2015 Before I Forget

 

Three things that define my 2015.

1.  I learned to like grapefruit.  

There is something really fun about finding a new food to savor.  That's why I waited so long, apparantly!

2.  I grew lemon verbena.

It's the sound of the name, the smell of the leaves, the sight of the delicate, viney plant with little white flowers.  I've been wanting to grow it for quite some time, and 2015 was the year.

Mount Auburn Cemetary, Cambridge

3.  I went to Boston with my husband.

Honestly, I still can't believe it even though I have pictures and memories and it's in writing.  But we did go.  We toured the city, the historical sites, Harvard Yard, the famous cemeteries.  We stayed at a cheap-ish B&B in Little Italy on the 5th floor and ate amazing Italian and seafood.  We walked almost everywhere and stopped into real Italian grocery stores and ate real cannoli at quaint Italian bakeries.  We basked in history and culture, which was deeply life-giving.

With thanks to our church family for providing funds for airfare and my parents for staying with the kids and putting us up with food and lodging.  I hope one of my kids goes to college there.  I'd like to visit and experience more.  Actually, living there for a year would be a dream come true!

other huge highlights;

PRAY48

A friend brought this idea to bear at our church, having someone praying for specific things for a string of 48 hours combined.

The evening of culmination, where many of us gathered to pray together, was overwhelming for me.  I sat at a table with 7 others, some of them my own sons, their friends, their siblings, parents.  That night I wept, wept for pure unworthiness, that I could bear witness to these precious souls praying together for over an hour, begging God to act in His goodness and power in our lives and the places we inhabit.


Even more highlights:  Conner playing his first full piano recital, getting a baby grand piano, having an amazing housemate, an extremely blessed trip to Washington State and Glacier National Park, getting back in shape and enjoying new work out friends, having coffee with many amazing women and talking about Jesus, being a part of a cool engagement story, working with a super cool KidsMinistry staff at church, having friends and family come visit, and I could just keep on going.  It is good to review.  It is good to not get so bogged down in the difficult that I lose sight of the tremendous gifts.

Petersen Parade for my brother and sister-in-law

Housemate Becca

Washington coast

Conner and Beth his piano teacher

Counting God's gifts.  Remembering.  'Tis healthy for the soul.

Middle Child

They all play piano minus my middle child.  He chose violin.

We celebrated his eleventh birthday this week.  He wanted to play football with friends and have ice cream mixers.

I think about his life.  Today my hip hurts and I'm pretty sure I can trace it back to him as a baby.  He never wanted me to carry him, was always leaning out and grabbing.  That's all fine except that he was one heck of a chunk.

And the pain didn't stop there.  He naturally knew what a tantrum was and how to throw one well.  He has a mind of his own and wasn't afraid of disagreeing.  He has a knack for finding what makes you tick and pushing that button.  He's why Brian coined the phrase, "if it's not fun for everyone, it's not good fun."

But the flip side is he has an amazing heart for justice.  He's practically memorized The Action Bible.  He thrives on knights and fighting for the right and his heart is soft if you explain gently.

His humor is getting funny and growing in appropriate-ness.  He works hard; once he understands a job, he does it well and thoroughly without a complaint.  He looks out for the underdog.  He loves little kids and prides himself on his math.  He has a fascination with planes and all things military.  He loves dress up and playing pretend even now.

I've learned a lot from him and believe God has much more to teach me through his life.  I'm praying earnestly his heart is always soft to God and he seeks first His Kingdom and His Righteousness.

My dad writes poems for the kids on their birthdays.  Here's the one for Dawson.

The 'Middles'

There is beginnings and there's ends,

There's firsts and there are lasts.

Sometimes these bookends catch the eye

and what's between gets passed.

There's those who catch the football

and there's those who make the toss,

but the middle of the line

is what keeps all from being lost.

There's those who search the wilderness,

There's those who write the tombs.

There's those who lead out far ahead

and those who stay at home.

There's all of that romantic stuff 

of sailing seven seas.

There's all of those who ponder

in the universities.

Then there's those who build the bridges

and there's those who fight the wars.

