A Snippet from the Quiet Side

So, I'm sitting on my bed.

I'm staring at a blank wall and Jonsi is playing and I'm feeling unbalanced and yet perfectly centered.
I wish I could shed this skin I'm in and begin again. A winter wind races in through the open window, white curtain dancing, and I feel like I'm waiting for spring to show me she's coming.

I'm waiting for something to stop dying. For something to stop being hidden. For things to decompose completely so that something else can be built in its stead.

I finally have admitted to myself that there are no signs of life in garden beds which I've tilled, and no seeds I've planted in soil will return any life to my earth-pounding hands.

I wish I could make sense of why some soil is alive, and why others choke,
why some graves becomes wombs,
and some nests become tombs,

all I know is how I feel when I'm knees-down in winter,
hearing nothing but the cold sound of an empty earth.

I am sitting on my bed and Jonsi sings the songs of We Bought a Zoo, and I wish I had a zoo to buy to give me something beyond this winter that seems to teem wild with things I never asked for.

8 years ago, I sat on my bed in a Northern NY farmhouse, and listened to Sigur Ros, and felt all the beautiful things slipping between my fingers. I dropped them all with each tear from my eye and let the loose ends unravel and stared out a single window into a forest barren of life.

Today feels not much different. Except this time, I'm unraveling into grace, and not myself. I'm lifting some dirt-stained hands, not in protest, but surrender.

Because as CS Lewis said,

All this trying leads up to the vital moment at which you turn to God and say, "You must do this. I can't.”

The Sun is Rising

(I'm taking another break from the 30 lists to share this brief thought with you.)

She wandered into the dark living room. 7 a.m. felt early to both of us and even the sky was still blush blue, and only hinting at a morning sky.

"But it's not morning yet, mom," she said bleary-eyed. 

"It is dear," I sipped on hot coffee and tried to reassure her, no... both of us. Despite the night-ish feeling of a dark, city-lit sky, the clocks said it was morning and time to be on the move.

"But it's still dark," she cried, and ignored my promise that morning was here. 

We went about our routine, breakfast, chores, clothes, shoes. The morning arguments and negotiations and questions went on; typical chaos for the hour preceding the school drop-off. We rushed out the door in the dark. In the long apartment hallways, the east-facing apartment doors pierced through the shadows with light. Streams of a morning sun we had yet to see danced through foggy glass and she squealed.

"It IS morning!" She pointed at the warm yellow light as we walked through each beam on our way to the elevator. "See the light mom?"

I nodded, "Just because you can't see it, that doesn't mean the sun isn't rising." 

And just like a good soul echo does, the very words I meant for her came back into me. 

It seems like a lot of people are getting the sunshine these days. They're getting picked out of the crowd. Seen. Shining. Chosen.

And for the ones who feel like they're still sitting in the dark, it's hard to understand why the sun seems to shine on some and not the rest. It's easy to stand in the shadow and not know if it's dawn or dusk. I am so prone to doubt the goodness of God when I don't feel like I can tangibly experience it. I want to feel the heat of the light kissing my skin; not just hear about it. 

I think this is what's hard about believing that God is good. I believe He is good and does good, but I'm not always convinced that He has good for me personally. I know somewhere the sun is bright and shining, and no doubt it's warm and good. But I have found that shadows sometimes feel more familiar than I'd care to admit. 

But believing that God is good for me is the same as believing that the same sun that breaks on the eastern horizon will come this way to our northern windows. I have no doubt that behind the buildings and curtains of clouds, a light is bringing a new day.

So wherever you are today, whatever darkness you find yourself standing in, remember this: Just because you don't see it, that doesn't mean the sun isn't rising.

I would have despaired unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord In the land of the living. Wait for the Lord; Be strong and let your heart take courage; Yes, wait for the Lord. — Psalm 27:13-14

Just Beyond the Halflight

"Therefore I am now going to allure her; I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her." (Hosea 2:14)

This scripture was once my small spring of a water in a Texas desert. A summer and fall that had stripped the earth of all moisture had also stripped my heart of all softness too. I begged for mercy and begged for God to overlook my sin, and plodded on as Gomer, straight into the desert of my soul. And now I see it wasn't me as much as it was Him too. Taking me out, away, stripping, into the wilderness where nights are cold and everything else void.

Today, I wake with that slightly ominous feeling. It could be the cloud cover. It could be the panicked email about a tropical storm threatening to alter our vacation plans. It could be the wishing that I had held my tongue, or the wishing that I hadn't.

These mornings, when I seem to wake rocking with the earth, feeling the aches and pains of something meant to be beautiful, gone so terribly wrong, I'm reminded of this scripture.

I can't put my finger on it lately, this gnawing edge to my thoughts, heart, words, plans. It all seems backwards. During the day, I feel the darkness and at night, by light of the moon and stars, I'm reminded that the heaviness is just a facade. That the real sky is vast, the Light is broad and never ending. Before the sun heats up this earth, I'm remembering that to walk into a desert isn't always a sign of being lost. Sometimes it means that you're about to be wooed. Allured. Spoken to with kindness.

