Pardon My Progress

     There's a hotel in our town that is undergoing renovation.  At the onset, it was one big mess- old furniture strewn about the grounds, debris cluttering the parking lot.  Little by little, the mess has been cleaned up and the facade of the building has taken on a new look.  Still the work remains incomplete, presumably renovation going on inside, as the doors have not yet opened for business and there remains a sign upon the marquis that reads, "Pardon our progress."

     I love that sign.  It's ripe with hopeful anticipation of something glorious yet to come.  And I've pondered that sign.  I've determined that I really need one hanging around my neck.  "Pardon my progress."  It would serve to remind myself and others that I'm not a finished piece.  Sometimes I forget that.  I'm not how I was.  Some of my messiness has been cleared away.  But sometimes the mess I cant see is so much more far reaching than some of the outward junk.  Like a tree grown around a wire fence, the wire embedding itself into the young sapling, I have things embedded into my being that were never intended to be a part of who I am.  Lies I've embraced distort my perception of truth.  The toxins seeping from heart wounds have damaged my ability to give and receive love.  If I'm to continue becoming, renovation remains a must.

     I could settle, I suppose.  After all, it's not like I can't tell improvements have been made.  Quite frankly, I'm growing impatient as I look within and recognize how much work is left.  I think of the hotel.  More than likely there are those who drive by and wonder what in the world is taking so long.  The outside appears to be in order; open up already!  But if they caught a glimpse of what remains left to be finished, they would understand.  It's still a big mess.  But what's more important still, I believe, is that they catch a glimpse of what's yet to be.  If they were to see beyond the mess and gain a vision for the end result, I think their impatience would be tempered.  And maybe if I were to wear a reminder about my neck, a sign reading "Pardon my progress", the impatience I have toward my seemingly stunted growth would likewise be tempered.

     Truth be told, I'm just as guilty of looking at others on their journey of becoming with the same intolerance toward their slow growth as I am myself.  It's so easy to desire grace for myself, desperately wanting others to take note that I remain incomplete- I'm a masterpiece still in the making- while I pass judgment based on their lack of completeness.  Maybe if we all were to don pardon signs, we'd remember to look beyond what we can see to the potential for what can become.

Making THE Difference

            Articles are interesting little things.  An article, grammatically speaking, is a word used to modify a noun.  They’re similar to an adjective, although an adjective is generally more descriptive, whereas an article is used to point out a noun.  They’re rather bland as far as words go.  In this regard, adjectives completely dominate.  And being rather bland, they often fade into the background for me. “I went to the store.”  The.  A.  An.  Boring!  Boring, perhaps, but not altogether insignificant.

            Take, for instance, the familiar phrase “to make a difference”.  I both love and detest this phrase.  Certainly it evokes a prompting of sorts, a desire to be a part of something big and amazing.  But that a in there… It causes me pain.  A difference.  That seems so ambiguous, and it seems to carry with it an unspoken mandate to make such a difference large and meaningful and important.  To bring about such a feat, the doer of the deed must therefore be meaningful and important.  And to be quite honest, most days I feel much more like a baby chicken than a soaring eagle.  Let’s just be honest:  not even a baby chicken.  They’re cute and fuzzy and cuddly and elicit adoration from onlookers.  I feel like just a regular chicken, pecking my fool head off to try to find whatever it is I’m supposed to be looking for, every now and again flapping my silly little wings when I get an inflated sense of self and think of myself as something more than a flightless, ground pecking non-eagle.  My focus immediately shifts to what I’m not, and that nagging voice inside my head incessantly yaps to me of my failures, real and perceived, and paralysis sets in, and I once more do absolutely nothing to yield any sort of difference.

            I wonder, though, what if we were to simply change the article in that phrase?  What if, rather than attempting to make a difference, we instead attempted to make the difference?  To say that someone has made a difference, their status immediately elevates, and we view them as some sort of super human whose level of significance we will never attain.  To make a difference is to be important, to be significant, to matter.  To know this of ourselves- that we’re on this planet for more than decoration- is a longing every member of the human race has in common.  We want to be important; we want to matter.  What I believe we fail to understand, though, is that our “mattering” is intrinsically woven into the very strands of our souls.  We matter because of who we are, not what we do.  The “what” is supposed to merely be a natural output of the “who.”  But for so many of us, the significance of who we are has been lost.  Sadly, for some people, never have they experienced the truth of their worth.  To make a difference is to be important; to make the difference is to change the nature of something.  I have no doubt that some of us were born to do things that all would esteem as significant and amazing and incredibly noble.  I wonder, though, if some of those world changers are holding those differences as merely untapped potential, unseen potential, because there are those who, would they embrace the truth that their significance is intrinsic, that the value of the difference they make doesn’t get to be defined by anyone else but that it’s value is beyond all worth nonetheless, would make the difference in the life or lives of those whose worth is hidden from them and change the very nature of a soul.  Sounds pretty noble to me.