There's those who raise up children

and there's those who mind the stores.

There's those who care for animals,

There's those who entertain.

There's those who load the trucks and ships,

There's those who grow the grain.

The 'middles' are important,

They're essential; just the same

They often go unnoticed

while expected to remain.

It seems they're like the planets

sparkling bright in pre-dawn sky,

but then the hand of brighter sun

obscures them from our eye.

But though they are obscured

by all the glorious yellow light,

They run their course with diligence

unnoticed 'til next night.

We cannot measure truly

what the 'middles' worth might be;

so we must pause, appreciate,

and sing out thankfully.

Lies and Grace

We sat in the front row this year.  All the kids had a clear view.
It was our church's annual Thanksgiving and Baptism service.

I believe it is the first one we've sat all the way through.
I watched other moms go in and out, relieving little children of their energy in the foyer for awhile.
But I wasn't with them this year.

We've entered a new stage in which we can sit through an hour and a half service.

The music was wonderful and my heart was filled with praise and thanksgiving.  But there was a voice in the back of my mind that challenged my worthiness to praise.

With the change of family stage comes new hurdles.  I stood next to my eleven year-old and thought about how he might think I'm a hypocrite.  Now that he can sit through a service, he's also been privy to my imperfections.  He's experienced my sin too many times to count.

Can I really praise God with these little people next to me who know how badly I can behave?

We sit and listen to testimonies of God's power to reach into hearts and change them from selfish to selfless.
We witness God's power in drawing those who've been lost to Himself in creative, supernatural ways.

And I think maybe it's fitting...that my kids don't have a perfect mom.  That they daily see how much she needs Jesus.  That even when you're raised to follow Jesus from a young age, it doesn't make you any less in need of His forgiveness and grace.

That voice, the one saying I've lost my temper and don't deserve to praise.  The one saying my kids have seen me so ugly in sin that to smile and sing praises is nothing but a farce.

That voice leaves out the part about God's part.  The whole reason of baptism.  That we are baptised into Christ's life.  The One Perfect Life.  That we are raised to praise Him in His resurrection because He beat death.  Won the battle with the liar.

I remember my own baptism and how every day, though I sin, I ask for forgiveness.  From God and those I've wronged.

I pray that, because of my imperfections, not of in spite of them, my children will also come confidently before the throne of grace in worship.   That they will be content to live a life of humility and freedom devoted to Christ, without the burden of perfectionism.

God's grace,  never depleted, always growing.   A gift to be thankful for.

Canned Thanks

My farmer parents and family bless us with lots of beautiful, ripe fruit.

Food preserving is hard work.

I leave for a lunch meeting and when I return, I am fully reminded of my great blessings.

One of them is a husband who reaches into the deepest parts of me and speaks to them.  With love and gentleness.

There are dahlias on my desk he's brought me, each color and shape specially chosen.

Today on my bed are five cards.  The children have made them while I was out.

I don't deserve such a man, such a family.

I'm incredibly thankful.

Overindulging

Below the Spicy Baked Apples Recipe in my cookbook is a quote:

"When the holiday season of consumption that began on "black Friday" (the Friday after
 U.S. Thanksgiving that is supposed to help merchants end the year in the "black") draws to
a close, our consumption doesn't stop, it just changes focus.  During the holiday season we
are encouraged to consume, especially foods, to feel loved.  In January we are encouraged to
purchase diet foods and exercise equipment; ironically, to assuage our previous overindulgence."
-Simply in Season

I'm keeping this in my mind as I go throughout my days...how overindulgence is hard to stop.  How in my eating, my buying, my planning, I want to stay moderate.  How it's not such a blessing to overindulge on Thanksgiving when I'm doing it daily anyway.

We've been reading lots on the Pilgrims lately.  So much, actually, that when my oldest got his next history reading assignment he looked at his dad who happened to be giving it to him while I was at a meeting and said, "You can't be serious, not another Pilgrim book!"

One thing I found fascinating was that even in their infamous sea biscuits, maggots and other disgusting bugs had found a home.  It was so bad that some of the Pilgrims waited until after dark to eat their food...at least that way they couldn't see what they were ingesting.

