The Art of Everything: Come to Your Senses

 

The Art of Everything:

Come to Your Senses

Back in the early days of my stint as a home schooling mom, someone recommended to me the series written by Charlotte Mason for home educators. I dutifully began reading the first volume and got about a third of the way through before an ill fated encounter with a bumble bee hive took all the wind out of my sails. I had great visions of nature walks in which my three “students” would draw beautiful pictures and write memorable accounts of the various specimens of creation we would encounter. (AND, I could also count it as PE, could I not?) After that day I herded them home while brushing the bees off their backs and yelling, “Run! Run!” none of us were all that eager to leave the house. It didn’t help that it was summer in Texas and it was hot. As has often been my experience, life got in the way, and the books sat on my shelf for many years before I passed them on to someone else. All I can say for sure about my homeschooling efforts is that my children are functioning members of society, and none of them (as yet) has expressed resentment towards me for what I see as being a minimally successful effort at educating them. 

There is one portion of what little Charlotte Mason I read that has stuck with me through the years. While I didn’t really emphasize it as a teacher, it has lately been resurrected in my own life. This is the practice of observation. Ms. Mason encourages an exercise in which you are given a limited amount of time to look at your surroundings, and then you must turn your back and list everything you can remember seeing. I haven’t done this exercise, although I have toyed with the idea of trying it. However, I have begun to develop in myself a habit of noticing my surroundings. 

Right now I can look out the window and see the breeze blowing through the leaves of the various plants. I have just noticed how differently the wind affects the large elephant ear leaf as opposed to the leaves on the oak tree. And the weeds that need to be pulled from my garden blow in a different way altogether. I’ve also noticed that my peace lily across the room from me has flowers on it that have stayed green, instead of being white, like they were before I moved it away from the widow, where direct sunlight was making it wilt (or was it the air from the vent in the ceiling blowing too directly on it?). 

I have a friend who always posts pictures of the sky on his facebook page. My mom and sister always notice the clouds. Because of these people expressing their observations, I notice the sky. And when I do, I see how it is different from the last time I saw it. 

I spent a week on the beach in January, and was struck by the changes in color of the water and the sky from one day to the next. In fact, we were on a peninsula that was narrow enough that if you stood in the middle, you could see the bay on one side, and the ocean on the other. On more than one day there was a marked difference in the level of cloud coverage and wind from one side of the land to the other. Along with the pleasing effect observing the changing landscape has on one’s mood, there is the added effect of showing us just how amazing is our Creator.

My beach companion mentioned to me that nature is full of beautiful gifts from God. He did not have to make it so varied and beautiful, but He did – at least in part for the benefit of His children. I actually think He couldn’t have done any differently. Creation is a reflection of His nature. It takes everything from the vast sky and ocean and mountain to the intricate detail of DNA and atoms and things unseen by naked eyes to encompass who He is. What I think is remarkable is that He, then, created us with multiple senses that allow us to appreciate this world in a variety of ways. 

I believe there is much to be learned about God through observation of the things He has created. Psalm 19:1 tells us that the heavens declare the glory of God. Romans 1 tells us that God’s invisible attributes are understood by the things that are made. Psalm 8 describes the humbling effect of looking at the night sky and the works of God’s creation. “What is man, that you are mindful of him?” 

There is another home schooling experience that has managed to stay at the forefront of my mind. (I actually think I learned more from teaching my kids that they did). In a science book, there was a one page blurb about Charles Haddon Spurgeon. Apparently he was one who made a habit of being out in nature with the eyes of an observer. He believed that much could be learned about God through observation of His creation, and he regularly used examples from his time outdoors in his sermons. I mentioned this to a pastor friend who mentors pastoral interns. He told me he requires the interns under his tutelage to work in his garden. His goal is to help them develop the discipline of seeing the spiritual implications of nature (and also perhaps to get rid of some weeds). 

Sometimes being artistic is as simple as appreciating the art. Creating art is good, but wouldn’t it be somewhat less good if there was no one around to notice its beauty? I want to be mindful to notice the beauty that has been gifted to me by my Father. I want to notice more about the grass than whether it needs to be cut. I want to smell the flowers and the ocean air and the sweetness of baby skin. I want to see the yellowness of the yolk in my breakfast egg, the way a raindrop makes its way down the window pain, and the skittering of a sand piper skirting the flow of water on the beach as he searches for food. I want to hear the deep tones of the bass cello, the tinkling of a wind chime, the wind through the trees, the giggles of a child. I want to feel the roughness of a carpenter’s calloused hand, the heat of the sun coming through my window, the softness of my pillow as I lay me down to sleep. There is a lot said about using our gifts of talents to the glory of God. But I wonder, shouldn’t we use our gifts of senses to His glory as well?

What sense do you have today?

Not My Will

I have loved the book of Psalms since my first year in boarding school. It was then I discovered what a treasure trove of emotion is found in its pages. I’ve heard from more than one source that the Psalms encompass all human emotions, and I am inclined to believe it. It certainly gave expression to the anguish of a thirteen-year-old who found herself homesick, lonely, and in need of much comfort. Today is no different. As an old lady I still find myself endeared to a book in which so much heart revealing is done before the Creator. If David can speak so frankly about the many struggles he is experiencing, then I can too. I have always been one to feel things very deeply. I’m a heart-on-my-sleeve kind of person. I joke about keeping a running list of public places in which I have cried, but I laugh as readily. I love fiercely and I can hang onto bitterness like a champ. This aspect of my personality exasperated my earthly father. I often felt his disapproval in my youth when I couldn’t stop the tears from flowing. So to have the example of the Psalms – this laying open the heart before God, without fearing disapproval – it’s a concept I have grown to love.

Lately I have been camped in Psalm 39. A friend referred me to verse 13 a few months ago: “Look away from me, that I may smile again, before I depart and am no more.” It kind of made my head spin a bit. Did David really just ask God to back off so he could smile one more time before he died? I think I might have prayed that a time or two myself. 

Most of the time, the Psalms petition for God to shine his face upon us. This is the symbol of God’s blessing. It reflects the look of tender mercy that a loving father bestows on his beloved child. But it also means that God is paying attention to us. I am reminded of a quote from Hind’s Feet on High Places, “Love is beautiful, but it is also terrible – terrible in its determination to allow nothing blemished or unworthy to remain in the beloved.”  

And Hebrews 12:7 “If you endure chastening, God deals with you as with sons, for what son is there whom a father does not chasten? But if you are without chastening, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate and not sons. Furthermore, we have had human fathers who corrected us, and we paid them respect. Shall we not much more readily be in subjection to the Father of spirits and live? For they indeed for a few days chastened us as seemed best to them, but He for our profit, that we may be partakers of His holiness. Now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but painful: nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.” 

So God’s blessing, having His face shine upon us, means that we are being sanctified. We are being conformed to the image of His Son. It is a good thing. 

But I have been there in that place that David speaks of in Psalm 39. I’ve been in verses 1-3  trying to hold my peace and keep a muzzle on my mouth while the wicked prosper around me. I have felt the fire burning in my heart until I have to speak (and generally regret it). I have considered the frailty of life, and taken comfort in the brevity of it as in verses 4-6. I have reminded myself as in verses 7-9 that my only hope is in the Lord and that I need him to deliver me from my own transgressions and those of the fools with which I share the world. And I know what it is to hold my tongue and accept the difficulties of this world as being from the kind hand of my great Redeemer. And I know, how I know! the weariness that makes David say in verse 10, “Remove your plague from me: I am consumed by the blow of your hand.” I have existed in the last few verses of this Psalm so many times that it feels as comfortable as an old sweater. 

Oh how weary I get of this life sometimes. I want to be found faithful. I want to be sanctified. I want to hold nothing so dear as to be like my Savior. But please, dear Lord, understand me when I say I need a moment’s peace to catch my breath. Please understand that I can’t take the brightness of Your perfection on my sinful heart any more today. Just look away for a minute and let me breathe!

Does He understand? Can He possibly fathom what it feels like? Truth be known, as long as I have been a Christian, I still resemble David more than Christ. David was terribly flawed. And so am I. Can an incarnate God, who knew no sin, truly understand the weight of this life on my shoulders?

Yes.

Yes! The Christ who spent 40 days in the wilderness being tempted by Satan understands weariness and hunger and temptation more than I have known. The Christ who was betrayed by one who was in his inner circle understands. The Christ who was never without someone wanting something from him understands. The Christ who was constantly challenged and accused and plotted against understands. The Christ whose closest friends couldn’t even stay awake and pray with him as the hour of his crucifixion drew near understands. The sinless Christ who bore the punishment for my sins understands. He who saw the face of God turn away from him on the cross understands loss in ways I never will.

Hebrews 4:14-16: “Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” 

Jesus did the same thing as David, you know. He went to his Father and poured his heart out. In Matthew 26 starting at verse 46, the scene is laid out for us. Jesus takes his disciples to a place called Gethsemane and he tells them, “My soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even unto death. Stay here and watch with me.” (which we know they didn’t – they fell asleep). And then he went off by himself, fell on his face, and prayed. He prayed that God would not make him go through this terrible ordeal. Let that sink in a minute. He was so sad he thought he would die, and he asked God to think of some other way to accomplish His will. He did not want to face the wrath of God. 

And then Jesus said, “nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.” 

These words are not at the end of Psalm 39. David, like me, could not get past his own sorrow at the moment to see the big picture. We just want it to stop, at any cost. But Jesus, our Great Shepherd, saw beyond his present sorrows to the glory yet to come. He laid down his life for his sheep. Let me not lose sight of this. Let me remember whose image it is that I am being brought to bear. My Great High Priest. He knows my every sorrow. He knows, to depths I cannot fathom, the difficulties and temptations of this world. And He bore up under them for my sake. If I never accomplish any other part of his image, let me learn this one thing: not as I will, but as You will, my great Creator and King.

