me, and how He wanted to use me.

 

This transformed my approach to life. It’s still a struggle, but over the years, space has often been created to see God do something that only He could do. Life would be a small fraction of the gift it has been if my heart had been closed. I’m so grateful for this lesson early in my adulthood. Life, indeed, is a series of interruptions that can affect and change our courses. I want to continue to see these as invitations into His space…as a surrender of the plans I cling to into His capable hands.
Henri Nouwen has invited, “Let us try to see the pain of our human and spiritual journey “from above.” The great art is to gradually trust that life’s interruptions are the places where God is molding you into the person you are called to be. Interruptions are not disruptions of your way to holiness, but rather are places where you are being formed into the unique person God calls you to be. You know you are living a grateful life when whatever happens is received as an invitation to deepen your heart, to strengthen your love, and to broaden your hope. You are living a grateful life when something is taken away from you that you thought was so important and you find yourself willing to say, ‘Maybe I’m being invited to a deeper way of living.’ ” I want to live in such gratefulness.

Accepting Joy…

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Part of my very part-time employment at present is working with a woman who also has a severe neurological condition, though hers is far more severe. I model a few exercises and provide a little massage and stretching; she models so much more for me. She’s been sick for most of thirty years, and has spent thirteen of those paralyzed from the waist down and regulated to a wheelchair. And yet, she always has a smile on her face. When I asked her how she was able to be so upbeat and positive, she said that she wouldn’t want the husband who’s been her caretaker all those years to have to live with a grump. This made me smile; it almost seems like a casual and lighthearted approach to coping with illness, but it is most definitely far more. Long ago, she made a very intentional choice to live in acceptance, gratitude and joy, one I’m sure she has had to make that choice over and over again, but she has. Hers is a very cultivated positivity held perfectly in tension with practical surrender, and they end result is joy.

 

She calls it grace. It reminds me of what Ann Voskamp once wrote: “Grace is like the wind. It finds us as we are, but it does not leave us as we have been. All is grace.” Grace has met her anew each day in exactly the place she is; it continually shapes and molds her into the image of God. She’s a willing vessel in the hands of a skillful potter; anyone has only to look at my friend’s radiant countenance to be awestruck by its fragile strength. She’s a former elementary teacher, a mom and wife and daughter and sister and aunt and friend. She’s a quilter and a prayer warrior and a blessing to all who know her. I’m so very thankful: in a season of struggling to accept my own challenging circumstances, or perhaps simply arriving in the place where I actually have accepted them, God has given me this beautiful example. I want to accept the joy that fills and surrounds me and say with my friend and the saints of old, as voiced by the prophet Isaiah: “And yet LORD, you are our Father. We are the clay, you are the potter” (Isaiah 64:8).

 

*Photo by Ann Voskamp. 

A Cadence  of Thanksgiving…

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Since the time I was introduced to author Ann Voskamp through her book 1,000 Gifts several years ago, my thoughts and journals have been filled with lists of gratitude. As I walk and work and wade through life, conscious choices have built practices that have transformed me. Psalm 118:23-24 says, “I will enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise. I will say this is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.” If we are ever feeling out of the fullness of His presence, praise is the solution to encountering it once more.

 

Making sure our prayers are balanced with ACTS (Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving and Supplication), and not simply petitions for our needs and wants to be met, is part of the discipline of the Christian life. In her book 31 Days of Praise, author Ruth Meyers  revolutionized my prayers to praise early in my Christian walk, but the poetry of Ann Voskamp’s prose awakened my senses in a new way. Truly, there are thousands of gifts to take note of:

 

1, 697-Waking up basked in sunlight.

1, 704-A fun breakfast with former students; hearing about their college adventures.

1, 707-Storm rolling in over the mountains.

1, 716-Dwelling in a place of refuge.

1, 722-Walking and processing with a friend.

1, 723-Cobalt blue of the Colorado sky; walking with Colorado sunshine on my shoulders.

1, 745-Sitting on the porch to read a novel.

1, 765-Kindness, grace and understanding of true friends.

 

Now my days resonate with a cadence of thanksgiving as I set the intention of capturing the thousands of ways God works to romance me each day.

***Photo credits to Love Does