It is out of that dark, putrid, barely sustaining situation that Thanksgiving came.

And I'm reading in Romans.  It is out of the near dead body of Abraham the life of a nation is born.  Not just the nation of the Jewish people, but a nation of all who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead.

From what I can understand in this chapter (4), because Abraham believed God's words, that he would hold in his arms a son in his old age, God credited his belief to Abraham as righteousness.  A dead man brought to life, brought forth life.

It's like buying stuff on credit, knowing one of these days you're going to have to face up to the numbers, the red numbers condemning you, stalking you, looming over you and darkening your days.  But then God speaks and gives you an offer...He'll fill your home with life.  And you believe Him.

Then that account that was so defeating, when you reconcile the numbers, is changed to righteousness.  How can it be?  You, who were in deep debt, receiving righteousness and life instead!

It is this truth I want to overindulge on during this extravagant season--on the God who gives life to the dead and those in the red, and calls things that are not as though they were.

Resting in Labor

Saturday night at the park a neighbor asked if I was going to relax for the holiday weekend.
I thought about it and said no.  I'd rest on Sunday but come Monday, it was labor for me.

I think my mom always said "we labor on Labor Day."

It still stands true.  There is a hope of rest in the work, though.

"And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him."

It's the remembering of God in my daily work.  A turning and communing with Him.  A giving thanks to Him....

My body weary, my kitchen dirty, my cabinets too high for me to reach easily, I start to mumble, self-pity overtaking without me even knowing.  The Spirit calls and I listen, stop...turn my thoughts back to Him.  Thank Him for my kitchen.  For a good day of work.  For the work He's given me to do.  For the smile of a child passing by.  For a bed I will get to crawl into soon.....

This demands an explanation...I stole a friends' idea and each year on our vacation the kids each get to pick their own cereal out for the trip.  In other words, this is NOT normal!!! 

"Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive and inheritance from the Lord as a reward.  It is the Lord Christ you are serving."


Even more, I'm seeking that the "whatever I do" will be exactly what the Lord is wanting me, calling me to do.  Both of those verses in Colossians 3 start with that phrase.  Doesn't it matter what?  In some ways no.  It encompasses all people...whatever they do.

In some ways yes.  I need to seek His guidance as I make decisions about our schedule, our days, our moments.  Then as I'm doing that work and weary or depressed or discouraged or frustrated or detoured, it is His will I'm in.  I can do that work for Him, in His name, thanking Him even so.

And in that there is rest.

A few more funny pictures as I savor these childhood moments:

My instructions before they left for the lake were "you need to put the game away.  Completely.  In its' box."
hmmmmmm

This two year-old snuck away from me at the pool.  I'd just finished putting on his life jacket so he could go in the "big pool" and then turned to explain where the towels were to Conner.  I turned back and Timmy was gone.  We started searching the water and the big slide frantically.  Dawson spotted him first.  He had climbed up into a vacant Life Guards' chair and was gazing out at everyone contentedly.

Katies

The summer's been full and fruitful and all-consuming.  I've so many blog posts written in my head and pray there will be time to get some of them down before they're lost.
I often feel at a loss when I have so many ideas and have to start somewhere.  So I usually choose to start with the most immediate.
In this case, it's the Katies.
Within one month I've been able to spend time with three of my most favorite Katies in the world.

This is nothing short of miraculous and deserves a blog post!

Each one is a blonde beauty.  Each one loves Jesus wholeheartedly and is walking by His Spirit and continuing to grow more like Him each year.

Each one has been an immense gift to me.  Nothing but grace.

Here's the first one I saw in early July:

me, Sissy, Katie

I met her in late grade school when she moved to our country town.  Our families are now fast friends.
I have many a loony memory with her as we snow skied, raised lambs, worked in student government, played in the band, and hatched outlandish plans and songs together.
Mostly, though, she and I planned summer mission trips when she was 15, I 16.  We spurred one another on in our goal, she to Pakistan, I to Tanzania.  It was a trip that changed me forever...where I really and wholeheartedly gave myself to Jesus.
When we returned we worked together to start Bible Studies and a little drama group at our high school.
God used her to change me and bless me tremendously.  Now she happens to live in the same town as me, but usually she's overseas.  She and her family are planning to move to Peru soon to share Jesus with children there.