I am thankful for David. I am thankful for the transparency we see in the Psalms. I am thankful for the example of pouring out my heart to God. I am thankful for Psalm 39 that ends with this pitiful prayer that God would look away so that I might smile again before I die. Because, my life on this earth has not been easy, and I like to know it’s alright to tell God about it. But praise be to the Father who provided for us One who was willing to say, “not as I will, but as you will”. Praise be to my gentle Shepherd, who laid down his life for me. Praise be to the Holy Spirit, who when I am weak in my resolve, and beg him to back off on the whole Sanctification thing, loves me enough to not heed my request. 

 

The Art of Living

In case you hadn’t heard, my sister died. I was standing there holding her hands and singing to her as she slept and breathed labored breaths. She didn’t respond to my touch or my song. They say that the hearing is the last to go, but I don’t know how they could possibly know that. At any rate, I had no indication from her that she heard me, just as I had no sensory indication that God heard the prayer that I sang over her.

Pass me not O gentle Savior,
Hear my humble cry,
While on others Thou art calling,
Do not pass me by.

Savior, Savior, hear my humble cry!
While on others Thou art calling,
Do not pass me by.

And then it happened. There at the last word, it appears that God did hear my humble cry on her behalf, and my sister ceased the labor of taking in air. She just stopped. And in the silence that ensued I stared at her in disbelief. Was this really it? Was she finally gone to her rest? And suddenly my heart cried out, “Not yet! Not yet! I don’t know how to live without her!”

There was a memorial service in which I both sang sweet harmony with my surviving siblings, and spoke words of sorrow and hope. There was another memorial service in which I spoke memories. There were days in the home that my mother and my sister shared with my sister’s husband and son. Days where I carried around the piece of paper in which the tragedy of our loss was coldly proclaimed in legal terms. I worked on getting my sister’s name removed and mine put in its place on all my mother’s important documents and accounts.

It’s no wonder then, that my words at the art show where my sister was honored were scattered and gangly. Words are my thing, but the overwhelming flood of emotions that came with me to that venue were turned into a raging torrent when I saw her picture staring back at me from the center of her art display. And then I saw her husband across the room and the tears flowed for us both. So I walked away feeling ashamed that I wasn’t able to express myself with the grace and beauty my sister deserved at that moment.

This is what I wanted to say. This is what I meant to convey on that occasion:

For Cindy, art wasn’t something she did, it was something she was. It was a way of living. She read various books that taught how to foster a creative mindset in all areas of life. She saw it as a means of worship. It influenced every aspect of her day.

You could see this in the way she drank her tea in the morning. On her tray was a china cup and saucer, a small silver creamer and sugar bowl and a pot with a cheerful cozy she had knitted herself. She would take this tray to her bedroom where she had created a tiny retreat that was just for her. She had a green snuggle chair with ottoman. On one side was a wicker basket shelf that held her variety of obscure books, her journals, pens, tissues, and fingernail files. On her left were containers of art projects and knitting supplies. It was here she started her day writing her pages (The Artist Way), and drinking her Yorkshire Red.

You could see her creativity in the way she worked with her succulents and planned her flower gardens. You could see it in the way she cooked, in the things she knitted, in the gifts she gave, in the letters she wrote, in the clothes she wore.

The beauty of seeing art in this way, is that it makes it accessible to people like me who will never be able to create a painting that anyone would want to hang in their house (I recently found out my son hates it when I say that – but my goal isn’t really to have a painting hanging in someone’s house). I want to learn to incorporate beauty and art in my life the way she did. It has become something I think about as I go through my day. I hope to share with you some of the ways I have accomplished this, and perhaps discuss the way we bear the image of our Creator when we are creative. More about that later.

Towards the end of her life when she was forced to depend on the rest of us for so much, she was incredibly patient with our lack of imagination and with the way we forgot the details that were so important to her. But there were days when her patience ran out, and she would let it be known that we had not put enough ice in her water, or had put too much sugar in her tea (also, I was banned from making her toast). One such day she was particularly irritated at the way people would put their dishes in the sink, or by the sink, when the dishwasher was right there. There were a lot of us in the house that week, and, well, we weren’t keeping her space clutter free. She made the statement to me with strong conviction, although her voice was not particularly strong any more, “I don’t believe in procrastination destinations!” I remember thinking to myself as I envisioned my suitcase that was full of dirty clothes and my house with various projects that had to be left undone to make another trip to New Braunfels, “My whole life is a procrastination destination.”

I had put my husband in the nursing home on a Tuesday, and had made my first trip to New Braunfels on the following Thursday. The year and a half since had been a series of trips back and forth between my husband and my first family. Every time I left one for the other, I felt the guilt of leaving someone without adequate help. And then my father died, and then my sister died, and my mom moved into assisted living, and I looked at myself in the mirror and saw the proverbial dishes by the sink and I didn’t have any idea who I am or what my life is supposed to be.

I have the convenience of time and freedom to determine what are my priorities. I have the inconvenience of time and freedom that can thoughtlessly be filled up with whatever presents itself first. I have floundered. I have frittered away time. I have contemplated my life ad nauseam.

After way too long, (considering the amount of good teaching I have had) I realized that I have been asking the wrong question. Instead of asking who I am, I need to be reminding myself who He is. I need to be asking what can I do this day to seek the Kingdom of God and His righteousness.  I can’t really answer the question of who I am and what I am supposed to accomplish in this world apart from who God is. Because, as a Christian, my identity is intimately and intricately wrapped up in His Kingdom work. If I am to accomplish any large and significant things, it will be because of many seemingly mundane moments of just being obedient in the here and now. And if I never accomplish anything of worldly significance, what is that to me? I’m here to do my Father’s bidding. So for the moment, I am laying to rest the question of what I am supposed to do with the rest of my life. I’m back to the basics: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind. And love your neighbor as yourself.”

I have hopes. I have goals. I have things that I would like to accomplish. I want to be useful. But I affirm with Paul that whatever things are gain to me are nothing compared to the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord (Phil 3:7-10).

So for today, this is my goal: “Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, O LORD, my strength and my Redeemer.” (Ps 19:14)

That is all. That is all.

 

 

 

Cancer Like a Silence Grows

Is there anyone in the world who doesn’t know my sister is dying? It seems that even those who don’t know her must have felt the paradigm shift that happened when her body cried, “uncle” just last week after having fought and lost a three way battle for the past year and a half. The cancer so cruel and unrelenting ever pressing pain here and there, being beaten back on one front, but rounding the flank on another. And the chemotherapy fighting back, but with so much disregard for the massive collateral damage it leaves in its path. Her poor body trying desperately to hang on while the battle rages – like an inmate in a prison camp who can only hope to survive until the war is over – hoping agains all odds to still be standing when the last enemy falls. But the wrong side is winning and she can’t hold out any longer for an ally that is losing ground on every front.
And I must stand by and watch the cancer troupes come pouring in by the droves. Piling on the pain while confiscating those things that would make her last days on this earth bearable. All I can do is watch as the buildings crumble and the tanks roll in.
The fact that she can’t digest food hasn’t caused her taste for tea to wane, so we lift our cups to share and old ritual and then we pump it out through a tube.
Precious and few are the moments of lucid conversation before the next dose of pain control is absorbed through her cheek and she drifts away to a place of oblivion where she has temporary respite and I am locked outside alone, wishing I could enter her dreams so I could just be near her once again.
Loved ones brought together in tighter bond by the ropes of shared grief and loss. Tears mingle with anger and laughter and things that dull the senses for a moment. We connect in the, “I know,” and “It hurts,” and “why her?” We hold hands and cry on shoulders. We worry about each other in turns. We make room for each other by the prison bed.
In spite of the pain and tubes and the incomprehensible seeping away of life, she pats hands, comforts grieving children, offers sympathy and prayers to strangers who prattle on about their woes as if she didn’t have enough worries of her own at the moment (I want to scream at them, “Get your own sister!”). She extends her hand and whispers gratitude to those strangers who come to tend her.
And I want to be just like her. It’s the thing that doesn’t change.

Remembering Dad

This is my first father’s day since my dad died. I miss him, but I am not devastated. I was blessed to see my dad live to a ‘reasonable’ age. The end was hard enough on him that I had begun to pray that God would take him home. I honor him today by posting the remarks I spoke at his memorial service in January:

I know this will come as a great shock to those of you who worked with my dad in any capacity, because he hid it so well, but he was somewhat of a perfectionist. He had a tendency to look at any situation in terms of what needed to be fixed, and he wasn’t too shy about telling you what you could do to improve. As his children, we knew that he loved us, and that he was proud of us, but we also got the message that whatever we were doing needed to be tweaked a bit one way or another.

This perfectionism is what caused him to become quite the wood worker. The first coffee table he made fell apart after a few months. He figured out what had gone wrong, and the next one didn’t fall apart. He would do his research, he would learn from his mistakes, and he would improve his results.

This perfectionism contributed to his high school quartet being good enough to gain him a scholarship to Hardin Simmons University, and it helped him graduate from high school early so that he could take advantage of that scholarship.

This perfectionism is what made him adept at foreign languages. When he graduated from seminary, he thought that the whole point of learning Greek was so that he could use his Greek New Testament to prepare his sermons. Not just as a reference to clarify a word or two. He used it as his text. He became known for his Swahili proficiency in East Africa; to the point that he spent his last years, there, teaching other people the language. Later on, he learned Spanish for the purpose of being able to communicate with my brother’s family.

Dad’s perfectionism meant that for whatever job he was assigned at any given time, he would be the first to arrive, the last to leave, and he would give the task his full attention. It made him dependable. You knew that if Eucled Moore was on the job, it would get done. And he would find ways to get it done more efficiently and with better results than it was done yesterday. He pursued the ideal.

My dad’s pursuit of excellence is what made his sermons well thought out, well planned, and polished so that he got the message across in understandable, applicable detail, that was exactly the right length. He had little patience for preachers who ran over their allotted preaching time, no matter how good their message.

