tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-91902169724428745842024-02-21T00:01:36.482-05:00one for sorrow, two for joyElizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.comBlogger90125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-56111900614088797282015-06-22T00:28:00.000-04:002015-06-22T00:28:15.710-04:00On fathers, communion, & pizza<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">A month ago I took communion sitting in an ordinary wooden pew. I prayed that God would help me let some things go. I think this is a prayer nearly every twenty-something prays when they think about how they grew up, no matter how fun or fulfilling their childhood was.</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span class="s1"></span><br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><i>You get older and you want to be the forgiver and the forgiven, the absolute freest version of yourself.</i> So I broke the stiff wafer and drank the too-sweet juice and walked out through the double doors. It was a Sunday.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><i>—</i></span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span class="s1"><i></i></span><br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><b>Father’s Day and I have a history, tangled and thorny and only recently a little bit less heavy. </b>I’m sure many people feel the same, if you throw open wide the suitcase of your heart and start pulling out the things you’ve carried with you all these years.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Say <b>father </b>and you pull at everyone’s story, light and dark, good and bad, in between and in mending.</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span class="s1"></span><br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">We were supposed to have lunch together this year with my dad. For various reasons, people canceled one by one. My dad stood in the hallway with his eyes big and said, “Are you going to have lunch with us?” He got quiet for a moment. “Not many people are coming.”</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span class="s1"></span><br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">I could have found a million polite ways to say <i>no, thank you</i>, and maybe another year I would have. I’m mostly vegetarian and gluten-free, and I hadn’t planned on eating the pizza they ordered or most of the food they prepared. Yet I realized, in that moment, that he was trying. That he was a human who had been trying for quite awhile to be different, which is not at all easy.</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span class="s1"></span><br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Love is an easy thing when it shows up neatly at church; it gets messy when it shows up and says <i>pick me. Pick me now.</i></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<i>—</i></div>
<div class="p1">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><b>The more I take communion, the more it seems to take me back to my own kitchen table—back to the people I love dearly.</b> Isn't it so messy and human that the same people you love dearly are the ones you hurt and are hurt by?</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Despite the messes we make and unmake of each other, we always seem to circle back time and time again, slowly making things right. We scootch the table over and find more chairs, because in the end, what else is there to do but gather?</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
Sometimes communion is the wafer and the juice.</div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
Sometimes it shows up in church, and that’s a good thing.</div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<b>Today communion was pizza, salty and crispy at the edges and lemonade with a twist of tartness.</b></div>
<div class="p2">
<span class="s1"></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Today communion was showing up at the table and realizing that we are all broken people breaking bread together, and the crazy, maddening, beautiful mystery is that none of us are worthy–but we are all invited just the same.</span></div>
Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-79496703290611901792014-09-10T15:30:00.002-04:002014-09-10T15:30:12.025-04:00these small acts | national suicide prevention week<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Four years ago I was sitting in a lecture hall when I heard the whispers of classmates. Words small and broken rumbled through the room. A student committed suicide in the dorms last night. What was his name? What happened? Was anyone there?</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Did I know him?</span></i><br />
<i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></i>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I didn't know him, as it turned out. He was my age. We'd probably passed each other on campus. We probably liked the same bands. We could have had a lot in common but I didn't know. I would never know him.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">-</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/pub/youth_suicide.html" target="_blank">According to the CDC</a>, suicide is the third leading cause of death for people between the ages of 15-24. And <a href="http://www.nami.org/Template.cfm?Section=by_illness&template=/ContentManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=61191" target="_blank">two-thirds</a> of people with depression do not seek treatment.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>The more I read and researched, the more I realized that I did know him.</b></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He was the girl who came to the library every Saturday night to check out comic books. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He was the guy in my political science class who always sat alone. He was our waitress. Hurt is everywhere, if you are willing to pay attention.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Today is National Suicide Prevention Day. I spent most of this morning remembering the boy from the dorms. I don't know what went through his mind four years ago. I wish he was still alive and that his story was still going. I wonder if a conversation could have saved him.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Prevention sounds like such a clinical word. It seems to belong to doctors and firefighters- people who are equipped or qualified. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Perhaps the point of today is to take that word back.</i></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To say that we can start conversations. We can notice people who are overwhelmed and listen. <b>Maybe prevention is just a fancy word for loving people the best way you know how.</b> Listening and talking, asking questions, drinking coffee, telling stories- these small acts remind us that none of us are alone.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Four years ago I was sitting in a lecture hall when I heard the whispers of classmates. I didn't join the conversation. I think I got out my notebook and waited for class to start. I honestly can't really remember. Today, in my mind, I imagine it differently.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I turn to the girl sitting next to me and start with three words.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">How are you?</span></i><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">--</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">For more information on suicide prevention check out:</span><br />
<a href="http://twloha.com/" target="_blank"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To Write Love On Her Arms</span></a><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.afsp.org/" target="_blank">The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention</a></span><br />
<a href="http://www.save.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=home.viewPage&page_id=1" target="_blank"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">SAVE</span></a><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://store.samhsa.gov/product/SMA12-4669" target="_blank">Preventing Suicide: A Toolkit for High School Students</a></span><br />
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<br />Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-62569454903514926512014-08-04T20:00:00.000-04:002014-08-04T20:00:55.349-04:00for when you're unsure: these steps<div>
Dear friend,</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I'm not sure, these days, if I'm going up or down this staircase of life. If I'm running towards the things that matter. I'd like to think so. Sometimes forward motion seems better than none at all. And it's a constant learning, going up a few, simply to come down a few more.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Panteleymonovskaya-38-12.jpg#mediaviewer/File:Panteleymonovskaya-38-12.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Panteleymonovskaya-38-12.jpg" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/53/Panteleymonovskaya-38-12.jpg/1200px-Panteleymonovskaya-38-12.jpg" height="400" width="319" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: xx-small;"><a href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Panteleymonovskaya-38-12.jpg#mediaviewer/File:Panteleymonovskaya-38-12.jpg">Panteleymonovskaya-38-12</a>" by <a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Alex_Levitsky_%26_Dmitry_Shamatazhi" title="User:Alex Levitsky & Dmitry Shamatazhi">Alex Levitsky & Dmitry Shamatazhi</a></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: xx-small;">Licensed under <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0" title="Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0
">CC BY-SA 3.0</a> via <a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/">Wikimedia Commons</a>.</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div>
I don't know where you fall on the staircase. If you're having sweet triumphs and you're near the top. If you're bruised at the bottom. Whatever direction, I'll meet you in the middle.<br />
<br />
Maybe these words will fill you like they did me.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
*</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<div>
She sits one step above me on the staircase. She was on her way down; I was on my way up. That was an hour ago.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
"My girl," she says quietly. "You may not feel like you're hearing His voice...but you have His words. Read them. Sit in them and soak them up. Wait for Him."</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
"Be assured, Elizabeth-<br />
<br />
you may not always hear His voice, but you can trust His heart."</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
*</div>
Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-26674890880453853872014-07-08T14:00:00.000-04:002014-07-08T14:00:28.153-04:00forests & trees: for when you're holding pieces<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">“He said to me I was a tree in a story about a forest, and that it was arrogant of me to believe any differently. And he told me the story of the forest is better than the story of the tree.”</span> </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">―</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4829.Donald_Miller" style="color: #666600; text-decoration: none;">Donald Miller</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">,</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"><i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2003288" style="color: #666600; text-decoration: none;">A Million Miles in a Thousand Years</a></i></span></blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">The room has windows that lets in light from all sides. In a moment of sheer grace, I am introduced to someone new. My friend says these words: "This is my friend, Elizabeth. She's a writer."</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">I smile, even though I feel the tears behind my eyes, and even though they are good tears.</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"><b>This warm welcome- being taken in, being named- it reminds me of my God. </b></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">The One who shows up in my car and in an art gallery, and so brilliantly in grass that grows tall and moves with the wind. The One who breathes life.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">The One who mends.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">-</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">It's been a year of changes, things I still process and pray about. There was a long stretch of time that I had all these dreams, but I couldn't see any piece of how they would come together.</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">In a lot of ways, I felt like my life was breakable. As if one misguided decision could crack a place that could never be mended. What a frail thing. <i>What pressure I put on myself for no reason.</i></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">It was this idea, this past year, that was pulled apart at the seams; and it hurt and for awhile I held a lot of pieces with not a lot of answers. (Isn't that the nature of mending? You see mostly pieces before you see something new emerge.) I didn't know then it was beginning of something better- something more like freedom.</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">What I see now is an entire landscape. It doesn't matter so much that I can't see my dreams fitting together in the ways I thought they would. <i>I don't clench them so tightly.</i> I don't worry so much. These dreams are from my Maker, and He can take them, reshape them, or fit them together as He pleases.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"><b><br /></b></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"><b>What matters is that this story is so much bigger than I am, and the beauty is in the telling.</b></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">You see: my favorite trees are Redwoods, through and through.</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">I went to an arboretum once and it spilled abundance. It felt like my soul could breathe. I learned that the only way these trees grow is by having horizontal roots. They grow into the trees next to them, enmeshed, and they survive like this: together.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">*</span></span>Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-65653101389561008572014-05-30T20:59:00.000-04:002014-05-30T21:03:21.139-04:00pure grace | a few of my favorite things<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Dear friend,</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Today you challenged me to keep my eyes open. You spoke about finding pure grace in the common things. How God is always trying to show us His love in the ways He knows will delight us. You asked us to share them.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I wasn't sure this morning. I've been stressed, and untrusting, and sometimes just plain <i>graceless</i>. I didn't feel like I had the right to ask for anything, but then I remembered this thing, this part about <a href="http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Hebrews+4%3A16&version=AMP">coming boldly before the throne of grace</a>.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And it didn't say come perfect, or come smiling, or come like-somebody-who-has-everything-together. It just said <b>come</b>. So I did.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">1.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">My sweet nephew stumbles in fresh from waking up, with sleepies in his eyes. He crawls into my lap and wraps his arms around my neck. He's warm and everything good and he smells like blueberries. He burrows his little head in the crook right below my collar bone, where I imagine my heart lives and he says, <i>You. </i><i>You're here.</i></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And he does this one thing: he smiles.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">2.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">It's been a heavy week. On Wednesday, a young, vibrant girl lost a two year battle with cancer right before her high school graduation. We went to the same church for awhile, and I saw her story from afar. I didn't know her, but our whole community was praying.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Sometimes the world just feels broken to me. Not unfixable, but really broken. That's what I was thinking about as I stood in line for coffee. The barista gave me a cup, pointed at the thermoses. The one with green writing caught my eye, and I began to lift the spout. I stirred in milk and sugar, and the taste felt familiar- warm and comforting.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">My friend smiled and said, "I knew you'd pick that. It's from your favorite place- Nicaragua."</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I looked back to see the green sign, <a href="http://walkerswiththedawn.blogspot.com/2012/07/you-are-going-to-love-this-land-part-one.html">the name of the country that shook the dust from my heart</a>. One summer <a href="http://walkerswiththedawn.blogspot.com/2012/08/small-wonders.html">when I saw everything change</a>. It was that summer I learned that God is present everywhere, uncontainable. He is mending things I couldn't ever dream of fixing.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I needed to be reminded today that the Maker and Keeper of our hearts is a precise mender. Even in brokenness. What grace, that this reminder showed up in my ordinary- not in stained glass, not at a conference, or at my church- but here, where I least expected to find it- in the messy sanctuary of my life.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">4.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b>I used to know this by heart- it is love that changes things.</b></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Pure, self-sacrificing love is what mended me. This is the gospel that I cling to- that no matter our past, our deservedness, our own efforts- it is love that comes for all of us. And it is love that will persist.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">One of my students talked about how he used to think he was selfless, and then he had a family. <i>Things are different now. You see, there is nothing a father wouldn't do for his child</i>.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">He pauses. I can tell he's trying to translate. After a moment, he opens his hands. <i>This is a love I cannot explain</i>.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">But I know.</span></div>
Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-46521632871237484062014-05-12T20:49:00.000-04:002014-05-12T21:10:06.387-04:00this nest: for when you miss someone greatly<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">A sweet friend came up to me yesterday, wrapped her hand in mine, and said, "You have more words in you. They're in there. I just know it."</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Lately I've not been paying attention to my words. They lay dormant and still.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I've been quietly remembering.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">But, you know, she is right.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Yesterday was Mother's Day. I have a number of friends who I knew had to be missing their moms so badly it felt like work just to breathe. That's what missing feels like, sometimes.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And as May works itself into June, I have been remembering a friend who I miss very much. Lately it seems a good amount of my close friends have been doing that same remembering.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><i>So this is for you</i>. For the empty chair at your table. For the conversations that you miss, and the memories that you keep. For the ones who you remember, who you wish were here. For them. For you. For us.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Dear friend,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I woke up a few weeks ago to the sound of chirping. But I didn't listen closely. I just kept on with my getting-ready, going-to-work, drinking-coffee noises. A few days later, I saw a few twigs on my windowsill and nearly brushed them away. I had been missing my friend, and remembering some things, and I just kept concentrating on getting through today.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Tying my shoes. Throwing in the laundry. Getting gasoline.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Just right now. And the next moment, and then the next. Until one night I got pretty honest with God about how much I don't like death, and I don't like pain, and I don't like remembering people who I wish were still here. I just let it all spill out.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The next morning, I opened my blinds and there was this nest, so intricate and beautiful that it almost didn't seem real. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I remember thinking <i>this can't be possible.</i> You see, birds are my favorite animal, especially sparrows and robins. This nest, so intricately woven, felt like a well-wrapped gift directly from the heart of God. It was as if He was telling me, <i>I remember you</i>.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And even as I missed my friend, I began to remember the God who drew me to Himself. <b>How His timing is nothing but faithful</b>. And even as I grieved for what was, my God was creating new life right outside my window: what will be.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I peeked outside my window today to find two little balls of fur snuggled up against each other, and one turquoise jewel egg still waiting to be hatched.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The mother robin returned to the nest to provide for and protect her little ones.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">As they fumbled around on weak legs, begging to be fed, and kept warm, and crying out, I realized that this is how He cares for us. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And even when I am missing someone, when I am miffed about death, He just <a href="http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm+91%3A4&version=AMP">stretches out His wings and draws me closer</a>.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">We are only here for a little while. <i>We celebrate and live, and we miss and we mourn, and sometimes we do both at the same time. </i></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">It may seem like the most simple, obvious thing, but I still can't fathom how the same God who cares deeply for the small and intricate, cares equally for this giant world, and the canvases of our hearts. That He sent Jesus so <a href="http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah+25%3A8-9&version=AMP">that death might be swallowed up by glorious love</a>.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b>I take shelter in this: He is still making things new, right outside my window.</b> In people, and in places, and in the gifts disguised as ordinary. In you, and in me, and even in the pain that shapes us, this, here: new life.</span><br />