I Like My Trashy Pictures!

Apparently, nothing I do is right.  It’s more than likely a given that my kids will find themselves vertical on some psychologist’s couch at some point in their adult life because I let them cry too much, or I held them too long, or I exposed them to too much, or I didn’t expose them to enough, or I let them eat too much junk, or I caused them to be way too deprived.  Actually, for my oldest son, it’ll probably be my not allowing him to have a cell phone at age twelve.  I’m pretty sure he already sees himself as mortally wounded because of that one.  Not only are my kids a mess and my parenting screwed up, I don’t clean my house properly.  I didn’t know that, but fortunately for me, I received an email today informing me of “Eight Ways You’re Probably Cleaning Wrong”.  Sigh.  Who knew?  And just in case I didn’t have enough things to check off my “Epic Fail” list, Pinterest was more than ready to step up to the plate and help me out.  Now, don’t get me wrong.  I enjoy Pinterest.  I’ve already pinned more recipes than I could possibly make in my lifetime and an equal number of craft projects to make one of these “Somedays”.  But there are days when looking at everyone else’s masterpieces and maternal successes can make me feel like a great big pile of mediocre sludge.  From Elf on the Shelf to cutesy ornaments to picture perfect holiday treats, I already knew that I’m not one of “those” mothers.  You know the type?  Those women who seem to be some beautiful, magical amalgamation of Caroline Ingalls and June Cleaver and Clair Huxtable and Martha Stewart, with just a pinch of Xena, Princess Warrior thrown in for good measure.  Quite frankly, there are days when I feel like my parenting probably more closely resembles The Simpsons.  Probably Homer.  Double sigh.

Anyway…

I had come to grips with the fact that I wasn’t Super Santa Mom.  But then I saw something that further revealed my homemaking haplessness.  A picture perfect (no pun intended) Pinteresty idea on how to make your holiday pictures picture perfect.  Wrap the outside of a large box in festive Christmas paper and place all the trash and wrappings in the box in order to eliminate unsightly garbage bags from ruining your holiday photos.

Ingenious!  Make a note of this.  One more thing to add to the “Not to Be a Loser Mom on Christmas” list.  Oh, my poor Christmas pictures from yesteryear!  To be forever marred by Hefty-ness!  Horrors!  Shame on me… WAIT A MINUTE!

To be quite clear, I am by NO means a photographer.  I am, according to a “real” photographer I became acquainted with earlier this week, one who causes those of her kind to cringe (i.e., I use the camera on my phone to snap pictures).  I have great respect and admiration for those who use the medium of photography to tell stories, but my interests are different than theirs.  For me, picture taking is not my creative outlet of choice but is a means by which I can (attempt to) capture and preserve memories.

And I don’t care if my pictures look trashy!

But I care about what others think of me.  I want to be “in.”  I want to be deemed acceptable… worthy… desirable… choose-able.  So I assess what needs to be done to make my “trash” look attractive, losing sight of the fact that a dressed up box of junk is still, after all, a box of junk.  And for all my efforts, I end up looking more like a little girl who’s been playing in her mommy’s make-up bag than I do the picture I’ve embraced of a person I’m supposed to be who really looks nothing like me at all.

 The trouble with dressing up your trash is that it puts the focus on your trash.  When I take photos of my family, whether at Christmas or any other time, I want to capture the essence of them.  And that means, in our family, there’s sometimes chaos, quite often a mess, perhaps a Hefty bag showing; and it’s beautiful and wonderful and amazing.  When I look at pictures like that, I don’t focus on the trash or the mess; I focus on the faces of my loves, and my heart melts.  Maybe when God looks at me, his focus isn’t on the trash in there, either.  That time I lost my cool and spoke in higher decibels than I like?  God says, “There’s passion in there!  I can work with that!”  That time I crossed my arms and wouldn’t budge until things went my way?  God says, “There’s tenacity in there!  I can work with that!”  That time I stumbled and fell to my knees in despair because it wasn’t the first time, it was about the four millionth time?!  God says, “You’re doing SO much better than you realize!  And I’m so PROUD of you!  I don’t look at you in light of all you do wrong, but I see all you do right!  You’re so beautiful to me!”

So bring on the garbage bags.  Bring on the beautifully perfect imperfection.  Snap a few trashy pictures.  I think they make God smile. 