Katie and I cutting various children's hair this August.  They just jumped into the nearby kiddy pool to clean off.

The next Katie I met probably within a couple days of her birth, I being about 18 months old.  And yes, my aunt let me hold her.
We spent childhood together on the family farm and have more memories than I could ever even remember.  Connected by family blood and the blood of Jesus, we've traveled similar but different roads.
Both of us have five children.  She's got a heart for her family and for Jesus that never empties.  Her husband is in seminary right now preparing to be an army chaplain.  Usually they are in different areas of the country with the military, but right now they're in the area.

Me and Katie in front of our husbands

The last Katie surprised me yesterday.  I've not seen her for 11 years, yet there's a place in my heart especially for her.  We lived together in college.  Her to-be-husband introduced my to-be husband to a personal relationship with Jesus.  We went through our courting days with our future husbands together, a deeply meaningful time and friendship.
They now live in inner-city L.A. where they pastor in a new church there.

I, undeserving, stop and thank God for such beautiful women who've been a part of my life at important  milestones.  Women who call me higher and purer and point me to Jesus with their very beings.

Sometimes I forget what a gift friendship is...so today I stop and remember.  What boundless grace.

How about you?  Any friendships you want to stop and thank God for?

Surprise!!!

I've had many surprises in my life.  So far most of them have been good.  Like my children.  None of them specifically planned by us, but God's plans have sure surprised and blessed us.

This summer comes another surprise.

Not nearly as great as another child, but a surprise nonetheless.  The peony bush out my kitchen window has NEVER, not EVER in the six years we've lived here, grown more than one flower.

Usually the little balls turn black and never become petals at all.  I decided it had a disease or when we transplanted it we buried it too low in the ground.

So imagine my surprise this year....

I don't know why, how, when.  Can't take any credit.

So I'll just enjoy the gift.

Confessions of a Consumer

I don't like speaking in the present when confessing things, so please, understand this happened well over a week ago.  I'm a totally different person by now.  I'm sure of it.

Walking briskly through Costco on a mission.  I've got a twenty in my pocket and I'm not gonna let them get any more than that today.  Medicine for the kids' colds, paper napkins for the trip, cereal 'cause I've run out of time and energy to bake anything else before we leave.

Then out of the corner of my eye I see the crowd.  I'm diverted from my focus (this isn't anything new).  I know what they're watching.  I want one too.  I've been wanting one for quite a few years actually. 

The Vita Mix.

"Maybe I'll just stroll by and see what they look like again.  I wonder if I could just grab one today and charge it.  I can deal with the budget later.  And my husband's disapproval.  Truly, if anyone could really use one continually and for many years, it's me.  I've got lots of mouths to feed.  Three times a day.  I mean, there's machines like this sitting in kitchens barely used and then here's me, so deserving, so needing one. "

"Here I am suffering away on a focused budget and all these people can just up and buy one whenever they want.  Yes, I am truly a poor, poor person destitute and in great need.  I NEED one NOW!  I DESERVE to have one!  I've waited long enough.  The whole system's shot when a person can't get what they need."

I stand in a gray area, mesmerized by the moment and seeking clarity in my thinking.  I see walls stacked high with stuff and remember my own struggle to manage the stuff in my home.  I see fine food chopped up spinning for us Americans continuously fighting weight problems.

I turn away. Once my eyes aren't on it, it's not as alluring. Walk to the checkout stand and put down my twenty.  It's nearly all used, but my conscience is clear as I walk out.  Today the Vita Mix man lost the battle.

And me?  Well, I return home and look at my trusty Kitchen Aid blender.  I thank God for it.  For electricity.  For everything I need and much, much more. 

