family

31 Days, Freely – Why

Abuse Survivor, Angels, Art, bravery, confidence, contentment, courage, Faith, family, Forgiveness, freedom, grace, memoir, mercy, painting, Peace, Uncategorized, Vulnerability

Day 4 of 31 Days of Writing, trying to be brief and light and think about “my why”. I remembered why in an old hymn, just the chorus.

“Let others see Jesus in you…”

It’s simple but it’s hard, I’m either focused and feeling faithful or I teeter on my own inconsistency to come back around and hopeful again, once again.

What is my why? …a provoking question often used to motivate or continue something begun hopefully or associated with a personal goal.

Why do I write? This one I’ve been pondering lately. Does anyone really care, isn’t my life quite fine without it?

It’s not at all necessary, not as noticed as needed to go someplace grander, more visible, more esteemed.

Someone suggested I write fiction, perhaps people are sick of the sorrowful stories of women who’ve been restored, redeemed, renewed. I was perplexed, set off course and wondered why a made-up story instead of my truth?

Maybe I could, I’m not sure I should. Maybe I will; but, only after I’ve written on why, why I believe, why I have hope now when I was so very hopeless before.

Why you should too.

Have hope.

In the back of a worn little book of Psalms and Proverbs, pages missing and places with corners turned down, there’s a note among other notes:

If I wrote a book it would be a long letter explaining why I believe in Jesus, in His love and in His mercy.

There are countless versions bound into books with more significant stories than mine.

Still, my why is mine.

Why I pause to pray when I could easily turn and go the other way. My knees find peace and my soul finds rest in the personal and private moments I am intentional and I choose to pray.

Why I open my mind to learn from His word, finding new understanding in ancient recordings that develop slowly, requiring discipline and distraction-free commitment of time.

Like the verse about the yoke and rest, I can see it now. I couldn’t take the steps designed for me by God if I didn’t stay in a simple and steady rhythmic walk, I can’t follow God’s path on my own, can’t carry my stuff for too long.

Why I’ve come so very far because of His mercy, yet realize I’ve so much further to go and why I am blown away that He considers me worthy of the cross.

Thank you, thank you for the cross.

Why I am astounded that He prompts me still to pray and that answers come and each time I am moved, so very moved by His splendid and sweet mercy.

Why I think the most important thing about me if there’s anything at all are in the words to this song:

Your life’s a book before their eyes
They’re reading it through and through
Say does it point them to the skies
Do others see Jesus in you?

I understand others seeing Jesus in me differently now than before, more a gentle light causing need for others to come near, to know more, to see a difference in me, my art, my words, my everything.

31 Days, Freely – Believe

Abuse Survivor, bravery, Children, confidence, contentment, courage, daughters, doubt, Faith, family, Forgiveness, freedom, grace, heaven, memoir, mercy, Motherhood, Prayer, Redemption, rest, Salvation, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, wonder, writing

My mama never kept a journal or to my knowledge, wrote thoughts in a Bible.

So, I can’t say I “get that from my mama”.

She’d rather speak her truths to you, long conversations with time in between her phrases to let what she’d given you sink in. Look you in the eye or leave something with you and look away, walk away like that’s it, now I’m puttin’ a period there.

I believe every single thing she ever said.

Lots of times there was no acceptable reply, either she’d put me in my place or I had to just keep my mouth shut and let the sometimes unwelcome truth sink in.

She was resilient.

She believed in the possibility of everything working out for good despite so much wrong she endured.

She rarely quoted scripture, just paraphrased God’s truths in her own no holds barred way. Some would call it irreverent, her language was generous with cuss words.

I don’t think she aspired to write and I rarely recall a book in her lap, she’d rather be one with people, one with life.

She talked about books in a different way, telling me “turn the page, Lisa Anne.” when I kept mulling over some misdeed or misfortune.

She was quick to give her commentary on all that might be wrong or someone’s crazy choices or just mean motives.