A Blog Post About Absolutely Nothing

Today I wanted desperately to write a blog post.  There have been those moments when the need to write has been paramount- when the swirls of thoughts and emotions tinged with passionate conviction have been so strong yet so nebulous that I must give them form and tangibility, if for no other reason than to be able to give voice to and bring a semblance of sanity to the frantic musings of my somewhat ADD brain.  Then there have been those times when I’ve wanted to write, but without a doubt, I was motivated by insecurity that sought out affirmation as well as fleshly desires to shine.  But today was different.  I wanted to write, simply because I wanted to write.  It’s something I enjoy quite a lot.  In the words of Rainer Maria Rilke, “If, when you wake up in the morning, you can think of nothing but writing… then you are a writer.”  Now, with a somewhat ADD brain and all, I readily admit that it’s not that I think of NOTHING but writing; however, I think about it a lot.  I love words, and I love painting word pictures.  And I’m recognizing more and more how much God, just like the doting parent that he is, gushes over my art just as any parent would his or her precious child’s masterpiece.  He’s helping me to see how much he delights in watching me twirl for him (metaphorically speaking.  I was imagining a little girl in her “princess” dress twirling for her daddy.  Which, in my mind, was a beautiful and poetic way of saying that God likes it when I write.  If it didn’t come across quite as cleverly and seamlessly as I imagined, just go with it and let me live in my little delusion.  I’m feeling fragile.).  The more I see that, the more content I am with doing what I do as a love offering for a Daddy who is crazy in love with me.  And when I give something to God, he can then use it however he wishes for whatever he purposes.  “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as though you were working for the Lord and not for people.” (Colossians 3:23)  Oh, I like to pretend I might know how he’ll use a particular thing, how he might use the words I pen to speak thus and such to him or her; but the truth is, for every one thing I could imagine, there are countless others that would blow my little human mind.

So why are you troubled, oh my soul?  What is this frustration that has welled up within me?  If I’m beginning to have greater understanding that performance requiring perfection is unnecessary, that I’m “working” for one who is my biggest cheerleader and focuses on all I do right as opposed to being hyper critical, and that the onus isn’t on me to make certain my words reach exactly the right audience, shouldn’t I be feeling light and cheerful?  Enjoying my medium of expression a lot more?  I would be- if I had SOMETHING.  Something to pair with my desire.  A thing of substance.  A topic.  Any topic!  Certainly there are those days like I mentioned before, when desire is coupled with, if not surpassed by, the need to give voice to those things that seem they would cause my head and heart to burst.  And I know that I know that God will do amazing things with the words that spill forth in those moments.  But what can he do with NOTHING?  When the desire to write is almost the need in itself… When it’s as if I can’t not write, but… there’s nothing “good” about which to write.  What then?

And then it happens.  As I’m sitting in the corner of a coffee shop, writing about having nothing to write about, a song plays on the radio.  Not just any song- a Bruno Mars song.  And not just any Bruno Mars song (and quite frankly, I don’t know that many Bruno Mars songs)- the Bruno Mars song that happened to be playing on a radio station I never listen to but just happened to have turned to one day when I was feeling less than wonderful.  It’s definitely a song about the love of a man for a woman, and there may be those who would question whether God could or would use anything- gasp!- “secular” to speak truth to a heart, but the message he spoke to my heart through the lyrics of this song was as clear as day:

“I know, I know
When I compliment her she won't believe me.
And it's so, it's so
Sad to think that she don't see what I see.
But every time she asks me, ‘Do I look okay?’
I say,

When I see your face
There's not a thing that I would change
'Cause you're amazing
Just the way you are.
And when you smile
The whole world stops and stares for a while
'Cause, girl, you're amazing
Just the way you are.”

You see, I have a hard time seeing in me what God sees in me, and I constantly question his affirmation of me.  But his ever constant, ever patient, ever loving response to me is, You’re amazing just the way you are.”  And he goes on to say, “When you smile, the whole world stops and stares for awhile.  Because you allow me to love deeply through you, and because of that, you’re radiant.  It defies words.  It’s not what you do, but who you are.”

Suddenly, it makes so much sense to me!  I can offer my “nothing” to God just as well as I can my “substance”, and what he can do with my nothing is by no means any less than what he can do with my more.

So here’s my blog post about absolutely nothing.  And I think God loves it.

Mountain Climbing DNA

This past week, my husband and I were afforded an amazing opportunity.  We were able to attend a three-day conference in the beautiful Rocky Mountains in Keystone, Colorado.  Amazing hardly seems to sum it up.  Breathtaking; exhilarating; rejuvenating… All of those and so much more.  Author Mark Batterson says that “a change of pace + a change of pace = a change of perspective.”  This certainly proved true for me.  I found myself looking at things at new and fresh angles; contemplating the “what ifs” in a manner far removed from a worrisome or fear-based line of thinking; and simply drinking in the goodness of God.  What a glorious time!

