Preacher's Wife

It seems like there is a special category of woman who fits the preacher's wife profile. I certainly didn't make that cut. 
There are qualities these women display that may not ever be part of my personality matrix. I'm only dwelling on this because somehow, somewhere, I got stuck on the "preacher's wife" track and I'm really not sure what to do.
Serving God isn't the issue. I begged him in 3rd grade to let me be a missionary. I wanted to go to Africa and tell people all about Jesus. Of course then years passed and I ended up in 6th grade and then college and then well God left the picture. (Yeah, I know, he didn't leave. I did. He was there at my shoulder, tapping it every now and then.) So anyway, I abandoned the missionary career path. The one I went down was not one frequented by the other future preachers' wives.
Now, I'm watching my daughters as they grow up. They are talking like future preacher's wives. The youngest worships and prays with an abandon that almost equals David's dancing. The oldest laughs with Jesus like he's one of her girl friends. And the middle one in her quiet contemplative way takes the brand of "Christian" and wears it as proudly as she wears her sock monkey hat. 
If I have any success as a mom, it would be to have daughters who could serve as preachers' wives and missionaries. Girls who would listen to God's calls and follow. 
I may always stay on the outside of that special group. I didn't live that formative life. That crazy, church obsessed, Bible referenced, surrounded by true love and support formative life. I'm ok with looking into that life. I'm making headway in the thought pattern areas, backsliding on the makeup thing, and I'm not at all sure where the tats fit in the picture. But all that is ok. I'll just keep praying that my girls stay strong in their beliefs, beautiful in heart and body, and that their sharp sense of humor doesn't get them in too much trouble.

Driving by the Church

Last Sunday, the class shared memories of special Christmases. Most of them centered around Christmas spent in a foreign country far from home. They told of how God ministered to them through unexpected visitors. Those stories brought to mind the person I saw driving by the church one Christmas night.
It was a cold night in Boise. Around Christmas time a cold night wasn't much of a surprise. The snow had been beautiful earlier that morning. Now it was piled in watery gray clumps against the curbs. The lights sparkled off the frozen lawns and it was quiet. Quiet in a way you rarely see in Texas. The snow and cold cloaked everything like a blanket pulled over your head. It was cold. It was night. It was lonely.
The church windows glowed a warm yellow.  Little bits of snow reflected on the stained glass.  On the outside you could see the shadows of the people inside. Like the pictures on Christmas cards, it looked like the kind of place you could call home.
I wanted to go inside. My baby was a little more than a year old and had never been in a church. She didn't know that inside that building there was a comfort that couldn't be found anywhere else. The light streaming from the windows beckoned me to come in and the pride and fear of my life held me back.  I drove by, saddened by passing up the warmth and comfort offered there. 
The happy ending of this story didn't come for another nine months.
In Sunday school, they talked about how a stranger in a strange country reminded them of our Emmanuel.  There was no stranger in that country to offer me comfort.  How many more of me are there wandering tonight? Which car is holding the mother, tired and refusing sleep? Which shopping cart loaded with presents is being pushed by a person whose joy has long since departed?
Lord, let me remember the person who drove by the church that Christmas night long ago. Let me look for her in the face of strangers and friends.

Christmas Hurts

I have a secret for you. Unfortunately, many people are very aware of this secret. The secret is...Christmas hurts. There are so many expectations that fly around our festivities. Some are easy to push aside and others are as tenacious as toenail fungus. I'm not sure when we as a people decided that Christmas should be a painless holiday. Was it the avalanche of stories about miracles of love found under the mistletoe? Could it be the sparkling eyes of kids ecstatic over the toys and fueled on cookies? I'm sure much of the anticipation and expectations are the twisted out growth of hope.
Hope is not the problem, of course, and neither is love.  The problem is in the twisted part.  Hope didn't come into the world blindly expecting all the best things. Hope left heaven with its incomprehensible splendor to be born as a baby in a stinking stable to an inexperienced mother. See, even the first Christmas was painful.
Christmas can hurt deeply.  So many troubles pile on top of the expectations that everything should be joyful. Yes, there is joy. Joy that is more beautiful than a million trees dressed in millions of lights. There is hope. Hope that spawns movies with guaranteed happy endings and sustains those in terrible need.  There is love. Not the sappy love seen in movies but the strong, enduring love that allows itself to suffer beyond imagining in order to save another.
Jesus knew pain. He was fully human. I see my baby crying, trying to tell me he's hungry or hurting and I know Jesus cried and Mary had to figure out what he needed (though I'm pretty sure Mary would have only had to tell him once not to hit the ornaments). Jesus in the first Christmas knew pain. Why would we think that each subsequent Christmas should be painless?

Arguing with God

He is adorable you know. When he came to us, he was scrawny and quiet.  He would eat anything you gave him. I remember feeding him green beans for the first time. He wrinkled his little eyebrows and looked at me like I was terribly mean but he ate them. He just kept eating them even though it was obvious he didn't like them. We switched to applesauce after a few bites. He seemed so relieved.
I look at him and think, he'll be gone soon. I hate not knowing what his future holds. I imagine him next Christmas. What a mess he will be. He is so strong and strong willed. He will know what the presents are and want to play with them. Now he just wants to see what the ornaments do when you hit them. Next year...
I think sometimes that its not fair that I don't know how long I'll get to hold him. It's not fair that I've fallen in love with this little guy and at any minute he could be gone. I'm holding on as tightly as I can ready at any moment to let go. I think sometimes that it's not fair.
Then I think, all of our children are here for a limited time. We get to hold them and love them until its time to let them go. This little guy is no different from my girls. I know that God will take care of each of them and I know he will take care of me.  Whatever he allows in our lives, he prepares us to handle. And though my heart screams at the thought of losing any of them, I know, KNOW with a strange calm that whatever happens will be ok.  God is an incomprehensible being but he is love. He knew that Moses would argue with a burning bush and created Moses for that purpose. He knew that Mary would accept the role of Jesus' mother and created her for that purpose. These are not the people I would chose for their roles but thankfully he is so much more than I can ever be. He can handle our arguments, our tears, our screams, our joyful praise, our dance. He can handle each of us. He is God and he loves us.