Dad was not an adventurer. We as his children joke about the number of places we have been in the world – without seeing anything. We spent hours in airports all over Europe. This is something I understood a bit more clearly when I had five children of my own. It was just too overwhelming to think about navigating a foreign country with five littles in tow. And feeding all those mouths in a restaurant could break you. But his lack of adventurous spirit did not keep him from doing what he believed was his calling. He did leave his home in Crosby, Texas, and travel to the other side of Texas to be the first in his family to go to college. He did leave Texas to follow his call to the ministry, traveling further and further away from home and family until finally he was on the other side of the world. This made him a sort of reluctant pioneer, or trailblazer for his family. But I don’t know that he was really cognitive of that at the time. He was just putting one foot in front of the other as he followed the path God had laid out for him. The result of this has been that we as his children have come to be adventurers. (Well, most of us have.)

My dad was a man who looked for ways to serve wherever he was. And he did what he thought was right no matter what the personal price. I never saw him waver in his faith.

He was a man who valued family. We sat around the table for every meal at his house. We have many fond memories from our youth of meals where tears of laughter rolled down both cheeks as we competed to come up with one more pun. This bent for corny humor that you see in us originated with him. He was known for saying things like, “That makes my happy pooch out all over” Or on a hot day, “I wish I had a tall glass of ice tea, a neck a foot long, with a taster ever half inch!” This love of family extended to his parents and sisters. He did what he could to help care for his elderly parents in their last days, even though he was already struggling with Parkinson’s during that time. And there was never a doubt in our minds that my parents loved each other.

My dad loved music. He loved to sing, he love to hear us sing. He exposed us to all sorts of music: Sons of the Pioneers, Jim Reeves, Mozart, John Denver, Folk music, pop music, easy listening. Every furlough he would upgrade his equipment, from turntable, to cassette, to reel to reel. He was going to have music. No matter how large the crowd on a Sunday morning, I could pick his tenor voice out over the rest of the congregation.  In the past 5 or so years, he became enamored with the Polka shows on TV, watching them over and over (and over, and over). I am sad to say I was not around the day he talked mom into trying to learn a few polka steps from one of those shows. But alas, the Parkinson’s was too advanced at that stage to give him much success.

The last few years were very hard for dad. He lived to see his disease take away his ability to speak or sing, his ability to work in his shop, his ability to drive, his ability to read or write, his ability to think clearly. He fought hard to hang on to the things that defined him, and was grieved with each new limitation. But in a moment of clarity a few weeks before his passing, he looked me in the eye and said, “I know I am coming to the end of my life, and that’s ok. I am not afraid.” In the last few moments of consciousness, he raised his arms and looked beyond this world to the next as if to say, “I am ready to come home.” So we grieve our loss, but we do not grieve as those who have no hope. We know that dad has finally achieved the ideal. He has found the perfection. He can finally rest from his life long pursuit of the excellent, because he has found it. And I think I can hear his voice singing above the heavenly congregation.

 

Let Me Explain

I am always intrigued by the different responses I receive from my blog posts. It’s usually a mixture of people who are just finding my blog for the first time, people who have read it from the very beginning, and people who pop in from time to time. Some know my story, some don’t. The responses range from words of encouragement to words of thanks to words of advice. The comments are quite supportive and loving. But lately I have noticed that there seems to be a variety of views as to why I share my story in the raw-ugly-truth sort of way that I do. I explain it a little in The Very Beginning, but I don’t think most people go back to read an entire blog, so I thought I might take a minute to once again explain my purpose.

When I was early on in this journey, I started buying up books by the dozen about how to help someone get their life back after a massive stroke. The books I bought were primarily written by people who had rehabilitated successfully, and their books were filled with all sorts of motivational speeches and “simple” steps that just weren’t all that simple in my present situation. My husband wasn’t motivated, and I wasn’t making much headway, and the books seemed glib and glossy. I began to think I would like to read something from someone who was telling the whole ugly truth, instead of just hitting the high points. So I began writing the story I wanted to read. I began sharing the hard stuff and the embarrassing stuff and admitting I wasn’t being successful. It was my way to reach out to others who were just finding life so hard and uncooperative.

But I didn’t just want to commiserate with people. I wanted to give them something to hold onto in the midst of the storm. I try to express the spiritual lessons I have learned along the way, to express the humor (dark as it may be at times), to find the joy. I try to point out the silver lining, no matter how dim. I hope that I never sound hopeless, because I am not.

For those of you who have read my writing and found yourself saying, “Yes! that’s exactly how I feel, but could never say it out loud!” You are my target audience. I hope that my openness about my own struggle will help you realize that you are not alone, that you are not the only one. I hope that you can hold on the the Truth and be encouraged by the fact that there is meaning to the madness in this world. I hope that my words will give you the courage to reach out to other believers and be willing to express to them your struggles so that you don’t have to carry this burden alone. One thing I have found through my transparency is that there are people struggling with big issues all around me who haven’t had the nerve to say it out loud. Admitting my own weakness gave them courage to admit theirs and together is easier than alone.

For those of you who have read my blog and learned how to be more compassionate to people who struggle – have learned how to ask better questions and say fewer glib platitudes, you are my target audience. I want to help those who are not struggling learn how to more effectively serve those who are. I want to make you aware of how small things can sometimes be more appreciated than big things. I want to encourage you in the power of prayer. And I want you to store away Biblical truth. My pastor is prone to remind us that at any given time in our lives we are either just recovering from a difficult season, in a difficult season, or about to have a difficult season. “In the world you shall have tribulation.” It’s a fact of life. So if your life is pretty good right now, do yourself a favor and make good use of the time. Learn to think properly about the world.

It is not my goal to garner sympathy, make you worry about me, or make you feel guilty about your life being better than mine. I met a new friend this week who introduced me to the concepts of internal processing versus external processing. My understanding is that people who process life internally generally talk about things they have already worked out in their thinking. People who process externally talk about things they are trying to work out, because talking about them helps them think it through. My blog is a result of internal processing. I think about a blog post for days, weeks, even months before I write it. At that point, it flows out onto the paper in a practically completed form. I check it over several times to find the errors in structure, but I rarely change the content more that a few words here or there. What that means is that I am rarely in the thick of the battle when I post. I’ve already worked through it and gone on to the next thing. I write it raw, because that is the way I want to make my point, but it is rarely something I am sobbing through at the time.

My last post spoke honestly about my struggle with depression. This seemed to raise a lot of red flags for people. Let me assure you: While I deeply appreciate the struggles of William Cowper and the many times God prevented him from taking his own life, I am far from suicidal. I don’t allow myself to stay home and wallow. I do my best to find the balance between getting out and embracing life, and staying home to rest and replenish my spirit. For those of you who are into the Myers Brigs test, I walk the line between introvert and extrovert. I need equal parts of each. I am mindful of this, and do my best to be healthy. I have so many close friends who support me in their varying gifted ways, it’s kind of embarrassing. I have a church family that really is family in the truest and most beautiful ways. My siblings, my in-laws, my mom, my children, my grandchildren all surround me with far more love than I could ever earn. I could call a different person every day for months without running out of someone who will listen to my whining and pining. And then I have a professional counsellor who has to listen to me because I pay her. If you have read my post and offered yourself as someone I can talk to, can you please consider if there might be someone closer to home who could use your compassion? I am so humbled by the many offers from people literally all over the world. But I have a veritable wealth of resources, and I know for a fact that others do not. It would be terribly selfish if I kept you all to myself.

Having said that, I will say that I never turn down an offer for prayer. Yes, please continue to pray for me and my husband, and my children, and my recently widowed mom, and my sister who is fighting cancer. All these things weigh heavily, and I will gladly share the burden with those who will help me take it to the Lord.

So my dear readers, I say thank you. Thank you for reading, thank you for caring. Thank you for expressing your love for me. Be at peace. I am going to be just fine.

Mysterious Ways

A visit with my husband these days generally involves a litany of complaints about the mean charge nurse that comes on the weekends, the poor quality of the food, and the belief that some of the med aids are signing out his pain meds and then not giving them to him. It’s hard to listen to, because the charge nurse on the weekend doesn’t seem to love her job, so it’s believable that she is unpleasant. The food is pretty gross. And, well, while I am fairly confident they are giving him his pain meds, he believes they aren’t because he is still in pain. It wearies me on many levels. It isn’t the life I would have chosen for him. It saddens me that it has come to this.

Beyond that, it saddens me that he seems so incapable of applying himself to blooming where he is planted. I come in to the nursing home to visit him and see the man sitting in the lobby with his walker and his guitar, playing and singing (in spite of the bitter old woman on the other side of the room who finds “that kind” of music to be totally inexcusable). I see the group gathered around the table in the recreation room playing a game of dominoes or cards. I see the ones sitting outside soaking up the sunshine who greet me cheerfully as I walk in. Granted, they aren’t all that way. There are more than a few that choose to be like my husband – or worse. But there is proof that it is possible to be a resident at this very nursing home, and find a way to be happy, or at least to make the best of it.

If I ask if the nurse lectured him about calling them all the time because he is, actually, calling them all the time, he becomes irritable and defensive. If I suggest maybe she needs someone to pray for her, that maybe her life is hard, he becomes unresponsive. In the afterglow of our church family camp I waxed eloquent about how God was not unaware of his circumstances, and that we had to continue to have faith that there was a purpose to how things have developed in his life. I suggested that God was continuing the work He had begun in Strokeman many years ago and for some reason He has chosen to accomplish that through his present circumstances. He played possum. He closed his eyes and pretended to be asleep until I shut up.

So I come home and I am toast. I find myself unable to muster the energy to do much of anything. I will have a week, here or there, where I get up early, read my Bible, do a little writing and plan my day; all before running off to yoga. And then it unravels. I find myself sitting a lot. The dishes pile up, the clothes are laying on the floor, and I am watching Netflix. No follow through. No sense of urgency, no motivation. My whole demeanor shouts, “why try?”

