Seeing my Children

Children, Faith, family, Motherhood, Prayer, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability

So, it must be what others have known.

The simplest of things that remind you of them little.

My daughter, a beautiful woman, ecstatic over the joy of dogs…

That’s the way she was.   The way she is.

Little girl, giggly lovely woman

over a dog overjoyed.

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When Heather comes home..

It was, I thought, the best part of the day…remembering dogs and her.

Little girl and dogs.

We hug  goodbye and then I walk with him, “Colton Dixon” I call him.

There’s time left in the day, so I walk.

A slight loneliness in my step.  There’s a glancing towards sky, a noticing of green trees swaying…looking to fill the space they’ve left open.

A small void….not such a pitiful or gaping hole

just a place you didn’t expect

to be so obvious.

Nothing to wait for…no one to anticipate coming in back door, down the hall.

Walking to clear the mind has become walking to fill the time.

I’m intent though and I walk on with prayers and thanks.

We turn, the set path and Colt turns his body towards the steep hill.

So, we go this way instead… to cut across the grassy field past the homes.

Topping the hill, a soft sound, a door shuts and I turn.

“Hey” he says. I smile, meeting the look of  little boy with light brown hair, damp with warmth of day over his eyes.

“Hey”, I say. Then, “How are you?”

“Fine.” he says, reaching down to tie his shoes…then bounces up, looks towards me and waves his hand…”Bye.” he says.

I saw him there, my son.  Little boy  legs, bounding out into the afternoon…little blue Keds on white socks and happy suntan cheeks.

Texted him later, one more exam he answers. “Did well on the one today.”

“Love you, call me if you want to talk” I say.

“Okay, love you too.” he texts.

The newlywed and the rising college sophomore…

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Austin- Recognition Day – a culmination of perserverance

I saw them as children today.

It was sweet and timely, good.

It was just enough.

Seeing my children, dogs and smiles.

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Pretty girl, Beagle puppy, little brother

Hard to Say

courage, Faith, Prayer, Uncategorized, Vulnerability

 

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I told her that painting angels was new for me, adding texture to the wing and choosing vivid over subtle color.

I had an idea of grey, ochre and white against silvery sky.

But, I started again and I made it more me

More my heart, the blue of my eye, the brown of my bangs.

The words to a song

a perfect description.

So, I  named it the name, “Open the eyes of my heart, Lord”.

Yet, I told her I called it

“The Eyes of my Heart”

Left out the Lord.

I did that.

Hard to say why

and it’s a small thing really

in this crazy world filled with offenses and the offended.

It’s a small thing, I know.

Still, I was troubled by my reluctance to be clear, to be outspoken about the “angel prayer”.

It’s hard to say what we need to say.

What we know to be true. What we know of the God who created us, loves us, and sustains us and desires, longs for our hearts to align with his goodness.

It’s hard to say because to oppose the things God opposes elicits accusations and that we are after all, not a people who love.

Perhaps, many have decided, we are a people who hate.

So we’re careful to speak.

I signed the painting with my life verse and name.

They’ll see, I’m certain, the words on the back above my the signature.

Might, I pray,  pause to hold it up before hanging on wall.

Saying, ” Oh, I see.”

Quietly, thoughtfully…

“Open the eyes of my heart, Lord”.

I pray they do.

I pray He does.

I pray that your hearts will be flooded with light so that you can understand the confident hope he has given to those he called—his holy people who are his rich and glorious inheritance.  Ephesians 1:18

Grace and Open Space

Children, Faith, family, Motherhood, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, wonder

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We turned the sharp turn towards the little house.

Dinner with the newlyweds, the planned welcome home.

I can see the roof from a distance on the long, main road.

Looking towards the right, in the distance past the wide field.

Yellow house under blue sky embraced all around by border of green.

I turned towards peach fields, all leaves now, blooms becoming soft, pretty fruit.

Wide open fields lined with trees for miles.

This is the place God graced them.

I look again, again, again.

Same place.

Same grace, still I look again and linger.

We eat together surrounded by ribbons, paper, china…talking, laughing, remembering bliss of the day they wed.

I  look towards window,  I can’t resist.

Almost night now, the trees lit low.

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My daughter is a wife.

I’m a surreal kind of floating happy, like not believing I was chosen to be an observer of her joy.

It’s a new happy, a graciously quiet content.

We say goodbyes to newly husband and wife.

And turn towards the sharp curve home in the road.

Almost cobalt dusky blue sky love, grace, and God.

I’m captivated, yet again

By the grace of their open space.