She’d say “They’re not reading the right book or they’re not on the same page.”

I know she had a Bible. I know because it was mine and towards the end of her days I noticed it moved from the stack of old Southern Living magazines to the place in front of her where she’d fall asleep with the noise of Fox news.

I know she believed. I know she wanted us all, the four of us to always believe.

To pray, believing more often than beckoning or begging.

To smile, thinking how far we’ve all come and how far she and daddy got to see us go and grow.

Yesterday, I had an encounter with someone who has changed. A distant person who acknowledged her resistance towards relationship, she stopped by to give me a book.

She had a cold, I’d had to same one, I shared. She let me hug her and she hugged me back.

We walked out and I told her she’d reminded me of a new favorite word, “countenance”.

She was puzzled, said she had never heard it before and I told her I thought it might be biblical but that it’s such a beautiful word, a beautiful thing to see.

I explained that it means to me, your sweet soul is shining through, the change in expression showing so pretty on your face.

She thanked me twice, and more.

I thanked her for stopping by.

Thanking her and God now for reminding me of my mama.

Reminding me to choose believing.

Believing God is so very good.

“Behold, the hour is coming, indeed it has come, when you will be scattered, each to his own home, and will leave me alone. Yet I am not alone, for the Father is with me. I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.””

‭‭John‬ ‭16:32-33‬ ‭ESV‬‬

And to “live life today”, and then tomorrow live and believe again as you “turn the page”.

My mama’s stubborn resilience and God’s unwavering and believable peace and grace, I’m believing in both today.

Falling Beautifully

birds, bravery, confidence, contentment, courage, doubt, Faith, family, fear, Forgiveness, grace, memoir, praise, Prayer, Redemption, Stillness, Teaching, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, wonder, writing

I noticed it there like a tiny hand reaching out and I walked right on by then turned back.

Again, thinking someone will see me, wonder why I’m fascinated with a small leaf. I wasn’t bothered before,  I’d circle the walking trail oblivious to only what I’d decided God had for me to see.

So, yesterday I turned back and I was captivated by the rich red amongst the verdant green. A few steps later I stepped over one quite the same, told myself oh, there’s the sister, already fallen to the ground.IMG_0779

I’m surrounded by sisters, all teachers they are, brothers and little children too.

Encouragers, strugglers, strivers and restful ones, successful in ways I’m not and all storytellers like me balancing the joy of sharing with the question of our sufficiency to do so.

I’m learning to turn my gaze from all around to within, less numbing of my thoughts and more of a surrendering to someones leading other than my own.

Someone who knows, tells me so in a holy hushed tone.

The little red leaf is progressing, maturing, its positioning on the limb is surely just so.

The sun landing sublimely centered is only because of God and time.

Just as the ones alongside appear fresh and bright and new, the middle one is soaking it all in, gaining a warmer hue by the heat, ripening vibrantly and strong, the beauty so visible.

Our seasons are the same.

Soon the leaf will fall and land in the high weeds all around or maybe be blown nearby to intersect with my walk.

I’ll see it there as I continue and it will cause my notice to consider, I’m more beautiful when I’m surrendered, more fully farther along and changing with this season.

This season for me to allow the development, the spiritual kind, for His purpose and not mine.

It is brave not to resist, not to resist the changing, not resist the fall at all.

Linking up with Mary Geisen as she asks “Are you good at waiting?”

https://marygeisen.com/are-you-good-at-waiting/

Preparing for the Storm

Abuse Survivor, bravery, Children, confidence, contentment, courage, daughters, Faith, family, fear, memoir, mercy, Prayer, Redemption, rest, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability

So very excited to have her, my daughter might be sleeping in her little bed, her husband out working in the storm.

Crisp clean sheets and pillows fresh with light lavender scent and on Saturday night I’d have both she and her brother right next to me in their rooms.

Instead, the storm weakened, there was no need for her to sleep over.

No need for her to stay. I was prepared though, in every possible way.