A while back I had a really bad week. Full blown depression. It reminded me of a woman I had met in February who has struggled with severe depression for decades. I prayed for her. How hard it is to be the one who is depressed. The one who feels unsuccessful with life. The one who perpetually struggles to do the things that “normal” people do with seeming effortless consistency. I was reminded that having these struggles has made me more compassionate. I am far less likely to wonder why someone can’t get their act together, because – well, I know what that feels like from the inside. I wrote the following to a friend:

I have thought a lot about whether I am willing to “be” in depression if it will make me more useful to others. Can I be content to have hard times that seem to have no earthly solution if they can be used of God – even if only to bring fellow strugglers to mind so that I pray for them? I am so quick to want an escape, an ease of the burden, but maybe I need to have the tension of an uneasy life. “Lord make me willing to rest in the darkness until I see the light of You”. 

This has made me think about the kind of people who have been an encouragement to me in the midst of my difficulties.

There are the many examples of scripture: Job, who lost everything dear to him, and was left with a nagging wife, judgmental friends, and boils; Joseph who was sold as a slave by his brothers, and spent a good deal of time in jail for a crime he didn’t commit; David, who threw his whole life away on somebody else’s wife; John the Baptist who declared the coming of the Messiah, was thrown in prison, and Jesus never even came to visit him; Paul who wrote most of his epistles in a jail cell and sometimes mentioned those who had forsaken him. All of these stories with layer upon layer of helpfulness and application to my present life. But God…

Then there is William Cowper. Maybe you know some of the hymns he wrote. But you may not know he struggled his whole life with depression. He tried repeatedly to commit suicide. He was haunted by doubts that the grace of God extended to him. I would imagine that he would have assessed his own life to be anything but successful. Could he have ever foreseen the thousands of people who would benefit from his gifted writing? Could he have imagined for a moment that God would use weak, doubting, mentally ill William Cowper so mightily for His glory and the furtherance of His kingdom? Cowper couldn’t even muster the faith that some day he would be made whole. He saw the grace of God. He expressed it beautifully in his poetry and lyrics. His dear friend and teacher, John Newton, faithfully taught him all the good theology. But there was something that held on to him and filled him with despair.

It makes me think about 1 Corinthians 1. God uses the foolish things of this world to shame the wise.

Don’t get me wrong. I am not suggesting we all begin to flail ourselves and attempt to end our lives. I still believe it is better to find a way to be cheerful in whatever situation we find ourselves. I believe we are responsible to give thanks in all circumstances and endure hardship with patience. We need to take the battle seriously, and get up the next day ready to take up the fight all over again.

What I am suggesting is that God’s economy is not the same as ours. We don’t see things clearly, and we won’t until we see Him face to face. We can’t possibly measure the value of a spiritual life with our earthly measuring tools. I don’t have any idea what God is doing in my husband’s spirit at the moment. To me, his life seems mostly pointless, pretty tragic, and very depressing. All I can do is trust that there is more to this spiritual journey than is visible to the earthly eye. I don’t know if I will ever shake this cycle of depression, or if I will ever find the self discipline to make my life successful and meaningful by earthly standards. All I know is I have to get up every day and try.

I think for every William Cowper there are probably thousands of Christians who struggle in similar fashion and die in obscurity. No one sings their hymns. No one but God even remembers them a generation after they pass from this world. From our perspective, this would indicate failure. We want to be one of those “not many” mentioned in 1 Corinthians who are the wise, the powerful, the noble. “But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.” vs 27

This is God’s economy. He uses the weak, the low and despised, the nothings of this world so that we will not boast of our own success. All we have that is worth anything in the spiritual realm is Christ: His wisdom, His righteousness, His sanctification, and His redemption. He gives some of us the ability to rise above our circumstances, to reflect Christ in a way that brings courage and hope to fellow believers. But there are some who are not able to do this. Is it because they aren’t really Christians? Maybe, but who can know for sure? Is it because they haven’t applied the right formula to their daily quiet time? Maybe, but who can know for sure? What about those whose brains are damaged – maybe from birth – who can’t control impulses or comprehend great spiritual truths? Who can know for sure the condition of their spirit? Only God has the tools to measure these things.

Here is what I can glean from the life of our friend William Cowper: He availed himself to the means of grace. He read helpful books. He spent time with friends who encouraged him in the Truth. He studied the Word of God and applied it. He found ways to serve others. It didn’t keep him from being depressed. It didn’t keep him from making countless efforts to end his life. He probably never had a sense of accomplishment in anything he did, but he kept trying. And God used his sorry life to benefit me, long after he died, and long before I even knew his history.

So. I am learning to rest in the darkness – the unknown. God knows. I don’t have to comprehend what He is doing. I just have to keep living out my faith one step at a time. I have to fight against the urge to measure my life (or Strokeman’s) by the measuring sticks provided by this world. Because at the end of my life, all the things that would make me successful in earthly terms won’t be worth the dirt I will be buried in. (For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and is himself destroyed or lost? Luke 9:25) I am like a three-year-old. I want to know why. And sometimes all I get from my heavenly Father seems to be, “Because I said so.” I am learning to trust that like that proverbial three-year-old, I am not capable of comprehending all the whys. I just have to trust the goodness and wisdom of my Father.

I am developing a sense of wonderment about the spiritual realm, and the things that go on there. What is there in that dim mirror that I can’t comprehend? What transformations will take place in the seemingly foolish things of this world when I see my Savior face to face? Well, I must wait and see. For now the mirror is still quite dim. And I must be content to not know. I learned a long time ago that love is more an action than a feeling. I am learning the same about faith and hope. Faith is something I live, even when I don’t feel it. And hope is an anchor – not on things that might happen, but on the promises of God, who cannot lie, of things that will happen. And I am learning to be content that these are the three that remain when all else seems to be melting away.

Treasuring Christ

A most lovely group of ladies

Below is the second session from the women’s conference in Memphis. It’s probably longer than the first one – way too long to be socially acceptable for a blog post. I contemplated breaking it up into smaller chunks, but decided to keep it all together for cohesiveness of thought. 

In the first session we talked about the trustworthiness of Christ. He is our Creator, and the author and finisher of our faith. He is capable and faithful to do all that He has promised. But this would be small comfort if we did not have the assurance of His goodness. This is my reminder often in the midst of confusing circumstances, “God is sovereign, and God is good.” So even if I do not have any idea what He is doing in my life, or in the lives of loved ones, I can be sure that it is for His glory and for the good of His people.

In case you haven’t noticed, I have not been consistent in speaking specifically of Christ in our discussion today. I float back and forth between passages that refer to the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. I am no expert on the Trinity. We have recently gone through an extensive study of this doctrine on Wednesday nights. We studied the book, Delighting in the Trinity a few years back in our women’s Bible study. Both of these studies were very helpful to me. But any time I try to express what I understand about the Trinity,  I am reminded of a time in college when Jim Carnes was helping me with a paper I was doing for my philosophy class about Thomas Aquinas. He would explain a particular aspect of Aquinas’ theology, and then ask me if I understood. I would say, “yes” and he would say, “Ok, then explain it back to me.” And I would give him a blank stare. What I think I can say is that while there are three persons in the Trinity, the attributes of God are shared by all three. So I can’t talk about Christ’s goodness apart from the Father’s goodness or the Holy Spirit’s goodness, because it’s all the same goodness. So as we talk about treasuring the things that are specific to the person of the Son, like coming in the flesh to make atonement for our sins, we have to remember that Christ did this in perfect agreement with His Father and with the moving of the Holy Spirit in our hearts. A greater theologian than I might be able to be more specific about how these treasures are manifested in the person of the Son, but I best be less specific to keep from falling into heresy.

To help us meditate on the things we can treasure about our Triune God, I would like for us to look at Psalm 103.

Psalm 103

Bless the Lord, O My Soul Of David.
Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name!

2 Bless the Lord, O my soul,
and forget not all his benefits,
3 who forgives all your iniquity,
who heals all your diseases,
4 who redeems your life from the pit,
who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy,                                                                                       5 who satisfies you with good
so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.

6 The Lord works righteousness
and justice for all who are oppressed.
7 He made known his ways to Moses,
his acts to the people of Israel.
8 The Lord is merciful and gracious,
slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.
9 He will not always chide,
nor will he keep his anger forever.
10 He does not deal with us according to our sins,
nor repay us according to our iniquities.
11 For as high as the heavens are above the earth,
so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him;
12 as far as the east is from the west,
so far does he remove our transgressions from us.
13 As a father shows compassion to his children,
so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him.
14 For he knows our frame;
he remembers that we are dust.
15 As for man, his days are like grass;
he flourishes like a flower of the field;
16 for the wind passes over it, and it is gone,
and its place knows it no more.
17 But the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him,
and his righteousness to children’s children,
18 to those who keep his covenant
and remember to do his commandments.
19 The Lord has established his throne in the heavens,
and his kingdom rules over all.
20 Bless the Lord, O you his angels,
you mighty ones who do his word,
obeying the voice of his word!
21 Bless the Lord, all his hosts,
his ministers, who do his will!
22 Bless the Lord, all his works,
in all places of his dominion.
Bless the Lord, O my soul!

As we look at this Psalm, we see that David stirs himself (and us) to offer praise to God. Just as with the model prayer Jesus gave His disciples, we see in this Psalm the

starting point is “hallowed be Your name”. But where the prayer asks that God’s name be hallowed, David spends time reminding himself (and us) what it is that causes us to hallow His name. When we use the Lord’s prayer as an outline, we would do well to pause at this phrase and take time to remind ourselves of the reasons we have to hallow His name. We should take the example laid out for us here and stir our hearts to worship by meditating on the benefits that we receive as His children.