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Mud Rooms and God

Faith, family, grace, rest, Trust, Uncategorized

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I cleaned the mudroom/dog’s room/art studio last night. It was an absolute mess! There was green paint, pale in places on the wall I hadn’t seen before.

I remember the painting, large and vibrant sunflowers against muddy muted green.

My hands and my fingertips I’d used to create the raised center of flowers and then with sandpaper and a metal tool, I’d distressed the background, removing paint, exposing the old wood underneath.

Art is tactile. Life and God, too.

His hands all over our lives, we in His hands.

We, the clay

He, the potter.

Us, the work of His hand.

I thought of my painting style, a bit impatient, erratic.

Calm, but with fury in my focus.

The potter, though, has a gentle hand. The potter is slowly creating, no rush all rhythm.

Giving and grace-filled, a light tender touch.

Taking away, adding to or starting again.

A blob of clay held steady near the lap of the potter becomes a beautiful vessel.

Every circumstance, a question about what’s ahead, whether happy, disappointing, or unfolding is a molding of me.

If I truly believe God’s hand is ever on my life, then I’ll not be afraid.

I’ll not worry.

I’ll not live with the anxiety that compels me to know everything all the time.

I’ll stay there, okay in not knowing all, His potter hands on my life, my heart and I’ll surrender.

I’ll sit still there, accepting what He has in mind for me, for those I love, all vessels made from clay into a beautiful design of the hands of the potter.

Yet you, Lord, are our Father.
    We are the clay, you are the potter;
    we are all the work of your hand.  Isaiah 64:8

Tell His Story

Under Heaven

Faith, grace, Trust, Uncategorized

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On a rainy day, exhausted for good and really happy reasons.

I walked.

It’s good for me, so I walk.

Reluctantly, I walked.

Grey sky under puddled ground, I set out and noticed the beauty of grey against green all around.

To me, just as beautiful as the clear, bright blue.

The trees, feathery leaves offering

pink and white distractions.

I thought to myself; feeling odd,  I love the sky no matter its color.

I love the vast openness of sky, anticipating my arrival.

God, offering up the wide sky like a flip chart meeting, a  strategic gathering of bird, tree, sky, God and me.

Walking with intent or just in meantime

I stop, look down before opening gate back home.

Fixed on the beauty of a fallen camellia amongst scattered petals of pear tree blossoms.

Pausing there and feeling content

Regardless of storm.

Time, season and purpose under God’s heaven

Ecclesiastes 3

Fridays and Good Mornings -Seeing Jesus

Faith, grace, praise, Prayer, Trust, Uncategorized

I could have more morning time and be elated, really I could.

My Bible, pencils, coffee and big dog waiting patiently.

As I read, journal, think and thank.

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Happy about it or contented in the ease of moments doesn’t really express how much I’d like more morning.

I’m in the Book of Numbers, refusing to skip it along with Leviticus this time.

It’s passage and passage of muddling through;  if, but, sacrifices and rules, regulations and particulars.

When I was a teenager, I dated the preacher’s rebel grandson. We sat in the back of the church and changed the words of the hymns to dirty songs.

What a sinful rebellion, I followed along.

We loaded up the church van on Saturday mornings and we all had palm-sized booklets, stories of Jesus we’d been coached to share.

I wanted to be there. I wanted to be a follower of the rules, a follower of Jesus.

We told the story of Jesus because the preacher told us to.

Most of us, I believe not knowing Jesus really at all.

At least not me.

Still, we were good pupils of the teachings.

We were compliant. We were afraid. We were forced.

And so, I’m reading Numbers, a Psalm, and now the Book of John.

Because I want to.

Psalms recalling the greed of the people led from wilderness, through a parted ocean sized sea, fed manna from heaven and water from a rock.

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Safe, rescued and led; yet, longing and discontent.

These followers of law, empty, defeated and angry unwilling to subsist in the provision of God through his reluctant leader, Moses.

Never able to attain enough, be enough, walking straight, stubborn and stoic enough to see themselves worthy of the ways of law.

Following rules, striving for perfectly, afraid to believe in grace.

I’ve been there.

A child in church with an angry leader who wanted us all to go to heaven, but didn’t really believe we could.

I wonder now, who formed his shame-filled mind.

Caused him to preach shame and remorse over mercy, love, acceptance.

 I came to know the love of Jesus in my thirties.

A desperate need has become a peaceful seeking.

I’ve been confounded to understand more

The grace and favor that require no merit at all.