Several days ago, I heard or read that if there are pleasant hills, there will be valleys.

I wanted not to hear that, wanted to look away as if my understanding of this truth might hasten my finding myself sooner in the valley at the bottom of my current pleasant hill.

My life is not all pleasant; but, pretty much is good, sufficiently and grace-filled.

Has been for the most part for some time. This is why I didn’t want to hear it, shook it off, the possibility of the valley.

David knew valleys. He wrote of them, of the one that skirted the border of death, the one wrought with shame over his significant sexual sin, the one where he faced Goliath, the embodiment of what would prove his strength from God or evil’s victory that would change us all.

David has lessons, lots of them from which we can learn.

Or relearn.

“So even to old age and gray hairs, O God, do not forsake me, until I proclaim your might to another generation, your power to all those to come.

Your righteousness, O God, reaches the high heavens. You who have done great things, O God, who is like you?

You who have made me see many troubles and calamities will revive me again; from the depths of the earth you will bring me up again. You will increase my greatness and comfort me again.”

‭‭Psalms‬ ‭71:18-21‬ ‭ESV‬‬

I love to tell the story of the itinerant preacher man who traveled every weekend to the little church around a curvy clay road at the top of the hill, the one called Poplar Springs.

My life was in shambles. I found myself alone with my girl and my boy.

He visited me at my mama’s because we had been visiting the church, my children first for Sunday School and then I joined in.

Word spread quickly in the tiny rural place of my home, my dilemma a disgrace, it only made me strong.

So, I asked Him how I should pray for God’s help to get through.

His reply,

Just pray for mercy.

So, I did and I do.

Because the mercy I prayed for back then when my babies were young is the mercy I remember still now, and continue to seek.

Mercy in unexpected hardship, mercy in times of unknown outcomes, mercy that wraps its arms around me and is strengthened through remembering.

Strengthened even more in relating to others. Others recorded in God’s word.

The woman at the well called out by others and Jesus. The man who wanted healing but never thought to push himself towards the waters, the man called Saul who became Paul; yet, still knew he wasn’t able on his own.

He knew he needed mercy, for he would always remember how he’d been before, I believe this was his thorn “in his side”.

Like preparing for a storm that didn’t come with the devastation predicted, we should prepare for upheavals of a personal nature.

Praying not just when desperate, learning from God’s word not just searching for something to tell us all is well.

Believing all is well because we remember the mercies of before and we praise Him for the mercy of now.

Today, I’ll prepare good food for my son before he returns from his school’s evacuation. I’ll make enough in case my daughter stops by.

I’ll store up the goodness of these past few days, this weekend’s little victories and exchanges.

I’ll carry them with me as I rest in this time of merciful, this pleasant little place, this hill in my heart.

I’ll move on unafraid towards valleys that might come knowing I’m attended to lovingly, I’m held closely by mercy.

Pray for mercy, just pray for mercy.

My prayer, I once thought such an anxious desperate plea, now a dependence, a comfort and assurance.

If there are hills, there will be valleys.

So, we cling to the mercy of God, treasuring His truth.

God is for us.

God is with us.

Sun, Sit

Faith, family, grace, grief, heaven, Peace, Prayer, Stillness, Vulnerability

He sat so that I might see

The sunbeams that were

Soon to be sunset.

We’d walked a sauntering stroll

Purposefully so and the same prayer,

A thought unspoken.

Peace for them, peace surround them

Evidently, all around and real.

As our neighbor lies passing.

The thought I keep thinking.

He paused and I attempted new prayer

But, nothing came.

Peace, I asked again.

Peace.

And the Lab sat until I said “Come on.”

We continued on.

Continued on.

August ‘63

Abuse Survivor, bravery, Children, confidence, contentment, courage, Faith, family, grace, heaven, memoir, mercy, Redemption, Stillness, Uncategorized, Vulnerability

Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. – 1 Corinthians 13:7

The greatest thing happened yesterday, more special than anyone will understand. I saw myself surrounded by love and I am hesitant to say; but, I am thinking it may be the unlocking of so much more, the freedom to change my perspective, to alter my imaginary ideas of what I was incapable of remembering.