One of the most helpful traditions my husband established for our family was one of taking the time before each meal to name one thing we had to be thankful for. There were days when it was easier than others to come up with an appropriate response. On especially hard days when I would have to dig deep to come up with something to be thankful for, it would help to focus my mind on important spiritual truths. On our worst days, we have so many gifts from our Creator. Just in our bodies we can see the miracle of life in the fact that without a conscious thought our chests rise and fall with breath. The blood continues to course through our veins. As believers we have the assurance of salvation, which not only gives us peace with God here on this earth, but also promises us a better life to come, when we will be given new bodies that are not susceptible to decay, and complete freedom from the ravages of sin. Let’s spend some time looking at the list David provides of things to be thankful for today.

1. Who forgives all your iniquity and heals all your diseases. Surely this is a great treasure. Forgiveness of sins is freely given to the poor in spirit. Isaiah 64:6 “All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags”. Isaiah 53:6 “All we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.” We could stop the list right there. The great treasure of forgiveness should be enough to lead our hearts to bless Him with all that is within us. But what of this phrase about healing our diseases? Surely God is the great physician, He is the author of all healing. I am counting on that for my sister who is fighting a valiant battle with cancer. But to say that He heals all of our physical ailments this side of heaven leaves us with a problem. After almost six years, I have no indication that God will be pleased to heal the damage my husband suffered from his stroke. My father died recently after suffering with Parkinson’s for over 20 years. We are all going to die of something, and for many of us, chronic ailments are a part of this life. So what could this mean? John Calvin gives it this commentary:

“The second clause is either a repetition of the same sentiment, or else it opens up a wider view of it; for the consequence of free forgiveness is, that God governs us by his Spirit, mortifies the lusts of our flesh, cleanses us from our corruptions, and restores us to the healthy condition of a godly and upright life.”

Here is the closer inspection of this particular treasure: Not only are our sins forgiven, but He continually works to bring us, heart and soul, into conformity with His Son. While physical healing seems to be tantamount when we are facing big health issues, it is such a small thing compared to what is truly promised here. I want to tell you what a beautiful thing it has been to see the Holy Spirit at work in the heart of my sister through this difficult trial. She is being healed in the depths of her soul. She is learning of forgiveness, and trust, and rest, and peace that passes all understanding. And it is effecting the people around her. I want desperately for God to heal her body. I cannot imagine this life without her. But I am brought to worship as I see her become more and more like her Savior. Truly this is a great gift that He not only gives us forgiveness of our sin, but then proceeds to work His way through our hearts, weeding out all traces of the old man.

2. Who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy. We are reminded that we were dead in our trespasses and sins, and the Holy Spirit breathed His life into us that we might be brought to life through the blood of Christ. Thus we were brought from the pit of spiritual death and surrounded by His steadfast love and mercy. This thought should humble us. Our salvation is not something we accomplished. It is something that was done for us and to us. We were brought to life, our eyes were opened, and we received the free forgiveness of sins. But we were not left to our own devices at that point. He surrounds us with His love and mercy, morning by morning. Not a day goes by in the life of a believer when they do not have the Holy Spirit present to continue the work that was begun at the time of salvation- at the foundation of the world. We have this Comforter with us in our darkest hour – when we have been forsaken by our earthly friends; when we are in the midst of great trouble, when we are facing the valley of the shadow of death. There with us is the steadfast love and mercy of the Lord.

3.Who satisfies you with good so that your youth is renewed like eagles. This reminds me of the precious gift God has given us in the establishment of His church. We are in the midst of a difficult journey through a difficult life. We are dragged down by the battle against our own sin. We are tried by the sins of others. We are frustrated by the cares of this world. And weekly we are brought by still waters and green grass to have our souls restored. God has given us this great feast each week in the gathering together of His people on Sunday for the preaching of the Word, singing of spiritual songs, corporate prayer, observing the ordinances and fellowship with our spiritual family. We are foolish if we do not take advantage of this wonderful treasure! Here is the place to renew our strength. Here is the reminder of what we have been given in Christ. Here is where we get and give the encouragement we need to continue to persevere through the coming week. Do you hunger to know more of Christ? Come, listen to the teaching of His ordained mouthpiece. This spiritual food gives us renewed vigor for the Spiritual battle that rages around us. How can we keep going? How do we continue? Our strength is renewed through the Sabbath rest. We live in a society that puts great emphasis on maintaining a youthful appearance. Imagine the amount of money and research that has been invested in finding ways to keep our skin and our hair and our bodies looking young and vibrant. I am going to tell you a great trade secret today. Trust in the Lord with all your heart. Your hair may turn gray, and your body may not be as strong and healthy, but you will have a beauty in your heart that will shine through your eyes. There is something very attractive about a person who has learned to rest in the Lord and is satisfied with the good things He provides.

4.The Lord works righteousness and justice for all who are oppressed. I am repeatedly reminded of the Beatitudes as I read this Psalm. In this instance, “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you and say all kinds of evil against you for my sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets before you.” For the most part we live in a country in which we do not often suffer

for righteousness sake. We are free, to live by our consciences. However, this seems to be changing. There are forces at work to bring about many restrictions on the Christian faith in this country. We may see in our lifetimes, or in our children’s lifetimes the doing away of many of our religious freedoms. In many other parts of the world, Christians lose their jobs, their homes, even their lives for the sake of the Gospel. Sometimes we see the Lord work to bring justice on this earth, in our time. Certainly we should pray for this. But the promise we see in Matthew 5 is that their reward will be great in heaven. We may not see justice in this world. Certainly many have died unjustly. But we do have the promise that the day is coming when at the name of Jesus every knee shall bow. God has already passed judgement on His people and found them pardoned by the blood of His Son. But the wicked still have their judgement coming. We must continue to conduct our lives according to His precepts trusting that in His timing He will work righteousness and justice.

5. He made known his ways to Moses, his acts to the people of Israel. God appeared to Moses and made known to him the way of salvation for the children of Israel. These ways were communicated to the people through Moses and Aaron. So today God continues to communicate through his appointed leaders, through the preached Word each Lord’s Day. God has consistently provided a way of salvation for his elect. And He consistently provides a way of making this salvation known. We have the treasure of the written Word. We have faithful ministers who study that Word and bring explanation of it to us regularly. We have the ordinances of baptism and the Lord’s Supper. We have the gift of prayer both individually and corporately. These are means that we should be persistent to make use of. (Am I repeating myself? Well, it bears repeating.) I think we sometimes have a tendency to go about our daily lives quite oblivious to these priceless gifts until we come to a difficult decision or a particularly hard trial, and then we pray a frantic prayer and open the Bible without a clue where to look for answers. How much wiser would it be if we would diligently make use of the treasures provided for us here on a habitual basis? When we come every Sunday and apply ourselves to the preaching and teaching offered to us, and make use of the times for corporate prayer, then when hard decisions have to be made, we have a foundation from which to draw wisdom. I think about the passage in James 1:5, “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.” We ask for wisdom thinking it will come upon us with a poof. God is giving it to us liberally every week when we gather together on the Lord’s day for corporate worship. We have the wisdom of the Holy spirit poured out through the preaching of the Word. We have the wisdom of fellow believers who have faced similar trials. We have the wisdom of our pastors who commit themselves to hours of study every week. Do the work of showing up and paying attention. Do the work of praying for your pastors as they prepare through the week. Over time, you will acquire the wisdom that is liberally provided for you.

6.The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in mercy. Have truer words ever been spoken? Look at the mercy of the Lord on the world in general; that he provides rain on the just and the unjust; that the earth produces food for all to consume, the sun provides warmth, that we have breath. That even those who revile His name are allowed to prosper in this life. He gives this and so much more to His chosen people. His great mercy toward us is that while we were still sinning He gave His only begotten Son to provide a legal pardon for our transgressions. And even as His children, we are so prone to doubt His goodness, and to disregard His right over our lives, and He is merciful in His fatherly discipline that brings us to repentance. Let us never forget how slow He is to anger. Abraham was told he would be the father of a nation whose number would be like the stars in the sky. I am just one of those many stars, and I know that daily my sinful heart would provoke him to great wrath. Multiply that to all His people, and you have some idea how slow to anger He is. Instead, He looks at us through the blood of His son and shows us mercy.

7. He will not always strive with us, nor will He keep His anger forever. This fatherly discipline that God uses is not a reactionary thing like the anger we experience. We become angry in a flash because we sense that our rights have been violated or that we have been wronged in some way. Our anger makes us want to strike out at the other person. God’s anger is not like this. He does not strive with us out of petty offense. He is perfect and his anger is perfect. When He brings a sinner low because of his sinful acts, it is with the purpose of bringing correction. It is with the purpose of reminding us of our need for redemption and mercy. When His children are humbled before Him and cry out for mercy, mercy is what they receive. What a comfort it is to know that while my sinful rebellion against God’s law deserves His anger forever, He does not strive with me forever. How can this be? On my best day I deserve His wrath moment by moment. I am constantly choosing my own interest over the interest of God’s glory and His kingdom. But!

8. He has not dealt with us according to our sins, nor punished us according to our iniquities. For as the heavens are high above the earth, So great is His mercy toward those who fear Him; As far as the east is from the west, So far has He removed our transgressions from us. God is not only merciful, but He is just. He could not look on our sinfulness and say, “Just forget about it. It’s no big deal.” No, that would not be consistent with his character. So He graciously and mercifully provided a way to make atonement for our sins. He gave His only begotten Son. This Son met the requirements to redeem us from our just judgement. This Son was dealt with according to our sins. He was punished according to our iniquities. This act of redemption by Jesus Christ is the very thing that has removed our transgressions from us. So that now, God looks at us and sees the righteousness of His son. And as a result of that, we call Him Father. We are adopted into His family and receive the benefits of heirs.