By day, I'm counting hours, minutes, to-do items, due items, and pieces of cereal that have crusted to the floor. This pull feels great and I wonder how to keep this pace up.

By night, I'm breathing in the still, quiet air. Most of the strings that pull on my marionette arms have ceased for the day. The ones that really seem to matter pull on my heart as I'm resting my hands and feet.

And I wait on the dusty ground for the sun to finish its 9 p.m. blush. On a blanket made of cotton under a blanket made of stars. The "hymn of light". It was under the stars that Jacob wrestled. Under these stars that Ruth moved toward Boaz's tent. Where David watched the flock.  Under these stars that Jesus prayed. Under these stars I whisper gratitudes and beggar's words.

"Maybe this was made for me. For lying on my back in the middle of a field.
Maybe that's a selfish thought. Or maybe there's a Loving God."
(Sara Groves, Maybe There's a Loving God)

Sipping, Snapping, Surrender

{Listening now}

I poured my last cup of coffee for the day and walked into my dark living room. Hair still tied up in a towel, my legs freshly shaved, and a child in bed, I know well enough to not waste such moments. I dared not turn on a light to break the spell. Slipping slowly onto the couch, I hoped to savor the silence of an apartment post-kid-bedtime. 

Dark. The sound of a city still busy. 

And I closed my eyes to pray.

Yet, instead of prayer, my heart tripped. I'm confused, it said. I thought we knew how to do this better.

Well. Hm. Funny that.

I suppose that's the problem right there. That something in me assumed I could figure it out on my own. 

Yes, that one time I struggled, I needed grace. But needing grace again? Asking for help again? Admitting I can't do it again? That's weak. I should have learned my lesson the first time God gave me a handout of abundant grace, right? Now it's time to muscle up, grow up, whatever up and show God that I don't need his handouts.

Oh, but I do.

I so desperately do.

Broken.

Even the word feels broken.

Say it. Bro-ken. It's just snapped right in half.

I'm struggling and I'm not sure why more people aren't.

Or if they are, why are they hiding it?

Because, I sometimes feel like this struggle,

this very-aware-of-brokenness-state 

is the very thing that keeps me at the cross.

Because life is not always the most fun thing. 

Parenting for example, is exactly what you imagine and occasionally what you dreamed. No, actually, it has moments of fun, but the majority of the time it's giving, pouring, life-spending work. Parenting will take your selfishness, and pull it out in thin, snapping strings. You know you're breaking. You know it's necessary for these things to die. You know that everyone who pretends it's not hard work is pretending.

Somedays I write out my to-do list and think, "Yeah, that's work. That's a job. That's a to-do list for someone who has 40 dedicated hours at an office, every week." 

And then there are days where the struggle is to remember struggle. To count blessings and gather abundance and remember that we are given much grace to give grace. We are broken and bandaged and we carry the scars to tell others how we were rescued. To point our fractured fingers toward the Man who ripped us out of a dark, snapping shut world.

*sipping coffee*

It's pitch black in this room. The Great Lake Swimmers are singing from the kitchen stereo.

Stop, Listen and Feel.

Stop, Listen and Feel.

Oh heart, I say back. Stop. Listen. Feel.

And I wonder if the reason I've forgotten I needed grace is because I'm so good at keeping my mind full and busy. I never give my heart the opportunity to stare out a window at night and realize that yes, the weight of all this is real. And to feel the weight does more than simply turning up the noise. Because in feeling, I'm admitting.

It's too much.

I'm not capable of muscling through this. 

And I need that sufficiency You spoke of. I need it again and again and again. I'll leave the superheroing to others. Someone else can flex their faith muscles and tell the world how good they are at being a Christian. I'll take my dark night with a grace so rich that I can taste the sweetness on my tongue. I can feel Christ gripping my chin, and the beauty of peace covers this room and settles the noise.

And this is not a pity party. This is not where I wave my "I have a right to sulk" flag. No, no. That is not what wins this fight.

What wins this is surrender, oddly enough.

I will sit in this dark room again tomorrow night, and hopefully, my heart won't ask me what's wrong with us. Can I uncurl these anxiety-fisted hands to say I can't do this without You?
Then, perhaps, struggle becomes victory, small, slowly, somehow. Struggle becomes character, scars, faith. Struggle becomes humility, grace, hope. Somehow.

The Snapping and Such.

"Just give them to me. I want to break them."

 I hand her the strands of bracelets, the liquid inside still intact. She snaps each one, the color bursts with each crack.

Break. Color.
Break. Light.
Break. Shine.

"When I break them, they shine." She says this while each one is turned around her wrists.

When I break them, they shine. 

Oh, yes, it's true I'm fighting for contentment. One says come here, another goes there, and it's so easy for me to think that this right here is missing something. On this sleepy side street, in a 4th floor apartment, somehow in this place is where there is breaking, beauty, honesty and such things; this is where I'm placed and put.