That’s me there. The bobbed bangs and even back then I was unable to open my eyes for the shot. That’s me surrounded by love in the August of ’63 when I turned 3.

I’ve just read two separate perspectives on love after waking up with the realization that “we should just love”.

I can’t say how sleep unearthed this necessary proclamation.

It may have been the weekend with family, the coming together of us from different places and paths that had taken us all spread out from one another are bringing us back together.

In need of the other’s love.

In need of connecting again as if we were small and couldn’t help but be gathered together cousins, sisters, uncles, aunts, and dogs.

This morning I read of how disillusioned Jesus may have been perceived to be.

How he saw others as redeemable and that was all he saw. He saw them as returners to His Father’s love and He saw them without judgment of the places their hands, hearts, and feet had been before they came or returned from wandering.

I’d like to say I love this way. That I don’t pretend that my concerns over others is not judgment, that it is only my hoping for them to be better.

I’d love to know I could love, and that my love wouldn’t be questioned.

That I’d not have ideas about others that humbled me when they were conclusion jumping wrong.

That I’d love the way family loves, bound together although disjointed by life.

That I’d love without judgment, that my love would be childlike and innocent in acceptance and mature and intentional in the reality of its necessity and giving of grace.

I’d love to love like Jesus.

I believe I shall love better, knowing, after all, I have been loved, was and am.

The little girl in the pointy hat, the stretchy string pinching our necks as we all gathered around the table with our mamas, daddies, aunts, uncles, grandmothers, grandfathers and a bird dog patiently waiting for a scrap.

Children, now adults, all found our way despite stumbling, falling, faltering along the way.

One, Stephanie, not with us, missed so much more than time can attempt to measure. Others, babies then, too tiny for the table and some yet to be conceived.

When we all get to heaven, what a day of rejoicing that will be!

We all were loved, I’m so sorry to have ever doubted.

For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. – John 1:16

Love endured, endures still.

So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love. – 1 Corinthians 13:11-13

Coffee and Morning

bravery, confidence, contentment, courage, Faith, family, love, memoir, Peace, praise, Prayer, Redemption, rest, Stillness, Teaching, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, waiting, wonder

On our final beach day, I wake to the sound of lawnmower instead of sweet birds, the closest to sleeping in all vacation and the landscapers are I guess, trying to beat the heat.

Timely, typical.

I groan.

A dog, I decide small, someplace chimes in and it’s crazy because both our dogs left early, yesterday with the children.

Isn’t it ironic? …it figures.

Alanis Morissette

Redirecting the day, I start the coffee and go for the pretty cup, not a morning I’ve had quiet.

Today, I return to bed and inventory my prayer list.

Haphazard or just right I had wondered when I couldn’t squeeze it in, my typical time alone.

So, one word was all. “Insight” was my petition.

I’m looking over my list now and what I just experienced, thinking about what felt like literal stirring in my soul, an uncomfortable unrest.

We watched the waves last night under the crescent moon.

High over the ocean from the pier, the sound of the churning up from underneath, the bringing in of new and the taking out of old, the tide a gentle yet powerful change.

My word, again.

Insight.

Hoping for change; but, maybe scared that quite very possibly it is possible.

Scary, the reality that God is readying me for something different and I know it.

Say to wisdom, “You are my sister,” and call insight your intimate friend, – Proverbs 7:4

I know it because my chest is filled with stirring over the potential and it makes me just a little bit afraid.

Returning to my words and His word, I read about the way He carries me, helps me carry my load and I’m remembering His eye on the sparrow and I’m remembering He is the potter, I’m just clay.

And I’m glad for the storing up of these promises because I’m believing based on this stirring that He is preparing me and He is preparing new and new ways.

I’ll be strong, stronger with Him helping to carry me and my load.