Christmas Baby

Babies at Christmas are such a blessing. Holding a baby while singing about Mary and Joseph makes the mystery of Jesus' birth all the more real. This year I'm holding a baby I had no warning I would hold. He dropped into our lives at the end of August. We're still fighting to normalize the new baby experience. Every night when he wakes up screaming and we fight through deep sleep to rescue him it feels like we are battling an alien. Then in the morning he crawls over to us, slapping his hands on the floor and laughing, we wonder how life went on without him. (Of course we are all sure it was much easier.)
I hold on to this baby boy like he is one of my own but he isn't. At any point, someone could come in and take him away.  He has come into our lives, radically changing each of our routines and plans and we have no control over the situation.  We bend to the requirements of this government agency and that biological parent. Then our 6 year old asks "Mommy, how long will we have him?" I have to answer "We will keep him as long as God lets us". That is the answer we all have to give any time we're asked how long.
What did a teenage girl know about "as long as God lets us"? She knows she didn't do anything to get into the position she's in. She knows God did this for his own reasons. Did she ever feel resentful as the church ladies sneered at her? Did she stomp her feet and rant about the unfairness of this? Was the visit from the angel enough to hold her through the long uncomfortable days of pregnancy?
As she cherished all the miracles surrounding the baby's birth, could she have had any clue what was about to happen? Did she forget the miracles in the daily grind of life? Did she rest in the assurance that her son would be the great king?  Did she smile slyly thinking about how the ladies who sneered at her would be bowing down to the boy?  Maybe she was better than that. Maybe she just smiled that serene smile you see on the icons without any negative thoughts. Maybe

Something You Should Know About Bikers

Today we did a toy ride. Toy rides are great fun. There were something like a million bikes in this giant parade line.  I know some of you don't know anything about bikers or what you should do when confronted with a 15 minute long parade that is interrupting your trip to wally world.  So I will provide you with a few pointers.
1. If you see one of the parades headed your way, go ahead and put your car in park. It will take awhile for us to all go by. Some things you can do while waiting are: wave at the passing bikes, admire all the shiny chrome, enjoy the rolling thunder, call your mom, whatever.
2. If a biker pulls in to block your intersection, have mercy.  I can guarantee you that the biker wants to go as bad as you do. Bikers like motion. They like to be on their bikes not beside their bikes.  While you are staring eagerly at the road, praying to see the end of the line, the biker in front of you is imagining how good it will feel to hop on the bike and go really fast. Standing in intersections isn't our idea of a good time either.
3. If you decide you want to zoom around the biker blocking your way, don't. We are standing there because there a bunch of other bikers headed your way. It really hurts when bikes and cars collide. (Remember what I said earlier about bikers wanting to be on their bikes, not beside them? It applies here too)
4. Bikers really like it if you wave back when they honk or wave. They probably won't smile though. Every time I start to smile on the bike I hear my dad tell that joke "How do you know a happy biker? The bugs in his teeth". That's nothing to smile about.
5. Bikers are well aware that their mode of transportation is dangerous. We sit around and tell horror stories every time we get together. My faith has grown tremendously on the back of the bike.  I invite to meet the author and creator of my faith. His name is Jesus. We like to say He would have been a biker.
6. Those bikers you're cussing because the parade has gone on forever are raising money for kids. Bikers like kids. When you face danger on a regular basis, you find yourself treasuring the good things in life.
Those are some things you might want to know about bikers. The point of all this is to say "be nice". All we want to do is have fun and do something good for someone else.

The Void

There are days when it feels like I'm talking into a giant void. There are days when I look around and wonder how did I come to be this person. These are the days when the enemy carefully chips away at my relationship with the Father.  He has to chip carefully because if he goes after a big hunk I recognize what's going on.  It's intricate work. A sly thought here-No one is listening-starts to eat away my faith. Then when there is the slightest weakness another sly thought creeps in-You know no one wants to hear about...
So on and so on it goes until I start to believe that God isn't really listening and, if by some miracle He is listening, he really doesn't have time to care.
But then when the void is ready to swallow me up, a word comes. Sometimes in the form of scripture, sometimes as a song, sometimes in a comment from a friend. The word comes and I remember. I remember the day I was quite sure I couldn't do any more and I felt His arms holding me. I remember the hour when all hope was lost and He said "no". I remember the moment in worship when I felt the fire coursing through every part of me. I remember that there is no void in Christ. There is a love so overwhelming and profound that millions of believers over many, many years have survived in situations where no one should have survived. I remember my Jesus who left the warmth of heaven and came to earth to be born, to live, to die, and to trimuph over death just so I can be with my God.
There is no void in God. There is no void and the most amazing thing is that he understands that some of us have to fight to remember that. He understands that struggle so intimately that He has prepared the escape for us even before we start to "go there".