Yesterday, I read about Judas bringing the soldiers to Jesus. He’d spent time with the Twelve, handpicked to follow.  He was despondent, yet calmly submissive over the coming day of His sacrificial death.

Some had slept when asked to watch and pray.

Peter promised allegiance, then denied being acquainted with Jesus.

3 times.

Judas brought the soldiers to the quiet of the garden and Jesus calmly told them all, I’m the one you are looking to capture.

Then Jesus, knowing all that could happen to him, came forward and said to them, “Whom do you seek?”  John 18: 4

I imagine his arms open, as if to welcome their violent intrusion.

I hadn’t thought of Jesus as courageous before I thought of dark, angry soldiers intent on his arrest.

I sat in the quiet and filled the margin of my Bible.IMG_0740

Sketching a lush garden of flowers, Jesus facing an army of men seeking to destroy.

If you had told me I’d be coloring in my Bible 30 years ago, I would have denied it.

It would be one of those rules I’d be terrified of breaking.

I would still be telling the story of Jesus, a good story from a little booklet, afraid to get it wrong.

I’d still be telling a story, prompted by shame.

I’d be telling the story, cautionary, spurned by forceful warning of Hell.

I’d be telling the story of one who never knew grace herself.

Never believed in the courageous, sacrificial arms wide open love of Jesus.

It would not be my story.

My story of now.

Of mornings with Jesus.

Answered prayers in His name.

And simple, graces and glimpses unexpected of heaven.

Like Mary Magdalene searching an empty place on a hopelessly longing and grieving morn.

Looking up to recognize the Savior as he said “Mary”.

Her story is mine.

I have seen the Lord.  John 21:18

 

 

Linking up to Tell His Story

Citron Pines and Simple Sentences

Faith, grace, rest, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, wonder

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I’m dying to paint again; yearning to be effortless for a few hours.

To capture on canvas the color of the pines as the late day sunlight landed on limbs.

To somehow convey the joy of veering off my normal walk to be surprised by the happy color of citron splashed on a row of young pines.

To express the way my day turned for better because of this happenstance encounter of tree.

It was a beautiful sight.

To spread the old sheet over the dining room table,  fill the mason jars with water and line up the tubes of paint and brushes.

To have no preconceived ideas or projects, just to express.

That is all.

I’m prone to striving, to determined effort and attempts.

I write because I haven’t written.

I focus on approval of reader rather than simplicity of sentence.

I catch myself. I should probably trash it; but, I trod on adding to, saying more, thinking it may sound different or prettier, just a maze of overstated circling of whatever it is I meant to say.

See, I’m doing it again.

But, painting is different. I can cover a botched painting and stubbornly continue until what I get is what I know to be true.

The difference is the effort.

To be effortless is to be genuine.

Because effort is akin to striving, pushing, forcing, refining, fighting for a perceived perfect outcome.

Effort is not joy, not from the soul.

Effort is unrest. Unrest no one may ever see, ever take as less than good enough.

But, the heart of the writer, the painter, the poet, it knows.

So we try again, less effort this time.

And we are at peace because we know, our good never comes by force.

We are satisfied in splash of color or semblance of sentence.

Cease striving.

Know that He is God.

Psalm 46:10

 

 

 

 

 

Prayers Left Alone

Children, courage, Faith, grace, Prayer, rest, Trust, Uncategorized

Mary loved Jesus.FB_IMG_1458176276786

She’d wiped his feet with her hair.

She’d spent time in worship while Martha was bitter, angry and anxious over his presence in their home…worried she might not be good enough still.

Martha and Mary both struggled over the delay in Jesus coming to help their brother.  He was dead.

I imagine they felt, “Well, not all my prayers and struggles matter to Jesus”

I’m the same way.

One prayer spoken can bring what seems an immediate resolution while another lingers unresolved for what feels like years, sometimes is.

Mary waited quietly.

Martha, still anxious and panicked, ran out to ask  “Why so long?”

Mary had the same question; but, with a surrendered approach, a desire to understand and grow, she went out to welcome Jesus.

I want to be like Mary; to hear Jesus say “Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?”  John 11:40

Most days I’m so uncertain of prayer it’s almost a passing thought.

A passing thought like early yesterday morning.

My daughter called. Her wallet was lost; somewhere between job, soon to be new home, and her bedroom here.  We’re transitioning, a wedding very soon.

 She will be moving out.

My house is in total disarray.  Doors are closed to rooms that have become storage units and pretty little spots are unorganized and off kilter.

I searched everywhere, finally the laundry room.