9. As a father shows compassion to His children, So the Lord shows compassion to those who fear Him. For He knows our frame; He remembers that we are dust. God is described here using terms we are familiar with. When we as parents look at our children, we sometimes have great compassion for them. We remember that they are young and that our expectations for them need to be adjusted accordingly. I know with my own children that I could be pretty inconsistent with this. Some days I may have had the correct amount of pity. I made allowances for a child’s maturity or for such things as lack of sleep or sickness. Sometimes I had too much pity, excusing the child’s ill behavior or bad attitude when I should have taught them self control. Often I lacked in my own self control, dealing with them out of impatience or not dealing with them at all, out of laziness. God’s pity is not like our pity. His pity is perfect. He is not swayed by circumstances or hormones or lack of sleep. His compassion does not come from a place of emotion, so it never fails. What a great comfort this is to me, that God is not like me. There is never a day that He forgets to deal with His child with compassion. He always has a perfect understanding of our capabilities. He always remembers what we are as His creation. Luke 11:13 “If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him!” So this verse in Psalm 103 is basically saying, “you know how you love your children and want to give them everything good in the world? God is like that, only perfectly.”

10. As for man, his days are like grass; as a flower of the field, so he flourishes. For the wind passes over it, and it is gone, and its place remembers it no more. But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear Him, And His righteousness to children’s children. I have been reminded many times in the past year of the frailty of our lives. We are here on this earth by God’s pleasure. Were he to remove His sustaining hand from us, we would perish in a vapor. We think we are invincible. We at least expect to live to a ripe old age. But we have no assurance of our next breath without the pleasure of God. An illness, an accident, a storm, a wicked act, any of these could take us in a twinkling of an eye. Even if we were to live to be 100, in light of eternity this is negligible. Most of us won’t be remembered beyond a generation or two. But God’s mercy is perfect. It has no end. He was mercy long before the earth was formed, and He will be mercy long after the earth takes its last rotation around the sun. As His children, we do not have to worry that He will ever run out of mercy for us. There won’t be a day when I will come to my Heavenly Father to be told, “Sorry, you have used up your quota of mercy.” No. Through the work of Christ, we have constant, eternal, perfect mercy. The only limit to His mercy is that it is offered in its fullness only to those who have fallen on the Mercy Seat, that is Christ Jesus.

11. To such that keep His covenant, and those who remember His commandments to do them. We can’t keep His covenant apart from the work of Christ. Ultimately, He is the one who has kept the covenant for us. But we are reminded in John 14 that if we love Him, we will keep his commandments. This is the fruit of salvation: that we seek to do the will of our Father. This is how we actively treasure Christ. We study His Word, and we seek to apply it in the day to day. We work to be salt and light in the world. We have a tendency to overcomplicate things sometimes. We want to find a way to see the big picture – “God’s will for our lives.” And by this we generally mean we want to know which job to take, whether to buy a house, who to marry. We want to know the events. This is God’s will for our lives – 1Thessalonians 4:2-12  “For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God; that no one should take advantage of and defraud his brother in this matter, because the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also forewarned you and testified. For God did not call us to uncleanness, but in holiness. Therefore he who rejects this does not reject man, but God, who has also given us his Holy Spirit. But concerning brotherly love you have no need that I should write to you for you, yourselves are taught by God to love one another; and indeed you do so toward all the brethren who are in Macedonia. But we urge you, brethren that you increase more and more; that you also aspire to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business and to work with your own hands, as we commanded you, that you may walk properly toward those who are outside, and that you may lack nothing.” When we get this much down, then we can worry about the big picture. Instead of worrying about the details or events, we need to be concerned about how we conduct ourselves as the events unfold. Are we being sexually moral? Are we conducting ourselves honorably? Are we working to control our passions and lust? Are we working to have brotherly love? Are we aspiring to lead a quiet life? Are we minding our own business? Doing our work? As we go about our lives in obedience to the Lord’s commands, then we will have eyes to see the mercy of the Lord morning by morning.

12. The Lord has established His throne in the heaven and His kingdom rules over all. God is sovereign and God is good! He is on his throne ruling over all that He has created. We are citizens of this world in body, but citizens of His kingdom in spirit. Having just experienced the inauguration of a new president after a particularly volatile election, it is a comfort to know that this is all temporary. God raises up kingdoms and brings them down. We have no guarantee that our country will continue to exist for the generations to come. But God’s kingdom is eternal. We will benefit from the rule of our great King forever and ever.

13. Bless the Lord, you angels, Who excel in strength, who do His Word, heeding the voice of His word. Bless the Lord, all you His hosts, You ministers of His, who do His pleasure. Bless the Lord, all His works, in all places of His dominion. Bless the Lord, O my soul! David calls roll to each type of creature who is part of God’s kingdom and calls them to worship. This reminds me of Psalm 150:6, “Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.” I think perhaps as David enumerates all the benefits (or treasures if you will) of being a child of the great king, he knows he is not capable in himself to offer enough blessing and praise to God. He solicits all the help he can find. May our hearts respond the same way! May we leave here overflowing with praise on our lips and in our hearts. May we praise Him not only with our words, but with our obedience to His commandments. For Yours, O God, is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever, Amen!

Trusting Christ

I was given the great privilege of spending a weekend with some very lovely ladies from South Woods Baptist Church in Memphis, TN. They trusted me to come and speak to them on the recommendation of my dear friend, Nancy. The theme for the weekend was, “Trusting and Treasuring Christ.” The time of preparation for this event was of such great benefit to me! But I have to confess to feeling a bit like a pretender as I presented to these ladies bits and pieces of sermons and lessons I have been taught by the leadership of my church over the past few years. I can look through the remarks and see the influence of Pastor Larry here, and Pastor Jarrett there, Pastor Eddie in that place, and Brother Price in this and that. I realized once more how blessed I am to sit under such great teaching each and every time I darken the doors of my church. At the request of a few friends who weren’t able to attend the conference, I will post my remarks here, one session at a time. 

It is an honor to be here today. I pray that God will use what I say to encourage you, But I can say without a shadow of doubt that He has already used it to encourage me through the process of studying and calling to mind what I have been taught through the faithful ministry of my pastors. So for that, I thank you.

But let me tell you a little story before I get started. This story is about a young girl who grew up in Africa. And when I came of age, I returned to the United States to attend college. I had applied to Hardin Simmons University, primarily because that is where my sister was attending. When I arrived in Texas, I was informed by said sister that she had transferred to North Texas State, in Denton. Well, it was too late to change my mind, so I went on to HSU.
Now when I graduated from high school, I was given a copy of Spurgeon’s “Morning and Evening”. I cannot tell you what a comfort Spurgeon’s words were that first year. It was a difficult year in many ways, and Spurgeon reminded me of the truths of Scripture. I mention this because in my mind, this is what God used to lay the foundation for what was to come a bit later. Spurgeon taught me much of the sovereignty of God in all aspects of life.
During the first two years of college, I was asked to speak at churches about my experience as a missionary kid. I almost always referred to Psalm 139:16 “Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed. And in Your book they all were written, the days fashioned for me when as yet there were none of them.” So I had a sense of the sovereignty of God, but I had never heard the term, “doctrines of grace”.
And then one day a friend of mine started talking to me about moving to Denton, Texas, where she would attend Texas Women’s University. She went so far as to do research about my desired career and informed me that NTSU (also in Denton) was the only University in Texas that had an actual BSW degree (Bachelor of Social Work). And so, I agreed to transfer after my sophomore year. As my sister had already been living there for two years, it was only natural that I would visit her church in my search for a church home. She suggested I visit a particular Sunday school class in the college department. This class was taught by one Jim Carnes, and he was making his way through Romans at a snail’s pace. I had grown up in a pastor’s home. I had been exposed to the scripture since my conception. But here in this Sunday school class I was hearing things I had never heard before about the sovereignty of God. Jim had printed notes for us each week, and I would take those notes home on Sunday afternoon and open my Bible and study through what he had taught that day. I know a lot of people struggle a great deal with the concept of God’s sovereignty in salvation, but for me it was like coming home.
I remember asking Jim, “How is it that I have never heard these things before?”
And he smiled, and answered, “That’s a really good question.”
Beyond the Sunday school class, Jim and Nancy befriended me. They gave me books to read. They referred me to a good church once I graduated and moved to Fort Worth. And they have continued to be my friends ever since. I owe them a great debt. So I am thankful for this opportunity to encourage people who are dear to them, and I pray that God will use this time for His glory and the furtherance of His Kingdom.

Our theme for today is “trusting and treasuring Christ”. In this first session I want to spend some time considering who Christ is, why He is trust worthy. Then in the next session we will talk of what there is to treasure about him, and how we can do that. Much of what I will say is basic to our faith. I believe it is important to remind ourselves of the foundational truths regularly. This is not an easy life. Or at least it hasn’t been for me. I have a tendency to trust what I see with my eyes and that can sometimes be a problem. So I must bring myself back to the basics andremind myself of the things that must be seen with the eyes of faith. Because if I trust only what I can see for myself, I begin to wonder, “is Christ really trustworthy?”

So who is Christ, and is He trustworthy? Well, to begin with, He is God. He is the Son, who is eternally begotten of the Father. He is the Word that became flesh and dwelt among us.

John 1: 1-5 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him and without Him nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. 14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory and the glory of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.
From this passage we can see that Christ is God. He is eternal. He is the Word. He created us, so we owe our very existence to him. Because he created us, we can trust that He knows how to sustain us. He knows our needs better than we know our own. He has numbered our days, and we will live the exact number of days that are ordained for us. I playfully refer to myself as a hippie, because I am somewhat committed to a crunchy lifestyle. I eat organic when possible, I use non-toxic cleaners and toiletries, I drink tons water, etc. And as much as I believe this is a good stewardship of the life I have been given, I must regularly remind myself that I cannot do anything to add or take away one second of the days that are numbered for me. I must trust Christ to sustain me until that day when He will see fit to take me home to be with Him.

Secondly, He is our Savior. He did not create us and then leave us to ourselves. He became flesh and dwelt among us.
Philippians 2: 5 – 11 Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the father. Here we are reminded that not only did Christ give us physical life, he also went to great lengths to give His people spiritual life. He became a man, lived a sinless life, offered himself up as propitiation for our sins through his death on the cross. He rose again, conquering death and is seated at the right hand of the Father. This accomplished our reconciliation to the Father. This is peace on earth, good will to men. The same information is given to us in:

Romans 5:6-11 “For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through HIm. For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.”