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Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-6819356419806196042014-04-05T15:18:00.000-04:002014-04-05T15:21:19.567-04:00keeping these words closeI am six years old, and her rocking chair wears grooves into the deep brown carpet.<br />
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She reads Proverbs aloud and I draw. I draw until the colors blend, green over yellow into blue. I draw to the rhythm of her voice, humble and quiet-sweet.</div>
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She reads over the words and something on the inside of me changes, some sort of landscape forms, and while I am tracing shapes, these words shape me. I can still hear her voice softly, <i>Raise up a child in the way that she should go, and even when she is old, she will not depart from it</i>.</div>
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I'm nine years old, and she kisses me before she ties on her apron strings and leaves for the late shift. She still reads in the morning, but she reads longer. She rarely leaves the book of Isaiah.<br />
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I'm too young to realize that she's tired- that she takes care of so many, with so little time left for herself. But she doesn't seem to run out of herself to give. And when she reads <i>they will mount up on wings as eagles</i> she doesn't sound tired; <b>she sounds transcendent</b>.</div>
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I'm sixteen and solemnly quiet. If she still reads, I don't listen. I don't draw. I don't write. I don't do anything that would involve caring about something. Did I mention I was sixteen? She loves my hard edges and weird moods anyway.</div>
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When I come home late one night, a crack of light slants out of her door. She prays again: <i>Raise up a child in the way that she should go, and even when she is old, she will not depart from it. </i>And then I hear her, quieter. <i>She that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.</i></div>
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It's been a long day. She rests, and I pull down a quilt from the closet.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: xx-small;">"Mini-Quilt" by <a href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mini_quilt.jpg">Carol Spears</a> via Creative Commons</span></td></tr>
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She thinks I'm smart. She never went to college. She thinks I'm brave. But she never stops loving people. She thinks she's run out of things to teach me. <b>I think I've only just begun learning.</b> Because while I read piles of books, she knows the book of James. She knows it like you would a favorite song, because it gives her joy.</div>
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<i>My sweet mother has taught me more about faith- real, gritty, joyous, self-sacrificing faith, than any other person to walk the earth.</i> She reads the Bible like it's a letter from her favorite friend. And it feels like I'm only recently learning how.</div>
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I spread the quilt out and reach for her black Bible, which is coming apart at the seams. She says, <i>oh no, </i>you don't have to read to me, but I think it's time I return the favor. It's the beginning of Joshua that she falls asleep to; it's my voice now that carries the words.</div>
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This week's post was part of an exercise for <a href="http://shereadstruth.com/2014/04/04/shesharestruth-joshua-18-9/">She Reads Truth</a>, a community of women who read and respond and talk about the Bible. This week's passage was Joshua 1:8-9. I found I couldn't write about Joshua, or loving the Bible, or meditating, without writing about the person whose life I've learned it from. Thanks for reading along.</div>
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With hope,</div>
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Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-37997937175298894772014-03-21T21:30:00.002-04:002014-03-21T21:33:50.173-04:00starting now | when all you want to do is run awayI sit cross-legged, Bible and commentary in lap and marvel at the blue sky beyond my window. It has been a dreadful winter, and I know my heart isn't the only one that feels a bit tattered.<br />
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A bit sometimes like it wants to run away.<br />
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You see, I'm a collector of coffee cups. misfit mugs. tea cups and saucers. So about a year ago, after I graduated, someone I love dearly got me a new ceramic cup as a gift. It's a swirl of blue and green with tree branches, and the note attached said-</div>
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<i>For all your new adventures. They start now, my girl.</i></div>
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Instead of using the cup, I buried it. Because my life didn't feel like an adventure. It felt like I was failing. I didn't have my life together, let alone an adventure.</div>
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<b>So I packed this gift away</b>. It sat in my garage for a few months, at the bottom of a box.</div>
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<a href="http://shereadstruth.com/2014/03/18/repentance-story-jonah/">This week's passage</a> was Jonah 1-2, which is one of my favorite books of the Bible. Psalms, Job, and Jonah. And John.</div>
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I feel magnetized to these books because they are blatantly emotional and the people in them are totally messy. I like Matthew Henry's idea that Jonah is "best understood by those who are most acquainted with their own hearts."</div>
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Jonah, who was supposed to go to Ninevah, took to the sea instead. In a lit class I once took, we learned that the sea is an incredibly vital twist in most stories. You see: the ocean doesn't trace paths. There's no way to follow someone or prove where they came from. <i>You don't go to the sea just to travel: you go to the sea because you want to get lost.</i></div>
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When Jonah turns from Ninevah to sail in the other direction, my heart beats a little faster. Because he's not just running away from God, he's running away from his entire identity- not only as a messenger, and a man, and a writer, but also as a person who believes in God.</div>
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So what does God do?</div>
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He sends a storm.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: xx-small;"><a href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AGewitterfront_01_(MK).jpg">Photo</a> by Leviathan 1983/<a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/"> CC BY</a></span></td></tr>
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<b>What I find in these words is that God wants to know Jonah with abandon. </b>Wandering, doubtful, runaway, Jonah because <i>that's not all Jonah is to God</i>. Jonah, whose name means "dove" or "messenger," is God's beloved.</div>
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And God, in His great mercy, will use any method to bring us back to Him.</div>
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Even if it means using a fish.</div>
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Even if it means using a storm.</div>
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And even if it means using a cross.</div>
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I take a minute to sift in these words, of a God who goes after runaway hearts. Who loves people who don't always love Him back. <i>I wonder if I have rejected my Ninevah</i>. If I have not seen today, this day, as a gift.</div>
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So I grab a chair and I go to the cupboard and root around until I find it. My blue mug, painted tall with trees, a sign of promise. <b>Because I may wander and go off course, but that's not all that God sees in me.</b> It is sheer mercy that I have been given this adventure, this life. And the Lord will do anything to remind me of who I am [and to Whom I belong]. Even if it means using the storm.</div>
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It's time to face this day, and all of my seasons, and not turn from the things I know I'm supposed to be doing. Even <a href="http://walkerswiththedawn.blogspot.com/2012/08/small-wonders.html">the things that seem small</a>.<br />
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So I go to work. I read and teach and give what I have. I open up my words and pour them out like water. Because here, now, <b>I'm trying to be present for this moment</b>, convinced that it might just be exactly where I'm supposed to be.</div>
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<i>For all your new adventures. They start now, my girl.</i></div>
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Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-8349358156649603852014-03-15T12:26:00.000-04:002014-03-15T12:50:06.021-04:00when God closes a door | mixed metaphors and not moving<div>
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Last September, I almost moved my whole life across the country for a new job.</div>
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It's no secret around here that I'm a molasses-slow decision maker. It's a process. I pray a lot. Lists litter every surface. I talk to a handful of beloved friends. I go on long walks and write and write and write until I come out with some sort of conclusion. The whole cycle in itself is kind of painful and by the time I usually arrive at a solid answer, I'm exhausted.</div>