It seems that in the staying there is breaking. And in the breaking, something else comes through. What's the word for it... Grace? Love? Jesus?

When we're broken, there's finally enough cracks on our human shells to let the truth get in, and get out. Enough snapping to the point where we realize we're better off for the breaking. We're brighter when we give in. That seems like such a strange way to say things. But that's how it seems to work with Him.

We now have this light shining in our hearts, but we ourselves are like fragile clay jars containing this great treasure. This makes it clear that our great power is from God, not from ourselves. — 2 Corinthians 4:7 

When I break them, they shine.

The Last Thing You Are Clinging To

When the brilliant ethicist John Kavanaugh went to work for three months at "the house of the dying" in Calcutta, he was seeking a clear answer as to how best to spend the rest of his life. On the first morning there he met Mother Teresa. She asked, "And what can I do for you?" Kavanaugh asked her to pray for him.

"What do you want me to pray for?" she asked. He voiced the request that he had borne thousands of miles from the United States. 

"Pray that I have clarity." 

She said firmly, "No, I will not do that." When he asked her why, she said, "Clarity is the last thing you are clinging to and must let go of." When Kavanaugh commented that she always seemed to have the clarity he longed for, she laughed and said, "I have never had clarity; what I have always had is trust. So I will pray that you trust God."

— Brennan Manning, "Ruthless Trust", pg. 5 

"Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart." — William Wordsworth

(property of the organic bird)

"Remember when you used to write?" she asked.

I want to flinch at this, but she's right. I used to write. I don't much anymore. Somewhere between morning coffee, afternoon tea, new friends, mothering, working, and all the other things you do in life, my writing fingers have become arthritic. The muscles seem to atrophy quickly.

And every day that goes by in which I choose not to pen, something inside of me feels like the mountain gets taller, higher, and quite honestly, exhausting. It reminds me of Steven Pressfield's "The War of Art," and the Resistance is working. In fact, the Resistance is getting the job done.

When I write, at least those thoughts have a place to go. I may think that without words, I am well-adjusted. But when I turn out the lights, and lay awake with the sounds of the city, it's all there. I'm never so well-adjusted as I like to believe I am. I used to write to process and document, ask questions and tell stories. The stack of journals is proof.

Grace sometimes feels like a jacket I slip on and off during the day. Wisdom is that well I am at daily, dipping my hungry hands into the deep, reflective surface. My prayers are said when I stare out the windows of moving vehicles, when I'm pressing the coffee down, when I'm picking up wooden blocks and wiping the table of pink lipstick.

Writing is secondary these days. Working it all out and praying His work of endurance in me produces character that brings the hope that doesn't put us to shame. As my writing muscles creak, and my heart stretches, I find that analyzing or seeking out answers is not nearly as important as trusting my Father and believing that He is good and does good. Finding inspiration is not my goal; returning to the revelation of the Gospel is. When things start to feel joint-to-joint, knuckles white and popping, I'm asking my Father to provide Grace as the synovial fluid in between my words, my actions, my pen to paper, and mostly, in my heart. It's not about the writing these days — it's just the living of it all.

I forget so quickly, how He does it. Fills in those gaps where I need nourishment. Last year feels very far away. That is until I read and remember...
   .... about the days I felt like I was faking it.
   .... when perspective was fresh, new, clear.
   .... long Sundays and a quiet, quiet home.

I used to write, I did.
Now I tuck in away,
mull it over,
pray for wisdom,
drench my hands in the invisible wells,
wait for the season to come again.

this pilgrim soul

{soundtrack for today}

Someday, I will not always be such a wanderer...
of heart.
of thought.
of belief.
of life.

Someday, I believe this obvious symptom of immaturity,
of selfishness
will get worn off from all these rough edges around.

Maybe from someone else's stability,
from someone's commitment,
from someone's proving me wrong.

Or maybe just my own surrender.

Perhaps from a house that I'll dwell in until I know all the creaks in the floorboards,
and heights are measured on a wall,
with fingerprint stains on banisters.

Or a career I will invest in and work until I'm an old pro,
having lost my youth and cutting wit,
but never my skill.

I dream of the day I rest my lack of knowledge at the altar of faith.
I don't quite love my logic,
the ego that reasons,
tries to find explanations for the things my heart believes,
or hopes for,
or dreams.

I like to think that so long as I desire more faith,
that it will come.

And when it doesn't, if it doesn't,
I want to trust, hope that the measure I have,
is the measure I need. 
That I'm not lacking anything, ever,
even if the lacking feels gaping.

I don't want to wander to fill. If I wander, I hope it's only for the joy, not for the emptiness.

No need to figure out more than I have measured.

And still I try, and feel like I'm floating on the waves in the sea,
slowly moving, wondering if the sea is carrying me back to shore,
or farther out.

I suppose I won't know til I get there.
If I get there.