Faces like Flint

bravery, Children, courage, Faith, family, marriage, mercy, Prayer, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, wonder

Walking in step with the other, he paused when she paused. Each holding a skinny canned beverage boasting caffeine.

I’m standing in the kitchen of our vacation place, cleaning up from the breakfast spread, I look down to stare.

I’m drawn to their partnership, she takes his drink as he looks down towards the little boy with his face towards his lap and his arms angled perfectly at his sides, his legs positioned the same, the child seated in a small wheelchair.

It’s early and not so crowded, already hot, I decide they’re set on letting him see the ocean, planning to beat the Saturday crowd.

The man waits while the woman lights her cigarette, he takes a sip from his can and then passes it back to her. She manages all three, her Red Bull, his Monster and her Marlboro.

With both hands, he grips firm the wheelchair and as they pass by underneath, I step back, hoping to go unnoticed, my gaze and my sad sympathy.

Because they were determined in their partnership, their faces without expression, their eyes hollowed slightly.

Their day unfolding and being met by their best effort to continue, I felt.

I looked away. It’d be a shame I decided to have them see the pity in my eyes or worse, really, the acknowledgment of gratitude in my gaze that my life is mine.

But the Lord GOD helps me; therefore I have not been disgraced; therefore I have set my face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be put to shame. – Isaiah 50:7

Their faces set like flint and continuing forward, Lord help them I pray, lighten their loads and bless them in their endeavors with their child, help them to know you see them, that you see them unafraid and unashamed. Help me to see others, see others more than I see me.

The Same Still

Children, courage, daughters, Faith, family, kindness, love, memoir, Motherhood, Trust, Uncategorized, Unity, Vulnerability, wonder

All the pretty pots sat near the sill.

Tender colors and smooth shapes. My niece has become a potter and all of her pieces, she’d brought home.

My weekend, I’ve named the weekend of nieces and it was a whirlwind, my daughter and I began at 5:20 in the morning on a Thursday and keep goin’ til late night on a Sunday.

I kept thinking, calling it, our trip on the “crazy train”.

Takeaways once we made it home through uncertain outcomes, a baby girl, perfection…a moonlit boat ride, a tropical storm, a downpour on a skinny back road and a time for bed ice cold beer with my uncle, excited over us joining him in the indulgence and laughter ’cause I decided not to be stubborn, to not keep driving on.

So we stayed the night with Aunt Boo because the rain had set in, the radar made my daughter a little scared.

Oh, the takeaway, yes, back to what I realized while walking, finally back home.

My family is diverse.

God has flung us one way and another and all within a three hour or so perimeter. Vastly different now, I kept thinking we are.

But, oh in many ways the same, just reshaped, reworked, fashioned as God would have us be, has had us become.

“But now, O Lord, you are our Father; we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand.”

‭‭Isaiah‬ ‭64:8‬ ‭ESV‬‬

Each of us, reflecting the other, changed only slightly by life’s ripples and waves.

My brother in law noticed me in my sister. I noticed my daughter in my niece. My daughter noticed my son in my brother in law and I noticed my mama and my daddy in the newborn great niece.

I noticed my daughter in me, oh, that’s a given.

In my brothers, I saw myself and in my nephew, I saw his daddy. In my niece, I saw me.

In my sister, well,

I saw my baby sister.

Time changes many things, grows us, moves us, melds us and muddles and befuddles us.

But, change us deep down?

Maybe not so much at all, just all worked a little differently, made to work a little differently.

Not meant for sameness, only similarity.

We, the work of His hands.

Reflections of those gone before us and looking over us, of one another and of God.

All things work for good, we all the work of His hands, vastly different, still the same.

Still, the same.

The same, still.

Bird on a Limb

bravery, Children, courage, daughters, Faith, family, memoir, mercy, Motherhood, Peace, Redemption, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, wonder

There’s a bird on the branch of the old pine tree. At first it sat sideways on the fencepost. I turned from my coffee and it caught my eye, it’s belly so full and white,

I could see from the window. It waited it seems for my turning.