I'm challenged...though I don't think it's wrong to buy a Vita Mix I do desire to use the finances God entrusts us with the best way possible.  To make lasting investments.

"Sell your possessions and give to the poor.  Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will not be exhausted, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys.  For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."


Less than forty-eight hours before my Vita Mix fight I stood in the modest home of a family who follows God seriously.  We chat in the kitchen while dinner's prepared.  My husband points to a line of pictures plastered to their fridge.  "Are all these yours?"  I look.  They're World Vision sponsor children, more than half a dozen of them.

"Yes," she says.  "Each year my husband gets a cost-of-living raise.  But we don't need any more stuff.  We spend it by sponsoring another child."

That family has a purse that will never wear out.  A treasure in heaven that will never get used up, never be stolen, broken, ruined.

It's a battle.  Living in a consumer culture, struggling with a consumer heart.  I have to continually regain eternal perspective on wealth.

"True prosperity is not measured by how much anyone has.  It's measured by how much they give."

text: Luke 12.33,34.
quote: Spiritual Rhythm, M. Buchanan, p. 165.

Believing Right

I'm at the sink, carrots getting peeled when she comes to talk.  Says "Santa isn't real, you know."

"You're right," I say.  But she's thinking something so she continues with a juxtaposition.  "What he really does is go around giving people chopped off heads."

I do a double take, stop peeling.  "What, honey?"  She repeats again and again, her "ch" sounds more like a "t" and so I'm not sure, but yes, it's truly what she's saying.

"How do you know that?  I'm not so sure he gives chopped off heads."

"He does, Mama, he really does."  I don't think any convincing of mine is going to triumph so I stop.  The person who at once says Santa isn't real and then he is and he gives chopped off heads has some unclear thinking going on.

I shake my head and finish peeling, considering how often I'm the one with the unclear thinking.

How I worry about the future.  Get angry when there's thoughtless waste.  Compare my lot to another's.  Believe I don't have what it takes.  Consider my efforts a failure.  Resign myself to negative ideas about myself and my talents.  Have a hard time being open, honest, fearing rejection.

I say there's a God.  But I don't always live in light of His character.  The One who spoke to the masses saying, "Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom."  The One who spoke through His servant saying, "being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Jesus Christ."

These truths, these promises.  I've got to align my flighty thinking to them.

My parents visit.  We spend the morning at a park then decide to walk over to the toy store.  It's closing today and it's all 50% off.  Little Timmy fights and cries the whole walk, angry over having to leave the slides.  He doesn't understand where we're going.  He chooses not to trust my leading as good.  He won't rest in my plans for him.

I don't blame him, he's not capable quite yet of grasping his choices. 

I am.  The choice is continually before me.  Trusting His leading as good.  Resting in His plans for me. 

Believing that if I have to leave the slides, it's only because we're going to the toy store.

Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead?  Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion?  If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!
Luke 11.11-13


His gifts to me this week: #278-300

Visit from my parents, Food from the farm, My mom reading, hugging, loving my children,
My dad working with my children, listening to them and loving them,
Red-legged frogs, Generous friends caring for our children,
Praying for His people, Crying healing tears, A kiss from my old neighbor now at a retirement home,
French Toast Strata, Beef in the crockpot, Children wanting to go out into the wind,
Pruning vines, bushes and trees with my Dad,
Time with my husband...my true, loving Valentine, Good truth and it's challenge to me,
Timmy's joy over animals, Walking with my friend, Rest, Timely carrots,
Staplers to fix furniture, Little girl yelling loudly, "God is perfect!"

Text: Luke 12.32, Phil. 1.6

On Being Rich

One of the questions posed for us to consider at our Christmas gathering last night was "how has Christ's poverty made you rich?"

It is a puzzling question posed by someone who's been following the Christ-Child hard for many, many years.

Though I cannot fully grasp a clear answer, an explanation's been turning in my head for awhile....

There's something about knowing He, the Maker of All, came as an infant to a poor girl and her fiance.  There's something about knowing that throughout His life He had no place to call home, no just-right pillow for His head.  I mean, even I have a pillow I prefer to sleep on.