Someday, I will not always be such a wanderer.
This pilgrim soul will rest.
I wonder if I'll be given the gift of a family-surrounded deathbed. And will I then say,
to Home, I go.
To rest, to cease. To be for good
where only love grows
and my wandering soul finds it's
not so much about where we've wandered,
so long as our wandering always led us here.


--

It's Clair De Lune.

It's Clair De Lune.
I don't know how else to explain it to you,
or really how to put it into words.

It's when rain falls sideways outside my open windows.
It washes the railings and the yellow house, cars and autumn trees.
I have a moment to stop
nose pressed to glass
to listen.

It's just as I stir in the morning,
right before it all collects back in.
Right before I remember why I ever worry at all.
Just as one eye opens to the glow on the horizon.

It's the first sip of coffee.

It's the way it spins in this faint blue mug.

Bare feet on chilled hardwood.

Sometimes it feels like this world is just routine.
Just something we have to do,
put up with
endure
suffer through.

I get the e-mails.
The phone calls.
Not a day goes by without a wonder
why He still keeps us here.

And then moments.
Tiny slips in the veil of time
when I wonder
if I've just felt what earth was
supposed to be.

Did I just glimpse
Eden?

Did that apple fall from my fingers,
untouched,
untasted,
back on to the tree for a moment?

The air ripples,
and I feel it.
My heart races with recognition.

"And they heard the sound of the Lord God
walking in the garden in the cool of the day,
and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God
among the trees of the garden."

It's almost as though, right then, the garden is in my kitchen.
It's the cool of the day
and I could swear
I just heard footsteps.

And instead of hiding,
all I want is to abide.
To be.

For a moment,
I'm relieved. 

With one sip of coffee,
Debussy and the rain.
Footsteps.
Falling close.
Just on the other side of the veil.
Eden.

"To see the summer sky is poetry, though never in a book it lie - true poems flee." -emily dickinson

We took a slow stroll through this quiet town tonight.

all images by: theorganicbird

Can I just have a lifelong dose of summer walks? In small, mountain towns?

After summer storms, it all feels like a page ripped from a storybook.
Gray, low-hanging clouds make all of the colors rich. You can almost taste the green.
Old, worn wood and siding looks beautiful.
Overgrown brush is now wildly romantic.
Wild raspberries fall loose into our hands, sweet on our lips.
Misty and cool, the mountain behind us shadowed us all the way home.

If these trees could talk... they would tell you to keep walking and not listen to the praises and laments of my 28 years here on earth. It would just take too long. I've sat under these pines for hours, finding a holy sanctuary with my Father amidst the hidden patches of earth on these hills. My sister and I recently talked about Eve, and her home in the Garden. And I wonder if that's why I feel so much peace here. 

I know the word says that creation groans, waiting for the redemption. Just as Adam fell from grace, the earth fell with him and waits for the new. But I like to think when creation becomes a meeting place for the Holy, it returns to Eden, if only for a few moments. 

So we walk, and I remember, and pray for new to come soon. To my heart. To the stories that we tell. To this earth.

So again, I wish these summertime strolls would linger on in our hearts, in memory.

Soon, very soon, we head west. This summer will be a beaten down path that took me there but to which I cannot return. It's growing over behind me, branches snapping back, so forward we go.

theorganicbird

__

linking up with the soli deo gloria girls today.

sitting at the grown-ups table

My kitchen is dark. Actually, truth is, it's not that dark. Not as black as it is just outside my window. I'm huddled at this glowing computer screen, on this round table, passed down from my grandmother who no longer has use for it.

My grandmother would sit at this table and live. Her bills. Her meals. Her weekly plans, journals and candles lit. I, as a 5 year old, would crawl underneath it, hang up curtains around the edge, and dream, dream, dream. But tonight, it's just this old surface that braces me as I weigh truth against feeling. Kingdom-building vs. my dreams.

I've turned off the television and the music, and the only sound that remains is the rhythmic clock hanging near the fridge. The cars hum down the country road, their lights flash briefly against my curtain and then ... gone. Into the pitch. Out where the creek is full and a bullfrog bellows his midnight tune. The lawnmowers are quiet. No tractors plowing in neighbor's fields. No screen doors swinging, or chimes, or even birds. Even the birds have fallen into the dark, swept up their feathers and tucked away.

I don't wish to write. Or even sing. This evening I stare into that kettled black and find it bounces back with an endless silence. Countryside at night.

Anxiety is a shallow thrill that calls to me like a comfort. Luring. Drawing. Attempting to persuade this tidal rush of my soul towards its rocky shores. But my gravity is pushing and pulling against the cross tonight.

With Grace, in grace, against grace. Just when I think I've pulled everything back from my heart to get a good look, He comes in again with a crashing wave. Washing out my sand-built ideas and bringing me back to square one.

That's the thing about Grace.

It is the most vulnerable, rattling, exposing strip of soul I've ever felt, within the confines of the safest, purest, most gentle love. Within this pitch of heart, I'm confronted with a holy tremor that both pulls out my feet from underneath me and gives me wings to fly.