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It's not something I ever want to relive, let alone meditate on. Yet that was <a href="http://shereadstruth.com/2014/03/14/shesharestruth-psalm-38/">this week's text.</a> <i>All my longing is before you; my sighing is not hidden from you. </i>David's words, hitting so close to home.</div>
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I've thought all week about what I could write about<i> instead</i> of my personal life, and it all seemed a little fake. I had to laugh because I committed to a blogging project about telling the truth, and all I wanted to do was hide mine. Yet here it is.</div>
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When I finally decided to move, I let myself get excited. I started to pack and plan and prepare. Two weeks before I was supposed to go, a thread snagged my plans. The pipes burst in the home I was supposed to live in. The funding for my new job got cut, and details slid out of focus, and suddenly everything unravelled. I asked God to give me a peace about moving, if that's what I was still supposed to do.</div>
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The next day, I woke up more sick than I've ever been. My joints were swollen and stiff. I radiated with nausea. Even my lips were swollen. I was so <b>so</b> sick. It was Psalm 38 in real life. Fast forward a few weeks, and I decided not to move. I'm still here, exactly where I was one year ago, and the year before that. And the year before that.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/99/2011-09-12_Biedenkopf_Stadtkirche_Seiteneingang.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/99/2011-09-12_Biedenkopf_Stadtkirche_Seiteneingang.JPG" height="320" width="215" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: xx-small;">Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons<br />By James.</span></td></tr>
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Someone said to me, w<i>hen God closes a door, He opens a window</i>. I went home and thought about the phrase a lot. I think people say things like that when a situation seems too big, and they don't know what else to say. I think there's grace for that. But sometimes metaphors are too small. <b>They package up a messy situation while sometimes overlooking that pain can reveal big things, if we are brave enough to face the mess.</b></div>
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As I took in Psalm 38 this week, I kept thinking about laying down my metaphors and digging for the raw truth. You see: I would never choose to write about not moving, a chapter from my life that I still don't fully understand and that felt a lot like failure.</div>
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And yet, here is what I've dug up: if there's anything to be said about that season, it isn't that God shut a door.</div>
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<b>What sticks with me, deep down in my gut, is the truth that He was with me all along.</b> Even when things didn't work out. Even when I didn't "seem" successful. When the dust settled from all that almost-change: He was with me at the beginning and at the end. And you know, He is with me still, and I am thankful.</div>
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This Lent, the presence of God seems so precious to me. Of such great value. And if it took moving and not moving, if it takes one hundred unexpected twists in my story to draw me nearer to Him, then so be it. Then bring them. <i>Be not far from me...O Lord, my salvation. </i>Selah.</div>
Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-67975770307838787482014-03-07T21:41:00.000-05:002014-03-07T21:50:08.248-05:00on waiting | psalms and the sea<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Dear friend,</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
My grandfather was a fisherman. Have I ever told you that?</span><br />
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My best memories are of when he lived near water, when it was clear he had found a stillness. He got up before dawn nearly every morning and learned to read the weather by the morning sky, its colors, textures, and hues.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/93/Fischerboot.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/93/Fischerboot.jpg" height="240" width="320" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: xx-small;">By Rezensor via Wikimedia Commons</span></td></tr>
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He invited me to go fishing with him when I was a kid. I went once when I was nine and never went again. It seemed like an eternity stretched out between hours, damp with lingering chill, and all I did was sit on a bucket in a wooden boat in the water. </span><br />
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All I did was wait.</span><br />
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About a year ago, I helped pick colors to paint a house. I live in that house now. The green upstairs looks more mint than forest tinged. The firefly yellow looks like a street lamp at dusk. Colors on real walls are different than colors on swatches and cans. Real colors come alive and bump with imperfection, grow warmer and cooler depending on the light and time of day.</span><br />
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<i>If I could give you a polaroid of my life, that's what it looks like now: different from how I've imagined it but alive and warm and surprising despite its imperfections and my own.</i></span><br />
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In many ways, I am still the girl on the bucket in the boat, surrounded by water. I am older now. My questions are more complicated. I still have handfuls of dreams that are wild, ever reaching things. I still tell elaborate stories. <b>In many ways I am still waiting</b>. And you know, I have found a weird peace with waiting, a respect for the work it does. How it </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">carves away your idea of what matters until what you have left is pure. It challenges everything you think about yourself and humility and grace.</span><br />
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I felt drawn to learn more about Lent in this season because it's all about waiting and expectation. Here in the quiet, I have found time enough and words that feel true--<b> in this year of waiting, I've finally learned to watch the sky</b>. I've learned to sit in darkness and be still, clinging to what I know is true. To wait for my God, more than the watchmen wait for dawn. Yes, more than the watchmen wait for dawn.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">On the Fridays leading up to Easter, I'll be blogging along with the community at <a href="http://shereadstruth.com/">She Reads Truth</a>. They've been inspiring to me, and I'm happy to write alongside them. My goal is to write every Friday, not anything flawless or fancy, but all totally from the heart. Feel free to join us, read along, or say hello.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
With peace,</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">E</span>Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-38481954850897359412014-02-25T21:54:00.001-05:002014-02-25T21:54:21.868-05:00an apology to the ordinaryDear friend,<br />
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Today I talked with a stranger who was inspiringly, sincerely kind. Her words gave off light. She spoke to me with so much respect, so much value, and I have the suspicion she spoke to everyone the same way, whether it was her husband or the person who bagged her groceries. She was just one of those people who radiate joy.<br />
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<b>These are the encounters I have in ordinary moments, and it feels like God reminding me that He loves me in a hundred different ways.</b> I once saw an elderly man deliver flowers to a coffee shop. He somehow had too many, and he gave the rest to me. They were, of course, my favorite color. I still keep them pressed between a stack of dictionaries. I once had the manager of a bookshop give me a Bible, sneaking it into my bag with a bookmark. I went back the next week to tell her thank you, but she wasn't working. I never saw her again.<br />
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I often have really incredible conversations with strangers in line at the post office, or at the gas station, or in the most mundane places you could imagine. The ordinary tasks of every day life never sparkle with adventure. They never seem to say <i>here, notice me</i>, until I am there, until I am absolutely in the middle of something that seems scripted and precise and wonder-full.<br />
<br />
I can't explain to you why I needed to encounter this incredibly kind lady today. I'm not sure I even know why. I just know that there, in her words, was something that I needed to hear. That I needed to be reminded of a kindness that exists. I don't know.<br />
<br />
I know that belief is this giant, textured canvas. I know that it's a weight that keeps me steady. <b>I know that these one hundred small moments are a gift from a God who knows me well, and deeply.</b> I know that when I pass the ordinary by, striving for something bigger, something that seems more grand, I am so entirely missing the point. Lately, I am learning to be here now. To stay in one place. I am learning the art of consistency and showing up. It's a good lesson, and I'd like to apologize to the ordinary, and the ways that I've overlooked it. I would like to ask for grace, because the beauty I've been searching for, just maybe, has been here all along. Maybe it still is.<br />
<br />
With all hope,<br />
EElizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-31955656376480049412014-02-07T13:12:00.000-05:002014-02-07T13:12:10.768-05:00bittersweet & beginningsI just finished reading my way through Shauna Niequist's book <i>Bittersweet</i>, and her words still stick with me. Those are the best kind of words- that resonate so clearly they find their way into your doing-dishes, morning-drive-to-work, ordinary moments.<br />
<br />
She writes that creating is one of the most important things a person can do because it reflects a Creator. She also writes that it's not about the method- painting or writing or singing- but that it has more to do with what that does in us. That creating opens up some space to remember our brilliant, imaginative God and to try and be like Him.<br />
<br />
It's easy for me to see a blank page and think, <i>I have no idea where to begin.</i> But it's not my beginning, is it? I was created to shape words, to be loved, and you know, that's a really good place to start.<br />
<br />
I'll leave you with some of my favorite words from <i>Bittersweet</i>:<br />
<br />