There's something about knowing He didn't have much, materially, to speak of.  Of knowing that what He did have, power from God, He shared generously to all who sought Him, and even gave of His power, prayers, and words to those who weren't seeking Him.

It's a plumb line for me.  Truly, one of the few things that keeps me from despairing at times.  For though we lack nothing, God has chosen to place us in a position of constant reliance upon Him.  (And isn't that what He wants for us all???)

So in those moments when I get tired of being dependent upon Him, times when I wish I just didn't have to think about budgets and bargains, He is my plumb line.

Each time I am brought back to reality.  The God I worship and follow; His riches are not of this world.  He calls me to remember that where my treasure is, there my heart will be also.

He reminds me of the riches already mine....grace, mercy, peace, redemption, adoption as His child, forgiveness of sins, the Holy Spirit, an inheritance kept in heaven which will never spoil or fade....

How has His poverty made me rich?  Oh, let me count the ways....for the riches of Christ, made mine through His poverty, are worth more than all the man-made riches in the world.

This was their first pick...it wasn't the price of the tree that bothered us, it was  the price of the new home we'd have to buy to put it in!!!

Counting my other riches this Christmas....

#221-243

*Picking out a Christmas tree in the cold...Oldest boy now helping to carry it.

*Patience with the lights

*Popcorn strings and snacks hanging low for Timmy whenever he needs

*Christmas Carols

*Cutie Oranges

*Good Christmas stories

*Generous and insightful babysitters

*A faithful husband

*A faithful God

*Home Economics with Aunt Heidi and Eli

*Learning of Washington, D.C.

*Little ballet dancers in red

*How she just won't cooperate in taking a picture

*Patter of feet in the hallway

*Late night water calls

*Shirtless baby hanging ornaments for the first time...all on the low branches

*Receiving Christmas cards in the mail

*Visits from friends from afar

*Gifts for giving

*Timmy scrubbing his scribbled crayon off the floor

*Advent evenings together

riches taken from Ephesians 1, photos: this Christmas season

Rain or Shine

It was one of those special (and not too rare) days in the Pacific Northwest where you keep looking outside.  Confused.  Trying to make sense of the fact that there's a pattering on the roof and a beam of sun shining through the window. 

 How can this be?  Rain and sun together?  At the same time?

I've been thinking about the man in Genesis, Joseph.  How the only two times it specifically mentions God was with him was when he was in a pit.  

First, the pit his brothers threw him in and only took him out to sell him as a slave.  Second, when he was falsely accused of attempted rape and thrown in a dungeon.  Truly pits.  And truly God was there. 

It was raining and shining all at the same time.

We've been studying Jonah in school.  He deliberately ran from God.  Found himself thrown overboard ship in a storm and in the pit of a fish's belly.  And there, once again, God showed up.

Light in deepest darkness.

 

No matter if I'm running from God or being shoved into a pit involuntarily, He is there.

And no less true today...true, abiding comfort found in these words. For us all...
Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.

If I say "Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,"
even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is as light to you.

In times of deepest need, hopeless pain, unsure outcomes, He remains with us.  Our light, even when it's raining.

And I'm so thankful, thankful, for His constant presence, for He never forgets even when I do.  So I stop to thank Him, remembering His regular, marvelous gifts:

#207-230

*Slow Uno games

*A night out with just my family..enjoying pancakes together

*Hazy horizons

*Worm-diggers, boys who play hard at being boys

*Launching Lincoln Log cannons in the war--they included me and even thought I was a good shot!

*A church which values prayer for the persecuted

*Joseph's story

*My neighbor's life inside her--a boy!

*Call from my dear friend...life inside her after many years of waiting

*Hot coffee

*Daily provision

*Kind words at the right time

*Freedom

*Clearer understanding

*A good van

*Peace within

*Good talks with my son

*A walking partner

*School chaos that's okay

*A warm and undeserved welcome

*Finding a half-price book holder at an estate sale...just what I was wanting!

*Phones for communication

*Communication with my Father

photos: warm springs rainbows, Tim in a puddle, firework  text: Psalm 139.7-12