All I know right now is I am content, in this rocking, in this tide. I am not 5 and hiding under wooden chairs and gingham cloths. This table. This round of wood. This center of grace. This is now where I eat, live and learn; not where I wonder, dream and hide.

hello.

i spend a possibly wasteful amount of time staring at the trees and sky. wondering about everything.

(wonder was my word for this year, but i didn't see it working in this capacity.)

except for grace.
love. joy.
redemption. contentedness.
salvation. hope.
i'm not wondering about these things.

I guess I should say...
I'm not making decisions about the next few weeks of change, but rather I'm trying to just focus on today.

Two weeks. Nearly two weeks now of coughing and sneezing, sniveling and hacking, heads aching and bodies restless.

But now, now we're on the up. News flash: antibiotics work.

We started today with dancing and laughing, onto chocolate milk and coffee. I hear a rumor that the temps will rise to the 70s today. After the rain. After the earth gets muddy and thundered, the sun will rise and shine.

And I know I haven't written on this here blog in almost two weeks.

Maybe it's that we've been sick.
Or the arrival of spring.
The dirt roads and starry skies that are calling.
The wild rush of the creek and the birds who awaken us with song.

but I feel drawn to silence.

Something about this quote from Thoreau's "Walden" keeps jumping out at me:

"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived."

And then this morning, my sister sent me this blog from a Study in Brown  (a good read) and she included a poem from Wendell Berry. These few lines jumped out at me:

selections from How to Be a Poet

(to remind myself)

i.

Make a place to sit down.

Sit down. Be quiet.

.....

ii.

Breathe with unconditional breath

the unconditioned air.

Shun electric wire.

Communicate slowly. Live

a three-dimensioned life;

stay away from screens.

Stay away from anything

that obscures the place it is in.

There are no unsacred places;

There are only sacred places

And desecrated places.

iii.

Accept what comes from silence.

Make the best you can of it.

.....

There's incredible beauty in breathing
unconditional grace
unmerited favor
with unconditional breath.

The stars at night are so bright, and they feel really close.
The second thing I want to do is sit and write about them. The first thing I want to do is stare at them.

Crane my neck as far back as it will go and let my eyes wander until I'm dizzy. If the world ends by meteor shower, I'd like to climb one of these pines and sit at the top to watch the show.

And the truth is...
honestly, I really want to write. But I want to write things that I'm not ready to write here. Like open-heart surgery stuff. Things that I'm not sure I really believe or understand, which therefore, I'm not ready to put out here in the space where I cannot remove it and cannot defend it and cannot bear with being wishy-washy.

I am trying desperately to be here.

To not turn every experience into a life lesson or a blog, but instead to be grateful for the
million 

little 

breaks of light in my day.

I am battling my own desire to escape this season through the internet, through Facebook, Twitter; through the affirmation of others instead of the affirming secure love of my Father. 

So since there are mountains and dirt roads and stars, I'm letting myself be quiet.

Since I have a toddler and a to-do list and sanity to keep, I'm letting things be.

And in light of spring, hope and new life to come, I'm allowing stories to be written so that I have stories to share here. 

Intentionally listen. Deliberately sit.
And hopefully, shine bright.

I'm Not Signing Up for a Religious Lottery.

"But you trust that He's good... right?" 

My mother swirled her tea as she placed this question gently on the table. She smoothed her hands, checked her rings, waited for me to answer.

"Well...," I hesitated. "No, not really."

Sometimes I stand looking at the panorama of my past, my arms stubbornly locked across my chest, and I say, "How is that good?" Arrogantly, I size up the mountains, the colors, the people and I adjust my lens toward the distance and say, "Nope. Not what I would call good. Not entirely good. Somewhat good. Here and there lovely. But overall, completely, totally, wholly good? No."

In the dark of my living room, under a blanket last night, I listened to a man of God I admire address biblical womanhood. Calling us higher. To be clothed in strength and dignity. To laugh at the days ahead.

Not out of naivety, but out of hope in the Lord.

And today, I listed my grievances to a friend. He listened, as anyone could do through a chat window, as I typed.

"When do I get to say, "Look what the Lord has done for me!" and even in writing that, I'm revealing my ingratitude for the Gospel. ... if the Lord does nothing else but make me an example of Grace, that is grace alone. He already redeemed my soul, why am I asking for more?"

He says, "That's truth. Interesting how quickly entitlement slips into our thought process."

I agree: "It's so second nature..... It's so Eve."

The more I think God is not good, the more I am revealing my own idol of self. I am reaching toward a fruited tree, because surely what God has given me is not good enough. Surely he's withholding.

The more I tell you that I question God's intentions in my life, the more I am laying open the waste of my heart. I am sinking my teeth into the juicy, indulgent self; dripping with sin and rebellion.

When I deem something that I do not have as "good" and then turn to God to "direct" him in that, I am in a way saying —

You don't know better.
You don't know more.
You don't have this under control.