I stared.

It sat.

I walked outside and naturally it flew away and then it crossed my path to perch in the crepe myrtle. Again, until I got too close and it took up to the sky to rest on the thick limb of pine.

I just read what I know in my morning devotional, a confirmation that my contemplation over seemingly insignificance is never as I’m described “too deep”.

Nothing in our life is random or meaningless. Even when we don’t understand…

In Touch, Dr. Charles Stanley

The strangest thing it seemed occurred on Sunday. I’m traveling the interstate and notice what appears to be cloth of some sort, a red ribbon I decide.

I continue on expecting to see the breeze created by speeding cars lift it up and away.

Instead, I see a “red bird”, the bright red male of the couple, lifting itself frantic and fiercely hoping to avoid the white monstrosity of metal, my bumper.

With a loud bump the bird, failing to fly quickly enough meets my car and from there I presume lands someplace else most likely not surviving.

The thing is, it’s Mothers Day and my heart was looking for birds and feathers and such already, thinking of my mama long passed.

Melancholy over the void, determined to not be miserable.

However, I’m met with a bird’s tragic intersecting of my car.

“Ohhh no.” I moaned low and longing. My son’s reply, a knowing chuckle over my reaction, what other response could he give? Must be tough to be 20 with a mama who can be so thought-filled. Who knows, maybe he’s the same, my daughter too.

Deep thinkers us all, perhaps.

Surely knowing I’d not be able to let it go, this not at all happenstance happening to me on Mother’s Day, noticing.

Initially, I thought the worse, the vibrant male cardinal telling me disaster is near, someone’s passing is to be expected.

What a dreadful thought, an immediate conclusion, that “this is your sign” get ready for the taking away of someone you love.

Momentarily, we arrived and I entered the big sanctuary with my daughter and son having prayed prior, “Father, help me to be attentive to your presence, open my mind and heart to the Holy Spirit.”

The music was moving, the sermon meaningful. My eyes filled with warm tears to be reminded that I matter, when the statuesque young woman, oblivious to all the congregants opened her hands in rhythm with her soul and voice and sang and I cried quietly, understanding.

No one needed to know.

But me.

All these pieces

Broken and scattered

In mercy gathered

Mended and whole

Empty-handed

But not forsaken

I’ve been set free

I’ve been set free
Amazing grace

How sweet the sound

That saved a wretch like me, oh

I once was lost

But now I’m found

Was blind but now I see

Oh, I can see it now

Oh, I can see the love in Your eyes.

Broken Vessels, Hillsong

I can see it now.

“Pay attention.” I’ve decided the red bird was sent to say, from my Father.

“There are things you’ve stopped noticing as profound, the sightings of the birds and the sounds of their song, you’ve allowed them to be common, you’ve lost your keen longing to notice and be still in that notice.

You’ve considered like most, that it’s silly to believe this way.”

This morning, the bird with the fluff of fat white feathers for her belly and I had a staring contest. She sat, I watched. She moved and then returned and it’s not the bird who knows my need, nor anticipated my steps, impossible for that to be so.

It’s God who knew and knows.

Who reminded me to notice and made my pitiful and woesome imagining of the worst possible story into a reminder of what I’d lost, what I’d forsaken for other pursuits, distractions and decidedly doubtful dances with the devil.

A bird positioned in the middle of my interstate lane, mistaken for a ribbon, otherwise I’d have swerved to avoid and met God knows what.

Instead, it’s message so unavoidable and attention seeking…notice.

Pay attention.

Notice, again.

You forgot for a bit, needed to see.

God is everywhere.

The red birds and the fat mama birds and the voice of a woman who reminded me that He makes beautiful things of us.

God is everywhere.

Don’t forget to notice

His ways.

“For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”

‭‭Isaiah‬ ‭55:9‬ ‭ESV‬‬