Standing in the center of a spot only big enough for my feet. Two laundry baskets overflowing and shelves covered in socks unmatched, towels, things waiting to be hung or thrown back in to fluff, I ran my hands though the clothing and searched for a wallet I had no idea how would haved ended up here.

Stopped then, giving up the search and said a silent prayer, really just a thought, “Lord, please help Heather find her wallet.” and then decided to just go on with my morning.

Texted her to say, “Sorry, no wallet here anywhere”. I expected to hear later she’d found it.

She replied, “I just found it.”

I told her I had prayed. “Power of prayer” she replied.

I’m praying for bigger things than misplaced wallets lately.

 I’m praying with big lumps in my throat and with an honest pleading of surrender.

Praying so much it feels like angst, like work, like frustration.

Prayers that I know God is hearing; but, maybe wondering why I’m hesitant to believe.

Why I’m ranting so, when help is on the way…in time.

Maybe not as immediate a response as a laundry room prayer.

I’ll believe and I will see, soon.

As soon as I continue on my way, resolute in His glory.

As soon as I decide to stop my diligent search for the answer, like a wallet left at work that was never in any of the places I looked, after all.

If I’ll let go, sit quietly and wait to welcome the arrival of the one who heals.

If I will believe.

Have faith in God.  Mark 11:24

 I’m  linking up with others who tell stories of believing.

Stumbling Into Morning

Children, courage, Faith, family, grace, rest, Teaching, Trust, Uncategorized, wonder

Yesterday, I drank from my son’s cup.  Paisley flowers, curlicues, creamy colored. A cup, bought by a still chubby, middle schooler on a church trip with his friends. He came home, announced, “Here, I got you something.”

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So, I drank my coffee, turned my back from the window, the morning so heavy with fog, no desire to gaze towards sunrise.

I read of a man in the Book of John, unable to move towards the water, to be healed.

Scripture defining him as “an invalid’.

Him and many others, others who’d decided to go down into the water, to believe they might see change; to be an invalid no more.

To be valid.

But, he couldn’t figure out how to move towards healing; he didn’t believe he could move what must have been just steps away.

He couldn’t step. He expected he’d fall, an invalid, after all.

 When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be healed?”The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am going another steps down before me.” Jesus said to him, “Get up, take up your bed, and walk.” And at once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked.

John 5: 5-9

I thought of all times I’m paralyzed, unable, unwilling to try,  until I stumble back towards the water.

 I thought of the invalid; vowing to never to use the description again, recognizing how low a feeling it is to doubt one’s validity. 

Walking outside with dogs as morning requires, I noticed in the lingering fog, the pear tree beginning to bloom.

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The blossoms barely there against the full of a bland sky, insignificant on this less than optimistic day.

This morning I’m drinking from a different cup. It’s lined in the color of bluebird. It’s a funky little cup, my daughter’s. A big, healthy hog etched in the center of its round edges.

My daughter loves pigs, goats, cats, dogs, cows, livestock, in general. Her bridal portrait on Sunday will have a backdrop of peach blossoms and trees spread so far and wide, for miles it seems.

This morning, I sat with her cup.

The sky spoke, saying…”You can’t imagine the day I have for you, Lisa!”

So, I moved towards our big backyard, looked up and knew it was true.

Not just today, but so many more to come.

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Stumbling, prancing, walking slowly or simply standing still in the early morning

If I could, I’d count these birds of this morning, their voices all a flutter.

I’d touch each blossom of the white flowers of pear tree and I’d know undoubtedly the significance, the validity of my every day.

I’d write on my heart, in my palm with a  sharpie or somehow remember more strongly…the beautiful mercy of believing and stumbling into morning to be healed.

 

Count on it

courage, Faith, family, grace, Motherhood, praise, Uncategorized, Vulnerability

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If I get a little sense of ugliness

Of resentment, longing for different, for better…

Mad about why them, not me.

You can be sure, I’ll be faced with opportunity to redeem

All the ugly.

Run into someone, somehow acquainted with my ugly.

You can be sure of it.

I’ll be humbled and graciously welcome their joy in us crossing paths.

Because, I’ll see the lesson.

I’ll notice the providence.

And to be sure, just as sure, I’ll walk at day’s end with extra time thanks to Spring.

Frustrated over buffered songs sought to comfort

I’ll round the corner.

Climb the hill.

Song begins;  continues, meets every longing.

Speaks what I long to hear.

To tell another.

I can count

on it…walking at day’s end and being reminded of grace.

Listening to Third Day…”When the Rain Comes” and wondering if it’s too much like a love song.

To send to someone having a hard day.

Sending anyway, saying you can count on me.