"<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 24px;">The idea of bittersweet is changing the way I live, unraveling and re-weaving the way I understand life. Bittersweet is the idea that in all things there is both something broken and something beautiful, that there is a moment of lightness on even the darkest of nights, a shadow of hope in every heartbreak, and that rejoicing is no less rich even when it contains a splinter of sadness...This is the work </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 24px;">I’m doing now, and the work I invite you into: when life is sweet, say thank you, and celebrate. And when life is bitter, say thank you, and grow."</span>Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-54967826010059688232014-01-07T03:56:00.002-05:002014-01-07T03:56:53.479-05:00new years and blank daysDear friend,<br />
<br />
The streets here are eclipsed by snow, trees with branches that bow. I can't ever remember seeing the world look so clean, so covered. It has this quiet hopefulness. These blank days are ours to fill, this whole year blank. I like that thought. And I'm so grateful for the chance to start again.<br />
<br />
I heard a woman pray so earnestly yesterday it made me weepy. The simplicity of her words just rang true. She said, "thank you for breaking open our darkness and letting us go. May I spend my life telling that story."<br />
<br />
What clarity, what a sweet purpose for all my blank days...not always productivity, accomplishment, always reaching for something tangible. But may I always be returning, grateful, for the work of the cross. The work I couldn't do. That I have been let go, free, forever, washed white like the snow that presses high up to my window. And that I would spend this new year living, loving people well, driving to work, buying stamps, watching sunrises, waiting in line, finding one hundred new ordinary ways to say thank you.Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-11828254594721293942013-11-29T13:12:00.000-05:002013-11-29T13:12:02.927-05:00Still CountingAt the beginning of spring, I started reading Ann Voskamp's <i><a href="http://www.aholyexperience.com/one-thousand-gifts-book/" target="_blank">One Thousand Gifts</a>. </i>Her words painted vivid, rich pictures of how the act of living is transformed when it's drenched in gratitude. I started a list of things I was grateful for, abandoned it, started it again. I recently found it tucked inside one of my books.<br />
<br />
Whether I'm writing them down or not, I am still counting. always.<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDycxHbn6iTRU5_gGrTuTdLr5l11lEVihjq0stMiGGmbAZpqCz2PkSthvhkMXN9qqPChD7EJqHa2Uxuuw8BG-jrZZdx2qAIq3m6LSKJQpKLut4JFTrdGnRUZyfEdP9OWpev0jV3UJKnrhF/s1600/1024101438a.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDycxHbn6iTRU5_gGrTuTdLr5l11lEVihjq0stMiGGmbAZpqCz2PkSthvhkMXN9qqPChD7EJqHa2Uxuuw8BG-jrZZdx2qAIq3m6LSKJQpKLut4JFTrdGnRUZyfEdP9OWpev0jV3UJKnrhF/s320/1024101438a.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
I'm grateful for the way the leaves always return to the trees, every spring, this newness of life. For my nieces and nephews, who challenge me to be the kindest, most creative version of myself every day. These small ones have taught me more about love than I could have imagined.<br />
<br />
I'm grateful for hot coffee, and long road trips, and friends worth driving hours to see. Friends who trade stories over old songs and street light memories. For the memories. For this season, for this whole year, of waiting and learning and trusting that the Giver is abundantly good. For the light that slants through my windows every morning, a reminder that today is another of his gifts. For people who take me as I am, people whom I love and am better for it. For you, and for today, and for the million other ways I could keep counting. Let us be found grateful.<br />
<br />Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-49403664937621874992013-11-24T18:29:00.001-05:002013-11-24T18:29:30.701-05:00I hope you fail (best words: part one)My hands ache as I focus on the chords. Some come smoothly, others fumble forward.<br />
<br />
It's my final day, my final grade. This one jazz standard.<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
It's me, this old guitar, and the professor, with the door open, the breeze flowing through. I take a breath and start again. At the beginning.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0f/LAG_Arkane_AF200_BSH.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0f/LAG_Arkane_AF200_BSH.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">photo cred: Daemon, via Wikimedia Commons</td></tr>
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I close my eyes and just <i>play, </i>and all of a sudden, I'm done. He nods. I can't tell whether I did well or not. I replay the notes in my head but they all blend together. And he nods again.<br />
<br />
The whole semester of lessons had felt like I was failing. Not in that nice, everyone-gets-a-ribbon sort of way, but failing, making mistakes rapidly without even realizing it. Blending chords that don't mix. Strumming at the wrong time. Making my own rhythm and then relearning it again.<br />
<br />
He starts to talk, and I feel like I know what's coming. That I'm just not one of those people who have rhythm, or are talented, or I need to practice more.<br />
<br />
"You worked really hard," he takes a sip of his coffee and stands up straighter. "Elizabeth, I hope you fail." I freeze. He talks with his hands, tracing a concept in the air.<br />
<br />
"You're going to graduate and get a job and make a life for yourself. And maybe you'll play guitar, and maybe you won't. But don't be paralyzed by perfection. You're going to fail at a lot of things-- it's called learning. And I hope you fail. I hope you play jazz songs your own way, and make paths where there are none, and take jobs and quit them.<br />
<br />
<i>You have this fear of failing, and it will paralyze you if you let it. The moment you really fail is when you stop trying. Don't ever stop trying.</i>"<br />
<br />
--<br />
<br />
I wrote those words down, and I found them today. I found them like a favorite song, like a letter from an old friend. They proved to be some of the best words anyone ever gave me. You see,<br />
<br />
I don't play the guitar anymore.<br />
<br />
I remember my favorite chords; I can pick some melodies. I have chosen jobs and moved my possessions, started hobbies and abandoned them. I am trying, moving forward, full force, with every melody I've got.<br />
<br />
He was right: learning sometimes feels a lot like failing. But it's in that learning you find something out about yourself, something truer than safety:<br />
<br />
<b>You are incredibly resilient.</b> You will try things and change them. You will risk and learn about yourself. You, you are your own person, with your own music. You are not alone. You are an always-changing, always-valuable story. And we,<br />
<br />
we are waiting with sweet anticipation to see what good things happen next.<br />
--<br />
<br />
What are the best words someone has given you? Advice? Encouragement?Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-87378692577604169822013-11-08T21:24:00.001-05:002013-11-08T21:57:52.104-05:00In times of transition<br />
Dear friend,<br />
<br />
The words I used to use don't seem adequate lately.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ASouq_Waqif%2C_Doha%2C_Catar%2C_2013-08-05%2C_DD_11.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" title="Diego Delso [CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons"><img alt="Souq Waqif, Doha, Catar, 2013-08-05, DD 11" height="400" src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/91/Souq_Waqif%2C_Doha%2C_Catar%2C_2013-08-05%2C_DD_11.jpg/256px-Souq_Waqif%2C_Doha%2C_Catar%2C_2013-08-05%2C_DD_11.jpg" width="267" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Photo credit: Diego Delso</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
They feel too small and old. And day after day, I keep coming back to the words of secular novelist Virginia Woolf, that she wrote in her last letter to her husband.<br />
<br />
Please know that when I say them, they're hopeful. They're a prayer and a song, and a truth.<br />
Saying them feels like scattering seeds: something will grow from this.<br />
<br />
It's easy to say that change is bad and familiarity is good; we are people who crave comfort and sameness. And yet what great things God works out in us, in our transitions and in our discomfort.<b> If there's anything I've learned this year it's that there is beauty here, even in the hard work of becoming.</b><br />
<br />
So I give these words to you. A prayer. Maybe a letting go. In a season when I'm so uncertain of all my ways, it feels so good to scatter these seeds: "Everything has gone from me but the certainty of your goodness."<br />
<br />
With all hope,<br />
EElizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-36511703478590458012013-07-02T12:38:00.000-04:002013-07-02T12:41:47.669-04:00My dear, have gratitude.It's raining.<br />
<br />
Brake lights blur as far as I can see. If nothing changes, I will be late for work. It is a flat, gray, Monday and I don't see the goodness in it yet.<br />
-<br />
<br />
The man kneels beside his daughter and holds the bright blue bouncy ball that she's won. It's her prize. She jerkily lunges to grab it from his hand, but he closes his hand around it and hides it behind his back. I look on, puzzled.<br />
<br />
He makes sure she's looking at his eyes.<br />
<br />
"This is a gift for you, my dear," he says, gently. She slows down, stops fidgeting.<br />
<br />
He has her complete attention. He says something quietly, with the heart of a teacher. <i>"Remember the gifts, my dear, and have gratitude."</i><br />
<br />
He takes the ball from behind his back and opens his palm. She carefully takes it from him. Her new eyes scan this present for its value. This gift...for her. I almost forget that it isn't fragile.<br />
<br />
-<br />
With this one moment, I am all wrung out and undone. A million things go right in a day, and I only notice the wrong. I feel the fall all over again- spilled out so clearly in my striving, in my quick actions and sharp words. If it wasn't Eve, it would be me, remembering productivity while forgetting love. It would be one hundred small ways I overlook the good.<br />
<br />
<b>This is a gift for you, my dear. Have gratitude</b>.<br />
<br />
A loon flies out low along the water. I remember again that it is all gift- this sunrise, these breaths, my car starting. This life, so messy at times, with an extravagance that hides behind familiarity. I open my eyes wider.<br />
<br />
I count more gifts; they multiply. For some reason, I start to include the things that are harder to label as gifts, like waiting and disappointment. I remind myself that redemption is a funny thing. It likes to use my broken pieces, nothing wasted.<br />
<br />
The trees shake branches to some unknown hymn, and I know it's not a question of the gifts or even the Giver. It runs deeper than that. My own hummingbirds still and I wonder: will I be found grateful?<br />
<br />Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-82979647516292960152013-06-20T18:52:00.001-04:002013-06-20T18:52:21.360-04:00Of beauty and bicycles<br />
My sister's bicycle rests on her fence. It seems unusually tall, almost menacing. It's summer and the sun is disappearing, the colors muted and grainy, as if mixed with dust. My sweet niece wants to ride bikes with me, and I want to. I really do.<br />