There is more rest for me in trusting in God's sovereignty, even above my limited human perspective of what "good" is. God is good. He is bound to his own sovereign promises. He is not withholding good from me.

I don't have faith in a God who is sometimes good. My hope is not in a gospel that partly redeems. If it were that, then I'd just be signing up for a religious lottery.

It's tempting and too easy to become my own storyteller. I know what happens when I pick at the bark of this tree and feel Eve within me, sultry and unsubmissive, tangling around my fingertips. I know how that story ends. And that, that is not good.

But for grace.

the waiting place

It's true that sometimes (read: most of the time) I expect God to part the sea before I get there. Move the mountain before I see it. Calm the storm before I get on the boat.

When I packed up my car over a week ago and hit the road, I hoped for some giant drop of revelation to come hurtling out of the sky. Maybe a phone call. Or an e-mail. Maybe an airplane carrying one of those banner ticker-tapes, or a billboard+a song+a random prophet planted in a run-down mom and pop shop. You know —those kind of totally not normal things.

Shock of all shockers, that did not happen. I rolled into New York with nothing more than a revelatory "Hey, it's still winter." We came over the hills, into the valley and I realized I had driven thousands of miles to arrive with no great plan.

And now, I feel like I'm waiting. Perhaps it's the moment inbetween the question and the answer. The smidge of time as Moses drops the staff in the water and for a second, the water doesn't even ripple. The bit of wavering in my voice when I say, "My God is good." The stirring moments as Jesus wakes up from his nap on a storm-riddled sea. He stretches, takes a deep breath and the disciples wring their hands, wondering if he is going to do anything to save their lives.

Today, in the lull of the late afternoon in the country, my sister and I journeyed out for a walk. The hillsides looked ready for spring. Thawed, raw, but rich with fertile soil. A pileated woodpecker zipped over head and we looked for empty robin's nests, tiny blue eggs cracked and left behind. Wind-whipped and red-cheeked, we laughed and looked for green buds at the brook's edge.

Ever feel like you're living and breathing in the inbetween?
Really, honestly, isn't that life? We celebrate, grieve, give thanks, hope...all in this cradled in between.

The ripple is a split-second away. The mountains slowly groan when we say, "yes." And our Savior is not sleeping through our wringing of hands. In fact, it's my guess, He's telling us we can go ahead and stop the wringing. We're turning our hands raw for no reason.

This inbetween is just a second of time in a giant story which really isn't about us anyway.

30 Minutes

The drive back from my meeting this morning was easy and slow. Bright sun. Sea blue sky. Tiny airplanes scattering the view. Lake shores and bridges.

Songs of my heart spilling into my little four-door, whispering words of gratitude.

Everything was so clear.

Do you know what I mean? For a good 30 minutes, my Nissan was a sacred room of worship. Mental fog lifted and I kept whispering gratitudes. Praise. Adoration.

I have times like these and I wish I could say they happened more frequently but I think you'll understand me when I say... it just doesn't happen all the time.

When it falls into my open hands, invisible manna from Heaven, I am filled, down to my toes, with unspeakable joy.

Tears are shed because I'm spilling over the edges. I'm overwhelmed with how good God is.

See... I love blogging. And writing. And any sort of artistic creation that I can force out of my bleeding heart.

But some days, by stirring up words and color, I end up stirring the bottom of the basin. My placid water turns gray and brown, and I wonder if there's any beauty left to extract.

Some days, it feels more like an army crawl through the muck. I am dragging the weight of it all on my own back. Mud splashes into my mouth and I end the day with only the taste of the things that need to be washed clean.

See, sometimes I act more like a soldier of God than a child of God.

And even more, sometimes the soul-baring that is required to write, paint, sketch, sing...it's just a giant mirror of how far I have yet to go. It's still really muddy in there.

(I know, I know. We're all muddy.)

But do you ever just tire of your own stuff? My desire for Godly discipline sometimes turns so self-focused that I forget that my righteousness is nothing. That's when I realize I'm missing the point. Some days, the work of Grace seems more like work than grace.

(Even now, I hesitate to say all these things because I don't always like talking faith and pain and the mix between them. The possibilities for being misunderstood are nearly endless.)

What beauty is there in such mud? In army-crawling through life?

(My elbows hurt and these burdens are too heavy.)

Oh yes. I'm going to stop this madness.

Because Manna has fallen today. And I am up to the brim, filled.

I'm going to be carefree, even though I'm not care free. And I read these words from my ramblings last summer, and I remember why I do this. All this:

"We enjoy things that don't last, knowing full well that the stuff that lasts bleeds into the temporal. At least it should. So we enjoy homemade bread and coffee, because it fuels our community. We eat cake at midnight, because we're talking about dreams and the future. We shed tears because we know that sometimes we mourn together. Then we high-five about air conditioning, because we celebrate the basic luxuries. Carefree in a full of cares world. Because we can."

(I'm nodding, as you're telling me that you understand. And I smile, because you are a gift to me.)