Not only can we trust Him because of who He is, we can also trust Him because of what He has done. Recently I have been exposed to a counseling concept called the “trust equation”:

Trust = consistent behavior/time
We can certainly look through history and see that Christ has consistently done what He said he would do. From the beginning He has provided a way of salvation for His people. We see this in

the Old Testament through the nation of Israel. God destroyed the world with flood, but he

preserved the life of Noah and his family. He called Abraham and Sarah out of a life of paganism, brought them to a land of promise, and provided a son for them from whom a great nation would be generated. He preserved Jacob’s life, though his deceitful and conniving behavior caused his brother Esau to desire his death. He preserved Joseph though his brothers wanted to kill him, Potiphar’s wife wanted to ruin him, his cellmate forgot him. Joseph was raised up and put in a position to be a savior (little s) for his people by providing a place for them to live and prosper in the midst of famine.
Then a new pharaoh was raised up in Egypt and the Israelites became slave labor. God provided Moses as a little ’s’ savior for His people by leading them out of Egypt, through the Red Sea, and on to the promised land. Throughout the following years Israel went through many wars, captivities, kingdom divisions, rebellions. And through it all God continued to faithfully preserve His people, continued to faithfully provide types and shadows of the coming Messiah, continued to provide a way of salvation. And then the Savior came, bringing peace between God and man through his death and resurrection.
I am struck by the parallels between the the history of the Israelites and my own spiritual journey. I see the hardness of my own heart in the story of Lot who had to be basically dragged out of Sodom because he lingered in the face of danger. I lingered in my sinfulness but Christ changed my heart of stone for a heart of flesh, and I was saved from destruction. I see my own propensity to be allured by the things of this world, just as the Israelites were allured by false gods. And Christ has provided His Spirit to discipline me, and deliver me from the evil one. I see the repeated sacrifices of lambs for the sins of the Israelites and am reminded of the constant need to come before the Lamb of God to repent of my own sins, knowing that I have the ultimate forgiveness of Christ’s sacrifice, but still having a battle with the old man day by day. I am privileged to see the continued preservation of God’s people through the ages, and am reminded of the way God sustains me every day.

But one of the problems of sweeping through thousands of years in a few minutes is that we lose sight of the time it took for the people involved. Yes, God provided a son for Sarah and Abraham, but it was when they were very advanced in years. They waited a long time for the fulfilling of that prophecy. So long, in fact, that it seemed absurd to them that it would be fulfilled. So long, that they tried to figure out a way to help it along. Yes, God provided a bride for Isaac, but not until he was 40, and then he prayed for a child for 20 years before Jacob and Esau were born. Jacob was promised Rachel for a wife, worked 7 years for her, was tricked into marrying Leah, and had to work another 7 years for her. (I couldn’t hardly get my husband to wait 6 months to marry me, not sure he would have stuck around for 14 years.) Sure, God fulfilled the prophetic dreams Joseph had as a child, but before he saw the fulfillment of those dreams, he saw the bottom of a pit, where he waited while his brothers argued over whether to kill him. He lived as a slave, he was accused of rape, he was sent to prison and forgotten. I do love Joseph’s story, though, because he gives us such an example of living patiently with integrity while awaiting the accomplishment of God’s plan. May I be so diligent with my life to serve God where ever He may be pleased to have me be at any given time. May I be more concerned with doing what He commands than with being rescued from the difficulties of this world.

I think ultimately the question I have to ask myself is not whether Christ is trustworthy, but whether I will trust HIm.
I have a 23 year old daughter who has struggled with chronic illness almost her entire life. We have tried all sorts of medical and alternative approaches to her care, and still there have been times when I thought she would die. There have been times when I have wondered how much one person could be asked to suffer. There have been sleepless nights for us both where we exhausted our arsenal for relief, and were left crying out to the Lord for help. Will I trust Him to

take care of my daughter? Will I trust that her days are numbered and that she is gently carried by her savior? Will I trust that Christ is completing in her what He began? Will I trust that he is bringing glory to His name?
I have a husband who had a stroke 5 years ago whose personality has changed, and whose body is still effected. There are days I can see no possible good in his life from his continued existence in this world. I have grown a thousand spiritual years through this experience, but my dear man seems incapable with his present disabilities to apply anything that he knew before the stroke. He is plagued with paranoia. He is unable to consistently work toward rehabilitation. He is unable to realize the damage that has been caused in his brain, and consequently refuses to believe that he is not thinking rationally. There are many days I leave his side and cry out to the Lord, “Why is he still here?” Will I trust that every day that my husband remains in this world is for his good and God’s glory? Will I trust that his days are numbered, and consequently that none of them is a waste?

I think that one of the reasons we have a struggle trusting Christ is that we don’t have a clear understanding of what we can trust Him for. We are so limited by our senses. We only perceive what we can see and touch and taste and hear. We become very dependent on these things for our understanding of the world we live in. They are great tools, these senses, but they are limited. We are not able to understand with our earthly senses the spiritual truths. We want to fix this world to appeal to our earthly senses. We want to be well. We want to be fed. We want to store up treasures that can be destroyed by moth and rust. But these things are only temporal at best. We need to be thinking in terms of the eternal.

One thing that has been very helpful to me this year is a series of sermons our pastor did recently on the Lord’s prayer from Matthew 6 (the first of the series can be found here). When I find myself in a situation where I don’t know what to think or do, I have begun to use this model prayer to help me not only know how to pray, but to bring my spiritual sight into focus. Can we say this prayer together right now to remind us of its content?

Our Father in Heaven,
Hallowed be your name
Your Kingdom come,
Your will be done,
On earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts
as we forgive our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
For Yours is the Kingdom and the power and the glory forever, Amen.

So when I pray, I start by reminding myself that God is our Father: mine, yours, my husband’s,my daughter’s, my church family’s, the universal church. This is important in a society that is all about the individual. We are a collective. We are connected in one body with Christ as our head. The most important thing is not my personal welfare, but the welfare of the church at large. Then I remind myself how this wonderful thing can be true, that the God of the universe is my Father. It is through the sacrifice of His Son that this sinner has been reconciled to the Creator. This Father is in Heaven. This doesn’t indicate distance from me, because He has sent His Holy Spirit to dwell in my very soul. What it indicates is that He is in the place of power. He is seated because He has completed His work of salvation and earth is His footstool. There is nothing that can defeat His will. I have no need to fret.

Then I pray that God would bring glory to His name through the situation at hand. That His will would be done, that He would use my particular set of circumstances to further His kingdom. (This always reminds me to pray for my pastors who are charged with the responsibility of preaching the gospel that Christ’s kingdom would come here on earth.) By this point in the prayer, I have already reminded myself that there are far more important things at hand than my happiness or comfort. I am reminded that my ultimate destiny is to live my life in such a way that others will see Christ in me. The focus begins to shift from the temporal to the eternal.

Then I pray for today. Take care of my needs today. Take care of my husband’s needs today. I remind myself how he has provided for my needs in sometimes miraculous ways. If he provided a way to pay my husband’s hospital bill and rehabilitation when we had no insurance, isn’t that harder than what I need today? Is anything too hard for God? I am reminded by this phrase, “give us this day” that I am not to worry about the things of tomorrow. I am reminded that God feeds the birds and clothes the lilies of the field. I am reminded that worry doesn’t change anything other than my ability to cope with life. Further on in Matthew 6 (where we are given this prayer as a model), we are told to seek first His Kingdom and His righteousness, and all these other things will be added. This prayer helps us do that very thing. Seek His Kingdom, and we are reminded that all these other things are secondary to real life.
When I get to the prayer for forgiveness, I search my heart for those I need to ask for forgiveness. I search my heart for those I need to forgive. I meditate on what I have been forgiven through the blood of Christ, and I ask that I would have mercy as I have been shown mercy – that I would remember my low and needy estate before a just God so that I could have a heart of kindness for those who cross my path (or make me cross) today.
I go on to pray that God would deliver me from evil. I know beyond a doubt that the first person He must deliver me from is me. You know, since my husband’s stroke changed his personality, I have had several people ask me why I don’t divorce him. I have had people tell me that now that he is in the nursing home, I should feel free to date. Neither of those things are really a temptation for me. I have wanted to run. I have wanted to die. I have wanted him to die.I have wanted to curl up in a ball and just stop facing life. But I am not tempted to divorce him, because I understand that he has brain damage and is not capable of being what he once was. I know that he needs me to manage his care, even if he believes with all his heart that I have abandoned him. Sometimes I can feel pretty proud of myself for that. Look at me, sticking it out in a thankless marriage. Aren’t I special? Oh Lord, deliver me from evil! When my eyes are on what is not tempting me, the things that do tempt me are gaining strength. I am prone to worry, and complain and despair of my life. I must fight against letting my anger lead me to sin. I am an easy target for Satan, because I am so easily distracted by the cares of this world. I must ask God to help me be obedient, and patient for HIs timing. I must ask him for grace and mercy. I beseech him to keep me from bringing shame to the name of Christ by my self-seeking tendencies.
Oh how thankful I am that I can trust Him to do these things for me. I can trust that His Kingdom has come, is coming and will come. I can trust that today as we are gathered here, God is working His perfect plan in the lives of His people. He is drawing us to Himself. He is fitting us for Heaven. He has provided peace on earth between his elect and Himself, which gives us the ability to pursue peace with each other. He will preserve my life every day until my days on this earth are done. And more importantly, he preserves my soul. He gives me the ability to continue to cling to Christ through all the trouble this world throws at me.
As I contemplate these things. As I meditate on how God is accomplishing this through whatever situation seemed so insurmountable in the beginning, it is only natural that my heart would then turn to praise, “Yours is the Kingdom and the power and the glory forever! Amen”