<br />
The last time I rode a bicycle I was ten, and it was a spring day exactly like my niece's day. I could ride for hours, like I was flying. While I rode, I would make up stories in my head. One day, I thought, I would write a book. I picked up speed.<br />
<br />
Then I hit a hole in the broken sidewalk, at just the right angle. I flew over the handlebars and tried to catch myself. Something cracked.<br />
<br />
My right arm was broken through, like a wing, and I could see the bones.<br />
<br />
-<br />
I once took a class that was nothing like writing and everything like being dissected. Writing felt pushed into a formula, and my words didn't add up. To take something you know by heart and spread it out, flat, for others to examine and pick apart can be a terrifying thing. It makes you wonder if your numbers are the wrong numbers, when really- it has nothing to do with formulas at all.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: justify;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c6/Bicicleta_naranja_3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c6/Bicicleta_naranja_3.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: center;">
Attribution: (http://www.flickr.com/photos/jglsongs/2227593328/)</div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<div style="text-align: left;">
-</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
I can't tell her no. More than that, I don't want to.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
My niece's bright eyes show no trace of knowing my fear. With shaking hands, I unlace my sister's bike from the chain link fence. It rattles tin. I put my feet on the pedals and wobble, skitter. Suddenly, I'm balanced. I ride forward and the wind kicks up, bringing with it the invincible feeling of summer. None of my fears are coming true, and I remember what it's like to love something that has hurt you.</div>
</div>
<br />
When people say <i>it's just like riding a bike </i>what they mean is something you used to know how to do will come back to you. They mean it to be comforting, easy. I wince when I hear the expression, because what I remember the most is pain. The same has been true about writing for awhile.<br />
<br />
Except for lately. Maybe it was time or distance, or the encouraging words of friends and, sometimes, strangers. Maybe the things we love can't be explained or quantified in the way we expect to understand them. Whatever the case, words have come back like they never left. One day the numbers were gone; it was only this quiet page and the small things I know of beauty and bicycles.<br />
<br />
I am learning again how to fill my two hands with stories. My words feel a little rusty, but they're here. They're the feeling of flying and cartwheels in summer grass. They're freedom and slow forgetting, and if you look closely, right here, they're tracing the outlines of two girls, riding bikes at dusk.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<br />Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-44990852047086024532012-08-26T19:11:00.001-04:002012-08-26T19:12:05.091-04:00small wondersDear friend,<br />
<br />
<i>I'm starting to discover small wonders</i>, starting to relearn that nothing is small and everything is extraordinary. This past month has been loud with responsibility, and I get so easily sucked in. Writing gets pushed further back, further back, until I almost forget about it. <b>And then I find it again, and I pick up my pen, and I try to remember where to start.</b><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMpLgkM2MBq_4lwDf0NB8YUD8EiGDZjUW_DaRBfvKvFzLKfmgzgdR5z00UccPClld0ANheolmiX41ewU2bR3-iLekmW_-L4o3PL7NKGlPjZwiqmOgJc5wCdq9FKjFrW3SnwmN9lp3KCDem/s1600/101_0292.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMpLgkM2MBq_4lwDf0NB8YUD8EiGDZjUW_DaRBfvKvFzLKfmgzgdR5z00UccPClld0ANheolmiX41ewU2bR3-iLekmW_-L4o3PL7NKGlPjZwiqmOgJc5wCdq9FKjFrW3SnwmN9lp3KCDem/s320/101_0292.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br />
<br />
<a href="http://walkerswiththedawn.blogspot.com/2012/07/you-are-going-to-love-this-land-part-one.html" target="_blank">After coming home from Nicaragua</a>, my brain felt busy with questions and memories, beauty and opposite skylines. Missions has this way of shaking up your thoughts, rearranging your priorities, and challenging your sense of comfort.<br />
<br />
You get filled up with love for people and your shoes get dusty and <i>your ideas about what it means to be like Jesus get really messy, in a good way</i>. Then you come home, and your heart is brimming with big things, while your life has remained exactly the same.<br />
<br />
<i>So slowly, I am relearning that the small things are okay.</i> The doing laundry, writing emails, getting my oil changed days are beautiful. These are honest, good things. There needs to be seasons of flying and resting, and this is a season of resting. <b>This is where real faith meets real life- not always in the obviously grand, but in the quiet.</b> Not always in the storm, or the fire, or the hurricane, but in the stillness afterward.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXUIATD2LSFlB9DtlOi0aPqE3r1kgGcReIUjfzew76R3TQww7SgYfNjQfA9lGkBuFs0WvrJ_MYcglewe36tpsBUqnEta1asvn5-z9aBY20G2GVQGStfDNfM3ze17lbzayMp3ShyphenhyphenGfdZV4d/s1600/101_0347.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXUIATD2LSFlB9DtlOi0aPqE3r1kgGcReIUjfzew76R3TQww7SgYfNjQfA9lGkBuFs0WvrJ_MYcglewe36tpsBUqnEta1asvn5-z9aBY20G2GVQGStfDNfM3ze17lbzayMp3ShyphenhyphenGfdZV4d/s320/101_0347.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br />
This week has been a rediscovering of small wonders. <i> Of belly laughs and hot tea and good friends. Of chasing fireflies at dusk. Of warm laundry and writing letters. Of hiking with my nephew. Of ending days with dirty, black feet. Of shutting off the radio and just being.</i><br />
<br />
I am finding a joy in this stillness that I didn't expect. <b>I am finding a renewed sense of passion- a passion that I pray would be rooted in loving God first.</b> the most. more than anything or anyone else. more than motion. more than my dreams. more than whatever comes next.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhCPrfImyZyEtp9JyYewL7e0kTeVhaUXgtPhvYF2K2PGY0b6OOwXmBnniOiQ0On9h3uiKUAN-PVjfCtyT7wLGqs4XIFI_19dAj9TKB6Ik-OKyHNl2Ys9zerL6H_eQtmKuAHXHY17k42e_k/s1600/101_0060.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhCPrfImyZyEtp9JyYewL7e0kTeVhaUXgtPhvYF2K2PGY0b6OOwXmBnniOiQ0On9h3uiKUAN-PVjfCtyT7wLGqs4XIFI_19dAj9TKB6Ik-OKyHNl2Ys9zerL6H_eQtmKuAHXHY17k42e_k/s320/101_0060.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br />
<br />
I'll leave you with a few of my favorite words from this week:<br />
<br />
"When I get honest, I admit I am a bundle of paradoxes. I believe and I doubt, I hope and get discouraged, I love and I hate, I feel bad about feeling good, I feel guilty about not feeling guilty.<br />
<br />
To live by grace means to acknowledge my whole life story, the light side and the dark. In admitting my shadow side, I learn who I am and what God's grace means. Grace proclaims the awesome truth that all is gift. All that is good is ours, not by right, but by the sheer bounty of a gracious God. My deepest awareness of myself is that I am deeply loved by Jesus Christ and I have done nothing to earn or deserve it."<br />
-Brennan Manning, <i>The Ragamuffin Gospel</i><br />
<br />
--<br />
<div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">"Jesus tells me what I already know, what I don’t want to believe. In order to do anything worthwhile, we must all be crushed into wine, mixed up with each other, enmeshed and entangled and bruised. This was never about me saving anyone; it was about all of us, equally, being redeemed." -D. L. Mayfield</span></div><br />
Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-69455877892808482442012-07-17T21:49:00.002-04:002012-07-17T23:04:07.747-04:00You are going to love this land. [part one]<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;">Dear friend,</span><br />
<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;"><a href="http://walkerswiththedawn.blogspot.com/2012/06/just-this-one.html" target="_blank">Exactly one month ago, I was leaving for Nicaragua</a>. I've been home for two weeks, and it's hard to find a place to start. My brain is still processing everything that happened there. Bear with me as I write and sort all these things out. I hope this will be the first story of many.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;">I think the best stories happen when we have <b>no idea</b> what we're getting ourselves into. And that's where my story starts.</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHkbXYkWl-ZgIGDNOSdsLO1pA6jil4AUOgrCwgFt9LFpmgMiSKYD-t6WBURAEQAbh7PwcsxED0NG3EuSiVmXquVzdSG2oQZVy5W-4824nY86YU98IK61A9W6QRFHXhGO4bfiJy5PAJyRHa/s1600/DSCN1327.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;"><img border="0" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHkbXYkWl-ZgIGDNOSdsLO1pA6jil4AUOgrCwgFt9LFpmgMiSKYD-t6WBURAEQAbh7PwcsxED0NG3EuSiVmXquVzdSG2oQZVy5W-4824nY86YU98IK61A9W6QRFHXhGO4bfiJy5PAJyRHa/s320/DSCN1327.jpg" width="320" /></span></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;">When I first heard about the trip, <a href="http://walkerswiththedawn.blogspot.com/2012/03/on-my-way-nicaragua.html" target="_blank">I felt tugged in a way that I can't explain</a>. I had that same pulling feeling in my gut when I agreed to go to <a href="http://walkerswiththedawn.blogspot.com/2010/12/three-hundred-and-sixty-five-days.html" target="_blank">Virginia Beach</a>. It's this mix of excitement and fear and hope, and you know on some level that you will not- you cannot- return home as the same person you were when you left.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;">As I stepped up to customs, the border officer looked at my passport before he slowly stamped it. He was young. Maybe a few years older than I was. As he handed it back to me, he studied my face for a moment. He said in Spanish, "You are going to love this land." He repeated it again in English, as if to make sure I understood. He had no idea how right he was.</span><br />
<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;">--</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;">We drove from the airport through the city of Managua, through this beautiful, lush, green place filled with of people. I was immediately aware of my skin and how it glowed white, like the moon. At a stoplight, I noticed two small children trying to sell golf balls to stopped cars. I locked eyes with one young girl who was clenching a neon pink golf ball.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;">Before this trip, I had plenty of ideas about purpose and what my life should look like after I graduate. And one split second looking into the big brown eyes of this sweet girl changed all that. I felt, deep in my gut, <i>I am so in over my head</i>. I am so in love with this place that it hurts, and I've only been here for two hours.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;">You see, I expected Nicaragua to be hot. Dusty mixed with tropical.</span></b><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;">I expected to see livestock and old buildings and trash in the road. I expected to see and meet a lot of people. I didn't expect how giving they would be, even joyful. I didn't expect them to invite us into their lives. I didn't expect the love God put in my heart for them, which was so much bigger than myself. I didn't expect to feel so much, so quickly. <b>I didn't expect so much love.</b></span><br />