Thankful to join up with these other writers today:

Alright Now

Late night drives are one of my favorite things.

I love them more in the summer, but I'll take the winter ones too.

Tonight Bruno Merz (not to be confused with Bruno Mars) serenaded my 12:23 a.m. drive. The planes lined the skies over DFW and I listened as he asked, "As a child, is this how you saw yourself all grown up?"

No. Not really. But as a kid I also imagined that I'd have long and silky black hair and speak French fluently. I would "backpack" into woods with loaves of bread, slices of cheese and lots of unrealistic dreams. As a child I had no idea what growing up would look like.

(Side note: I never realized my physical traits would follow me into adulthood. Mousy brown curly hair does not equal silky black hair.)

The past couple of years have been a mixed bag of childhood wishing-well whispers. Things I wanted, things I never expected. Choices I made, choices that affected me. Backpacks of loaves and cheese, wandering and whimsical songs. These things all line up in the sky; many, many night drives processing and praying.

Tonight though, I'm not looking back. I'm look ahead.

And I'm asking, is it possible to make the wrong choice?

I'm not talking about sin.

I'm talking about good and good.

Paul's words in Philippians 1:9-11 hit me the other morning, and I've been thinking about them ever since:

"....And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God."

And I'm thinking about what my sister-in-law told me last Thanksgiving, as we tucked our feet under a blanket next to the fire. She cradled her newest in her arms, and I pulled in close to her legs and the warm flames. She asked, "So what are you thinking about the next step?"

The next step (meaning)... after all this, the pages turning, chapters closing, the unwritten blank spaces that splay all around me.

I rambled some answer. (It wasn't important whatever I said.) What was stick-worthy was what she said.

"The steps of a righteous man are ordered by the Lord," she said as her chubby baby cooed against her.

My first thought? Great. I'm far from righteous.

(Which of course... is the whole point of the Gospel.)

Then she continued, "And remember, Christ is your righteousness. So... your steps are ordered by the Lord. When you respond in faith to Him, you really can't screw it up."

As the road passes beneath my tires, I feel my heart trying to deceive me. Lie to me. Emotionally move me in different directions. Fear. Anxiety. Pride.

So on this drive as Bruno Merz fills the air with "Everything will be alright now," and as the planes start landing one by one, I find that place where my heart can rest.

Because my steps are ordered.
Because my righteousness is rubbish.
And (by grace) my success is not based on that.
Because someone is praying, interceding for me
by name,
that I will discern
the good
from the
best.
That even if I can't discern,
my steps are still
ordered
ordained
covered by grace.
And if I don't feel covered,
mercies are still
new
every
morning.

So tonight? Tonight I just listen. And follow the lights. And drive.

(linking up today with this awesome girls)

To Be Covered

Sometimes I forget...

that it's just the Gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ, that saves me. That rescues me. That covers me.

It's not anything I can do.
Anything I read.
Any theological position I embrace.
Any act of social justice.
Any amount of money I can donate.

It's all Jesus. All of it is on him and through Him, by His grace alone.

Sometimes I forget...

that he said, "You can't do anything without me."

me and my cousin, cliffs of moher, ireland in '00

It's not about muscling through.
Trying harder.
Proving my worth.
Making myself valuable.
Reading the latest self-help book.

It's not about making the cross meaningless by my own attempt to be approved by the letter of the law.

It's the unbelievable, send-me-to-my-knees truth that he chose me.
Not based on anything besides his love.

Does that make any sense at all? No.

a painting from last year

I need this to stick to my bones today.
To fill in those empty spaces between my to-do list items.
To balm the wounds. To seep into my words.
To cover our doorways. 
Fill the silence on phone calls. To rescue the broken hearts that no one can fix.
I need this to be the giant boulder that redirects every flow from my heart and mouth today.


((Listening to Brooke Fraser's "Crows and Locusts" as I write this. And thankfully, gratefully praying that we will let it wash over us.))

The Tipping Point

"It's like you're waiting for some thunderous boom. Do you think maybe you should wait for the silence?"

I let her words soak in a bit before responding.

Silence. Funny thing that. You mean, the nothing?

The emptiness?

Is that where I should be looking? The long periods of uninterrupted, dull afternoons, with the light casting long shadows over couch cushions and dusty floors? The early morning stir, with no phones dinging and coffee still whole bean and tucked in shadows?

After late nights of long questions, I should be searching for that drawn out gaping hole that swallows up my whispers?

That wordless, thick air that hangs over my breath, supporting simple pleadings slipping out between drops of tears.

This silence.

I have started a list. Of things I just absolutely don't know what to do about. The only thing I know to do with them is to put them on a list. It started with two. Then grew to four.

Now it's somewhere around eight items that are running toward me without hint of delay.

That's when I hit the tipping point. That moment when I suddenly realize that life is barreling down the hillside like a herd of wild horses, thundering at me to keep pace.  

If I'm not careful, if I'm not deliberate, my own compass begins to spin, wildly searching for North. For the center. For home. I can't capture in words this nauseating struggle to stay just balanced enough before one side of my life just collapses into the category of "everything I can't handle."