But I will let you in on a little secret. There are quite a few days when I do not get past “thy kingdom come, thy will be done”. It is all I can muster. So it’s good that the prayer starts out with the most important thing – His glory and His kingdom.
So, my dear sisters in Christ, I ask you. Will you trust Him? We know He is trustworthy. He is the God of the universe. There is nothing too hard for Him. But will you trust Him? Will you trust him when you want to be married and it seems that all the decent men are already taken? Will you trust him when you get married and that perfect guy turns out to be not so perfect? Will you trust him when you want children and can’t conceive, or can’t carry to full term or lose them to premature death? Will you trust Him when your baby won’t stop crying and you are in such desperate need of sleep? Will you trust Him when your adult children seem to reject everything you taught them to believe? Will you trust him when your years are advanced and your body is having a race with your mind to see which will fail first? Will you trust Him when your husband has a stroke and becomes a very different person (oh wait! that one was for me). But what is it for you, today? What is there in your life that would make you doubt the goodness of God? Will you trust Him?
What we see with our physical eyes can sometimes be terribly overwhelming. It can distract us from what is really true. We must do the hard work of meditating on the person of Christ if we are to be able to cope with the disappointment of this world. We must avail ourselves to regular preaching and teaching from the pastors appointed over our congregations. We need to memorize scripture. We need to familiarize ourselves with doctrinal truth. My favorite tools for this are the London Baptist Confession of 1689, and the Baptist catechism, because they help me to think systematically through the foundations of our faith. I also love hymns and songs that are full of sound doctrine. As a side note, let me encourage you who are mothers to teach your children these things. Not only for their benefit, but also for yours. Because as you go through the catechism questions with them, or help them to memorize a verse, or teach them a song, you are committing them to your own memory.
Let us agree together as sisters in Christ to remember and apply the words we read in Hebrews 10:24, 25 And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.
May we remind each other of the greater things of the Kingdom when the things of this world crowd in to claim our attention. Let us meet together with our congregations to hear the Word proclaimed and to fellowship together with those who will help us think rightly about our trials. This is a journey through a foreign land. Let us march on to beautiful Zion united under the banner of His love for us. We don’t know the way. We don’t know what lies ahead on the path. But we do know the One who leads us. And we know that He is safe. He is trustworthy.

 

 

In Retrospect

In January, I went on cruise with my best friend from 9th grade. Turns out she’s still best friend material. We had a great time. Her husband says I have ruined her, because she now wants to go on a cruise every year. Well, I am ruined too. If it wasn’t for my husband, children, and grandchildren, I think I would try to figure out a way to be one of those retirees who just go from cruise to cruise year round.

Cheesy cruise picture holding parrots.

January also brought a really bad bout of flu.

In February, during my second bout of really bad flu, I found out that my sister had been diagnosed with a rare cancer – peritoneal cancer. By the time I dragged myself through to the other side of that illness, I had reached a breaking point as a caregiver. The balance had finally tipped so that putting my husband in a nursing home, knowing that he would never forgive me and would choose to be unhappy for the rest of his life, was the better option. This caused me to be overwhelmed with grief.

Somewhere around this time I became a part of a small musical ensemble which came to be known as the Tequila Mockingbirds. We began to practice singing together every Monday night. We started out as acquaintances that barely knew each other, but have become fast friends. This group has been one of the greatest highlights of 2016.

The Tequila Mockingbirds making their debut performance, “Someone to Watch Over Me”

In early March I managed to get things arranged to transfer Strokeman to a nursing home near me. I had the support of my children and my pastors, and was ready to make the move, when the nursing home decided to back out. This added overwhelming depression to my overwhelming grief. I was not able to do anything other than the bare minimum – providing for Strokeman’s needs. I could not face the prospect of trying again. I could not talk about it. I stopped communicating with anyone, because all the energy I had was needed to just function minimally.

In April my daughter asked if she could take over the pursuit of nursing home placement, and I said yes. On the 19th my children, pastor, and I met with my husband around the dining table to inform him that we were placing him in a nursing home. My oldest son led the meeting, and I just sat there silently watching it all unfold. We transported him that day to a facility in a neighboring town. The rest of that month (and the subsequent months) was spent applying for Medicaid to cover the nursing home, which entailed a paper trail that would circuit the globe, spending down half our assets, and basically rendering us wards of the state. As predicted, Strokeman was angry. He still is.
As soon as I had Strokeman settled in his new room, I made a trip to New Braunfels to see my sister. This would be the first of many trips over the rest of the year to help with the care of my parents and sister.

In May, I started going to a woman counselor, to help me process some of the more personal and difficult aspects of my role as a caregiver. I continue to this day, although not as often or as desperately. I also began going to every possible church meeting and activity. This has been a joy beyond expression after years of sporadic attendance. I saw my youngest son married to his high school sweetheart. It was a beautiful way to end the month.

Family picture at the wedding.

In June, my oldest son and daughter-in-law finalized the adoption of their two children, who had been a part of our family for a year and a half. I flew to Athens, GA to help celebrate this event a few weeks later.

In June I also started going to the local recreation center for exercise classes. I tried several, and determined that yoga was the class the seemed most helpful (and also the only one in which I did not want to punch the instructor by the time class was over). I began soon after to make pithy Facebook statements about my yoga experience. Apparently, they are a big hit. I came into yoga class one day unable to control my tears, and consequently met two women who have become good friends. We see each other at yoga, line dancing at the senior center, and Thursday nights at the winery for supper. They have been such a bonus to my life that I am now recommending crying in public to make friends.

I spent 4th of July in New Braunfels with my brother and nephews from Mexico. I went down again a few weeks later, and was able to be there for my sister’s birthday. It was this month that saw my sister’s tumor marker numbers begin to not respond well to the chemo.

In August my sister, mom and dad came up to my house for what would prove to be my dad’s last road trip. We met some other missionary friends and “kids” at an Indian restaurant in Arlington for a long visit. We also stopped by the hospital on the way home to see another missionary friend and family who had been deterred by some health issues from being able to come to the get together. Also in August, we learned that dad qualified for Hospice, due to his degenerative illness. This service added some much needed support in the home.

September brought more trips to New Braunfels. This was also the first month we took advantage of the respite program through Hospice, putting dad in a local nursing facility for three days in order to give mom and Cindy some rest. Have I mentioned how much we love Hospice? This was also the month I started helping in the 2&3-year-old Sunday School class. What can I say? It’s hilarious, exhausting, endearing, invigorating, and hilarious.

October brought more trips to New Braunfels. This was also the month of our Chorus performance called “Joe’s Place”. We dressed up in 1920’s costumes and sang songs from that era. Huge amount of work and fun.

Right before that performance I flew to a class reunion in Minneola, Florida. It was a great time catching up with friends. I spent time with a friend who had just come through a pretty rough several years, and I learned these things from visiting with him:
1.Googling someone basically gives you gossip, not real information. Even police reports and court reports do not tell the whole story. It’s always a good idea to listen to a friend’s own account of their story before drawing conclusions.
2. Even in worst case outcomes God is still sovereign. He is able to use us for His glory and the furtherance of His Kingdom in the most difficult of circumstances. When your life is virtually dismantled by the maliciousness of other people, you can survive, your marriage can survive, and there will be people who will continue to be your friends with much love and grace (I can’t claim to have been one of those friends in his life, but I witnessed others who were, and they put me to shame for not taking the time to be more of a friend).

RVA class of ’80: we haven’t changed a bit!

In November I had a long talk with my dad about the fact that his body was failing him and his care was quickly becoming more than mom and my sister could reasonably manage at home. I told him how hard it is on a caregiver to finally admit they couldn’t do it anymore, and how my mom and sister would feel guilt and sorrow over having to put him in a nursing home when the time came. I asked him to lay down his life for my mom. He had what was one of his last moments of clarity, in which he told me he knew he was not long for this world, and was not afraid. He also said he would be ok if we needed to put him in a nursing home. He agreed to sign papers, or do whatever needed to be done to prepare for that time.

November brought Thanksgiving, and 4 of my five kids came with their families to my house. We brought Strokeman home for several hours to eat turkey and visit. It was a good time, considering all the various emotions that were being faced on this first family holiday post nursing home placement.

In December we put dad in respite care for a few days, and realized he was not going to be able to come home. He had become very disoriented and was falling several times a day due to forgetting he couldn’t walk. We had hoped to keep him home until after the holidays, but this was not to be. He forgot all he had said about it being ok to be in the nursing home. It was heartbreaking.

One of the last pictures taken with my dad.

Christmas was hard. It was so hard I felt like I had become a Facebook status cliche’ about how holidays can be so hard for some people. We survived.

So now we are in 2017 and already many things have come to pass. My father died in January. I took a trip to New York with my daughters. Right now I am visiting my mom (who is doing great, by the way) while my sister and her husband visit the Cancer Treatment Center of America in Phoenix, Arizona. We’re hoping for good things to come out of that visit, but worry about the financial toll unconventional treatments can take on a family. On Thursday I will fly to Memphis, TN where I will be privileged to speak at a women’s retreat on trusting and treasuring Christ. I look forward to also visiting with long time friends while I am there.

My hope for 2017 is that I will begin to get some sort of a rhythm to my life. Medicaid makes it complicated for me to be actually gainfully employed at the moment, but I want my employment to be gainful in the sense that I want to be doing things that benefit me as a person as opposed to being lazy or aimless. I hope this means writing more consistently, working to rebuild relationships within my church family, practicing hospitality. I will need to sell my house (I know, I just bought it, but this was always the plan), and move into something smaller and more financially manageable. I have opportunity to try my hand at editing some sermons notes for one of my pastors in order to put them in book form. I have goals to exercise more in an effort to prepare for a possible mountain climb in 2018. Chorus practice has started back up, and so the Mockingbirds are making the transition from playing together to working together (which is really a lot like playing together). I am also looking forward to welcoming my army son home after 6 years away. And always, I will continue to work at tending to my husband’s needs as he lives out his worst nightmare in the nursing home.