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</span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi71AIyJumTQysYCpPfiYPcX4a-HeEk69_q9oxZHIc_WWPu3W6uMt68nS8LBEc2eUcx7NOswGZOiNlKIUZPi6NqhmWMbxdO8Y2tHq4zRq0gkF-hzrYiq4koN8upBsPpYmD1CAzk1IIOqGa7/s1600/DSCN1361.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;"><img border="0" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi71AIyJumTQysYCpPfiYPcX4a-HeEk69_q9oxZHIc_WWPu3W6uMt68nS8LBEc2eUcx7NOswGZOiNlKIUZPi6NqhmWMbxdO8Y2tHq4zRq0gkF-hzrYiq4koN8upBsPpYmD1CAzk1IIOqGa7/s320/DSCN1361.jpg" width="320" /></span></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;">It's like I've been walking around all my life with this flat, clay map of how I think about things: success and life and relationships and joy.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;">I went to Nicaragua and it brushed up against my skin like a stamp, and I am undeniably imprinted with its story. God did so much there, in the prayers that were prayed and the sick that were healed. The people whose lives were changed and the sweet kids we got to teach and spend time with.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif;">All of these things have marked me, like a tattoo or a painting with bold strokes and one thing is certain: my flat, clay map has been changed forever. And I am bright with color.</span>Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-44202032419678615062012-06-16T23:07:00.001-04:002012-06-16T23:17:27.316-04:00just this one.<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">A friend once asked me that if I could only tell <b>one story</b> to someone, what would it be.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I find this question incredibly hard because I love stories and to choose one would be like picking a favorite child. If you were sitting across from me and we didn't have much time, I'd tell you one. Just this one.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">---</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/39/Rapeseed_field_2012_G1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="265" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/39/Rapeseed_field_2012_G1.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">One summer, fifteen other people and I crawled through a large field on our hands and knees looking for a rock. The rock was supposed to have a number 1 on it. This was our only task for the day- and it was important. We couldn't leave until we found this rock. At the time, I didn't understand this exercise but as I remember it now, it still moves me to tears.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">--</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I grew up in a Christian church. The people there were kind, sweet, and friendly. My church was a nice brick building where I learned that God loved me and Jesus had a beard and I got stickers and ate a lot of free pretzels. I liked growing up there; everything I'd been taught seemed wonderful and I was carefree.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Then I got older and overnight, I turned into a teenager with sharp edges and big questions. There's another story there, but that's deeper and too big to not tell you face to face. Just know that all of the things I'd been taught seemed harder to grasp or remember or believe in. I had all of the "right" answers from my childhood, but none of them lined up with my heart. I felt wandering and lost, disconnected from being loved.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">There's a story about that in the Bible. It's clear and beautiful and reached down to where I was and scooped me up. Jesus talks about how one of a shepherd's sheep wanders away, and that shepherd does <i>everything</i> to find it. He leaves his 99 other sheep to seek out this one that decided to wander away. I always figured that if you lose one of something and you have 99 others, it seems like a no brainer: you just let that one go. After all, you have so many more, right?</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">No. Not according to Jesus. Not in the case of the shepherd. And not in mine.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">--</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Grass and dirt smudged on my skin as we crawled against the grass, flipping over every stone, looking for the one. At the beginning of the exercise, I figured that it was another church camp object lesson- finding the stupid rock didn't matter that much. As we combed the field and time passed, I began to realize that it did matter. The truth was that I felt like the sheep- like I had wandered away. I became desperate to find this rock, and kept crawling, clutching at the dirt.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">A half hour passed. Then an hour. And all at once, a girl from our team leapt up, clutching this rock with a mark on it. In an instant we gathered around her with this crazy, palpable joy, cheering, laughing, and jumping up and down. We had found the one.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">In the moment of finding that rock- I realized that it was just a rock. How much must God love people- his precious, beautiful, wild creations? How much more must He want to know us, then to seek us out when we wander away on our own paths, stuck in rocks and jagged places. How much <i>joy</i> must He feel when we're reunited with Him.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">This is the story that I keep coming back to: God loves lost people. He seeks them out. He goes out intentionally to look for them. He's desperate to find us, there in our jagged places. He doesn't turn away the brokenhearted or the worn out or the outcasts. Read the book of Luke. Read I John. Read Isaiah 52. In all its beauty, the stories are true. God wants to know us. And Christ came to save us. And we don't have to do work harder or be more or earn grace- we just have to say yes.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I don't understand a love like that- how someone could set out looking for me. How someone could think I am precious. How someone could leave the 99 and say, I'm going to find this lost sheep. I'm going to give her direction. I'm going to rewrite her dreams. I'm going to love her and I'm going to give her a story better than any she could ever dream up.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">--</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Dear friend,</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I leave for <a href="http://walkerswiththedawn.blogspot.com/2012/03/on-my-way-nicaragua.html">Nicaragua </a>on Monday. I'm ready and not ready all at once. But this story- it's written on my heart. I am made to tell it.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I'm excited and ready and needy, so <i>needy</i> for the Jesus of the gospels. So inside-out, upside-down, ready to lose my life to find it. Because my life isn't here. It's not in Michigan. It's not in my education or my job or anything you can wrap your hands around. My life isn't even in my words, here in this writing.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">My life is in this Jesus, who set out to find me and hasn't let me go since.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And that's the story I never want to stop telling.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Just this one.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">-e</span>Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-31026380399392464622012-05-28T22:58:00.000-04:002012-05-28T22:58:31.876-04:00shake the dust."I'm not writing...much," I throw out casually, like it's not a big deal.<br />
<br />
"It's just different now. Harder. I'm not sure if it matters like it used to." I wriggle, even though I'm on the phone. I don't like confessing this to my friend, and yet it's where I'm at. She'll know.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f9/You_are_here_-_street_sign.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f9/You_are_here_-_street_sign.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Photo credit: Joe Goldberg- Seattle.</td></tr>
</tbody></table><br />
You see, I haven't felt really purposeful lately. This summer, I'm not taking any classes. I'm not a student. I'm working at a job that has nothing to do with what I've studied. To quote my sweet friend Deeny, "Everything is up in the air. Way up there." And all of my big dreams have felt put on hold, at least for awhile. It doesn't feel like I have much to say these days, or that any of my stories matter.<br />
<br />
The honest thing to say is that it feels like I'm failing. And when I told my friend that, she said, "To whom?" It stopped me there, my insides a train that always runs too fast.<br />
<br />
<b>There is this thing about failure that deeply worms its way into our hearts.</b> There's so much pressure, especially us 20-somethings. You need to know what you want to do. You need to go to school. You need to be the best, the fastest, the most successful. It's like there's this unwritten law that you need to have your life together in a certain amount of time.<br />
<br />
That's what has been on my mind lately. That feeling of failure, I think it's powerful. I think it keeps people's dreams caged in. <i>I think it can keep us from being free.</i> It settles over us like thick dust.<br />
<br />
If God really did create us as unique, bold, alive puzzle pieces of Him- then we all have different stories to live and things to do. The dreams ingrained in us have a purpose; no two are exactly the same. We each have places to go and people to love along the way. How can you measure that?<br />
<br />
What makes something a failure?<br />
Is it taking too long? Is it trying too hard?<br />
Is it giving up?<br />
<br />
These up-in-the-air seasons of life often lack a purpose that this world can identify. The easy thing to do might be to call them failure and just give up. The harder, more beautiful thing might be to open my eyes a little wider to seek out God's goodness. Because it's here.<br />
<br />
My words are for you tonight. They've been hidden somewhere, in quiet, tight spaces but not anymore. You see, if we are God's and He is ours, then we are His. <b>And there is no failure in that- only freedom.</b> There is freedom to do what lives in your heart, and I hope you do it. I hope you dream and pray and sing and write and live. Shake the dust.<br />
<br />
-eElizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-53187898882626214282012-04-07T12:26:00.000-04:002012-04-07T12:26:18.254-04:00Finished.<div style="text-align: left;">The moon was close last night,</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">so white and glowing I wanted to know what it was thinking.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">I wondered if it saw right through me,</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">that I have no idea where I am going. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">You see: I make my own plans.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">They tend to fall apart.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">And then, untrusting, I tend to fall apart,</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">seams and thread and all.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">But in the planning, and knowing, and sewing,</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">you should know this:</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">Once I chose what I thought I needed-</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">convinced that my heart couldn't live without</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">something other than God.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">Even in my wandering, He had a plan</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">so great to reach down and scoop me up</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">out of my own selfishness, even if it</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">cost His son. Even if He had to kneel</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">in the dirt to show me what love is.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">This is rescue: when I chose myself,</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">when I spit in His face,</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">He pulled me out of my graves,</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">once and for all. </div>Elizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-47613780535322806662012-03-24T18:43:00.001-04:002012-03-24T19:17:39.597-04:00on my way: nicaragua.Dear friends, <br />
<br />
I have some really cool news, but it requires starting at the beginning. This post is a little long, but I promise I'm going somewhere. The last six years of my life have been an amazing journey, and I would love to have you in on it. <b>Walk with me?</b><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><br />
<b>6/26/06-</b> On my way to Mississippi after Hurricane Katrina. I am 16. Our group from church will help repair a barn, shingle a roof, and frame a new house. In red dirt, empty lots, and twisted, mangled tree roots, we find some sort of crazy hope. There can be rebuilding after disaster.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhP0f_V0-3HwuTyz7Xox-YeUVvfviJFFkBvFUdDwfwiIPp8CQqS2UX66p2ddU4U5w1TFDWuwAn2Z47dA9AP6_27QmycVEhNQQ-PQdqEijenOMs_QlGXkbKRnv3RVCza-yAlkntBQiEig4-y/s1600/july+06--july+07+149.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhP0f_V0-3HwuTyz7Xox-YeUVvfviJFFkBvFUdDwfwiIPp8CQqS2UX66p2ddU4U5w1TFDWuwAn2Z47dA9AP6_27QmycVEhNQQ-PQdqEijenOMs_QlGXkbKRnv3RVCza-yAlkntBQiEig4-y/s320/july+06--july+07+149.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br />
<b>7/6/06-</b> The woman we helped cries as we pull out of her driveway. <i>You don't know what you've done for us</i>, she says. I want to tell her it's the other way around. I want to tell her she blessed me more than she'll ever know. I came to fix a barn and left, startled by the love I felt for another human being in the course of one week. I left broken and whole and challenged. <br />
<br />
<b>6/26/07- </b>On my way to Mississippi again. Except I decide not to go. What changed? I have no idea.<br />
<br />
<b>6/26/08-</b> I graduate from high school. I get lost in things that seem important. I find my worth in studying, working hard, pleasing people.<br />
<br />
<b>6/26/09-</b> I am exhausted. I pray that God would interrupt me from myself. And He does.<br />
<br />
<b>12/26/09-</b> On my way to Indianapolis. Instead of graduating a year early, I decide to go on a missions trip to Virginia. What changed? Everything. God changed everything.<br />
<br />
<b>6/1/10-</b> On my way to Virginia. It is <i>hot</i>. I have no idea what I'm getting myself into, in the best way possible. I'm immersed in a community of Christian college students that loves me exactly as I am; this view of grace will change my life. We walk along the beach, we sing too loudly, we talk with people about what they believe. For the first time, I feel known and alive.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaYksYjYpZju_TrRIwhhgJjwlW3mwNYDn_xHRvtL3siYZBAnuX8x-sz5-sXEAr42YfQVSagzGN6eLGDLxeAgrgld2RyX_kSxobqToMqMyQNsr-VW8T3v6JIu2whm4KEAAT1J8m8QGK7ipo/s1600/VA+beach+sun.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaYksYjYpZju_TrRIwhhgJjwlW3mwNYDn_xHRvtL3siYZBAnuX8x-sz5-sXEAr42YfQVSagzGN6eLGDLxeAgrgld2RyX_kSxobqToMqMyQNsr-VW8T3v6JIu2whm4KEAAT1J8m8QGK7ipo/s320/VA+beach+sun.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />
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<b>7/15/10-</b> Walking home from church the night before my birthday, friends and I run into a man on the boardwalk who we talk with about God. He says he's too far gone for forgiveness. We talk with him until it's dark out, until it's midnight. Until it's my birthday, and I have given this stranger the most valuable thing that I know how to give. We are all talking and crying and praying, and I realize that this is what I want my life to look like. I want it to look like love.<br />
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<b>8/12/10-</b> On my way home. I struggled with readjusting. I don't know what to do.<br />
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<b>1/1/11-</b> I get a little lost again. I am on my way to graduating. People swarm in with opinions. I should try this. I should have studied something else. I'm going to be unemployed. Being a writer is ridiculous. Just do something normal, for once.<br />
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<b>6/1/11-</b> I take on more responsibilities. I take more classes. I have two jobs. I apply for internships. I try to balance obligations and the idea that people are important. My priorities wrestle. People get the short end of the stick.<br />
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<b>1/20/12-</b> I apply for a dream internship. I realize that my church is going to Nicaragua to help people in poverty. I want to do both. I consider withdrawing my internship application. I submit it anyway.<br />
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<b>2/28/12-</b> Rejected from internship. I am disappointed and yet...relieved. Do I cry or laugh? These plans are bigger than me.<br />
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<b>3/24/12- Today.</b><br />
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Today finds me spending two weeks of this summer in Leon, Nicaragua. I am thrilled, amazed, and ready. It feels like I've been waiting years for this trip. Years to rediscover what I once knew in my bones was important.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgF5Tf_LW1CS-Wcud9jztgG7D7mtVhfugY7HAKktjPG3sCZqaanwZPhcUbcbJuNA8KmKVvDuIz1PrjcnXOK9MXqTdMJtT3rT1JW_LQnaqHnUOWFE_66pAFWmT3nby_BSQ3bSdoGT-3a9Pcj/s1600/Nicaraguan+children.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgF5Tf_LW1CS-Wcud9jztgG7D7mtVhfugY7HAKktjPG3sCZqaanwZPhcUbcbJuNA8KmKVvDuIz1PrjcnXOK9MXqTdMJtT3rT1JW_LQnaqHnUOWFE_66pAFWmT3nby_BSQ3bSdoGT-3a9Pcj/s320/Nicaraguan+children.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-size: large;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">People are important.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">People are more important than seeming important.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">And love.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Love is the most important.</span><br />
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I praise God that He knows what we need. <i>And I think He knew I needed this trip.</i> That I couldn't get lost for awhile. That I needed to be found. Found in the power of the gospel, in the richness of community, in the awe that comes from His love.<br />
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If you feel lost or stuck or on your way to something you're unsure of: I know how that feels. <b> It feels weird to have big questions, or too-big dreams, or a passion for something that doesn't quite fit into how your life looks right now.</b><br />
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The best thing someone ever told me was this: <b><span style="font-size: small;">keep trusting God</span></b>. Dreams will come and go, but He stays the same. And if you're supposed to be somewhere, you'll get there, somehow. Even if it takes time. It has taken me a lot of time, but I'm on my way.<br />
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I used to think I was on my way to being a writer and sometimes went on missions trips. I wonder, now, if it isn't the other way around. If I have always, deep down, been on my way to wherever God is taking me, and sometimes I get to write about it.<br />
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Who knows what the future holds? I don't. And it feels really good. It feels like surrender, after all these years.<br />
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With all hope,<br />
-eElizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9190216972442874584.post-74464982401722331972012-03-19T13:07:00.000-04:002012-03-19T13:07:35.723-04:00With us.Dear friend,<br />
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What a crazy spring season of life. Spring seems to set all things into motion--change and action and growth.<br />
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Many of my friends are graduating, moving, or getting married. There seems to be this increased pressure on their hearts. And on my own, too, sometimes. We are all trying to figure out why we're here and what we're supposed to do next. In between waiting and living, we work too many hours and try to quiet our questions. It is easy to be anxious, but it is so poisonous to our spirits.<br />
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The unknown can be scary because it's open and untamed and wild. The future has this way of feeling really big and looming, even if it's exciting. Last week felt loud with questions, and I went into my room, shut the door, opened every window, and began to pray. I took out my Bible and remembered Immanuel- the God that is <i>with </i>us.<br />
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God with us when we're excited. When spring and life are vibrant. God with us when we're tired. When we have no idea what to do. Sometimes I get wrapped up in other things and forget the truth of the gospel- that God would send His son to close the gap between us. I don't understand a love like that. But that love He has for me- it drives out all fear. It quiets my questions. Immanuel, God with us, <i>is </i>with us. And there's no reason to fear.<br />
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With hope,<br />
-eElizabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17464693442019195406noreply@blogger.com1