So the phone call that says, "You might need to stop shaking trees and banging pans. Maybe it's time to be quiet."

Someone should really consider writing a manual on adulthood. Or being a human being. 

That would be really nice.

Let It Swing

Having an open door policy in this home means sometimes people walk through my door at 10 p.m. More often than not, they're coming with heavy burdens too. 

These pilgrims who need a place to breathe. 

Recently a friend sat on my leather chair, his words heavy with questions, doubts and griefs. I didn't quite know what to say to his pain. It was raw. Unfiltered. Even his questions were choppy, asked with half of a broken heart and a weary spirit.

So I just listened. I pressed some coffee, pulled out the bag of corn chips and for four hours, listened to him talk in circles. 

The same questions leading to the same answers which spawned the same questions. 

The unpacking of a human heart, human head, human mistakes. Just messy life.

Darkness on this journey is inevitable. We have day, the brilliance of light and seeing clearly. The seasons when all is at peace. When we're in step with joy and energized with grace.

And then there's times of hand-wringing and heavy shoulders slumping into worn-out chairs. We must walk through the night. To say there is no night is to ignore the suffering that exists here... from our sin, from other's sin, from being in a fallen world.

As four hours ticked away, it was clear to me the only things worth saying were things that brought light. Words that I didn't write, or create in my brain. No song lyrics, no euphemisms, no "in my experience." All that he needed was some light.

Your word is a lamp to guide my feet and a light for my path. — Psalm 119:105

So that's what we had. With corn chips, with coffee, with quiet night hours, we let the Word be a lamp. Swinging through the dark, it cast some light. A few brief glimpses of where his feet are. What the path looks like. Where he came from. And a bit of where he's headed. 

The door closed behind him, and I prayed that maybe the light would swing into his path more. Walking alone is hard. Walking in the dark is hard. Walking without a lantern, in the dark, alone, is deadly.

So get the lantern. Let it swing.

Good Friday

Good Friday. This is the day it all changed. The story of our lives had a different ending. This is the day beauty betrayed itself for misery for beauty to be complete. When love stepped in for ignorant, forsaken children.

Last fall, my husband and I went to hear Rob Bell speak about suffering. He talked about how suffering unites people. To prove his point, he had us all write down on an index card "I know how you feel." Thousands of us scribbled this with pencil onto the cards on our laps. He said, "Stand if any of these questions are true for you..." and he started asking...

"Who has face financial difficulties in life?"

Most of the room stood and awkward giggles scattered, and he continued, "Turn and hand that card to someone you don't know." I exchanged my card with a girl behind me. Bubbly script read, I know how you feel.

He asked again, "Who in here has been affected by cancer, either yourself or someone you know."

Almost the entire room stood. Some sniffles, somber smiles to one another.

A man in front of me turned, smiling meekly and we exchanged cards. I looked down to see some stranger's chicken scratch that read, I know how you feel.

"Who has experienced the pain of infidelity, whether it was you or someone you love?"

The room went painfully silent as we stood, chairs creaking and cards fluttering through exchange. I handed my card away and received the next one, strong handwriting that read, I know how you feel.

He had proved his point. Suffering united the room, in laughter and finally tears as we now held the card of strangers, echoing our own sentiment, "I know how you feel."

He went on to tell this... 

“In the last novel of Susan Howatch’s Starbridge series, the confident, self-righteous Bishop Charles Ashworth finds his boxes smashed and insulators destroyed when his beloved wife, Lyle dies. He ends up in a conversation with an old acquaintance who can’t get over how vulnerable and honest the bishop is being with him.

‘God, isn’t life bloody sometimes?’ (asked his acquaintance)

‘Yes.’ (he replied)

‘Are you just saying that to be nice to me?’

‘No.’

‘Thank God. Lord, this is a damned odd conversation to be having with a bishop! Excuse me while I just pinch myself to make sure I’m not dreaming.’

‘It’s no dream. Good to meet someone else who’s gone through hell lately.’

‘Isn’t it wonderful? It makes all the difference to know there’s someone else screaming alongside you – and that’s the point of the incarnation. I can see that so clearly now. God came into the world and screamed alongside us. Interesting idea, that.'

Perhaps that’s why people across the religious spectrum, for thousands of years, continue to identify with the cross. It speaks of our longing to know that we’re not alone, that there’s someone else, ‘screaming alongside us.’”

When I am weeping when things don't go as I want, Christ says, "I know how you feel."

When I feel alone and unsure if I can survive, He whispers, "I know how you feel."

When death haunts this world, when I cry more than I laugh, when my breath feels ragged and there seems to be darkness surrounding me, Jesus cups my chin, lifts my red eyes to his and says, "Andrea - I know how you feel."

And then comes the rumble, the stone rolling, the piercing sound of a woman crying in a garden, and we rejoice as we cling to final hope to hear once again, "I know how you feel."