On the morning we left to return home, we stopped in the quaint little town of Georgetown, Colorado for food and fuel.  While Cory was putting gas in the tank, I sat gazing out the window at the mountains, as I had for so many hours of our trip, mesmerized by their grandeur and beauty.  As I studied the opulent landscape, I sensed both a beckoning and a yearning.  It was as if the mountain before me called out to me, “Come!  Be among these trees.  Explore these rocks and crags.  What other treasures might abound upon these slopes?  Climb!  Ascend!”  My heart responded with desire to acquiesce.  This mountain before me seemed to exist, if for no other reason, than to be climbed, and I wanted to climb it!  Of course, I knew such an adventure was not to be had that morning.  First of all, we were under time constraints.  Secondly, while this was by no means the tallest peak we had seen on our get-away, it was a mountain nonetheless, and I was ill-equipped to tackle such a rigorous activity.  But were I to be perfectly honest, I knew the real reason I wouldn’t be climbing that mountain.  It’s because I’m a chicken baby.  You see, I recognize the desire I have to be adventurous; but I also recognize a voice within me that says, “It’s a mountain.  You might fall.  Off the side of a mountain.  And DIE!!!”

Isn’t this essentially the same struggle I have each day?  These dueling rivals for my heart- a life of adventure or a life of self-preservation- always at odds with one another.  It occurred to me that day as we drove away from Georgetown, mountain climbing is a part of our DNA.  Our spiritual DNA.  In the book of Romans, Paul says, “God’s Spirit beckons. There are things to do and places to go!  This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave-tending life. It’s adventurously expectant, greeting God with a childlike ‘What’s next, Papa?’”  In other words, there are mountains before us to climb and explore and treasure to be found!  And my spirit responds, “Yes!  I want to climb!”

But fear would love to have the last word.  “It’s not safe,” it says.  “You might…”  “What if…”  “It’s too risky.”

Certainly in any adventure, there is an element of risk.  God’s not safe; he’s not tame.  Yet he’s entirely good, and I’m completely safe in his hands, regardless of any outcome.  I want to choose to yield to that which is a part of my spiritual makeup, to climb every mountain before me.  To simply play it safe, wondering what I might have seen at the summit, is an unbearable alternative to scaling the heights with Jesus.

  

"Woo hoo hoo me, Mommy?"

               “Woo hoo hoo me, Mommy?”  Big brown, pleading eyes looked up at me, little arms raised expectantly.  The music was playing, the beat was lively, and my precious boy knew this as an invitation to be swept up into my arms and twirled around in a silly, wonderful, beautiful mommy/son dance, jubilantly shouting out, “Woo hoo hoo!” as we spun ourselves dizzy.

            I don’t remember the last time we engaged in the “woo hoo hoo” ritual.  But there was indeed a last time.  My little boy is big now.  On the verge of teendom, he looks me in the eye now when we stand face to face.  His little boy features are being replaced with the chiseled features of a handsome young man.  He hasn’t reached his arms out to me to be gathered up in mine for quite some time, and quite honestly, I often find myself at a loss as to how I fit in his quickly growing and changing world.  I try to hold onto the fleeting vestiges of a little boy who needs his mommy, and I am met with the sullen response of a preteen who resents being held tightly when he wants to soar.  Oh, I know he loves me… but he doesn’t “need” me.  And what is a mom if she isn’t needed?

            The sweet voice of my heavenly Father whispers to my heart.  He reminds me that the definition of my life- who I am- is not “Mom.”  First and foremost, I am Lisa, his beloved, and he has created me to be his friend, to love, and to love through.  I am not defined by what I do, but through what I do, who I am shines forth.  And what my boy needs is a mom who loves Jesus and is being transformed into a more “real” version of her true self and to love him in light of that.  He reminds me that he’ll teach me how to love my son in the manner he needs to be loved at every stage of his life, and that who I am and what I do are significant.

            “Hey, Mom, can I show you this cool ship I just built?”  Handsome brown eyes look across at me, long arms holding a monster of a Lego creation.

            “Wow,” I reply, “that’s amazing!”

            A grin comes across his face, and he begins to show me all the details and intricacies of his masterpiece.  I listen to what he’s telling me and watch the excitement on his face as he shares with me, and what I hear is, “Woo hoo hoo me, Mommy?”  And I’m most happy to oblige.

Seasons Change

All is well in my world today.  It’s 75°.  Windows and curtains are wide open, and I’ve been cleaning out my refrigerator.  Not usually my most favorite task, but with spring in the air and its beautiful breezes wafting through, the most mundane of chores takes on a guise of fun and excitement.  Well, maybe not excitement… but nonetheless, it’s a good day.  Ushered in with the delightful temperatures is a sense of anticipation.  Spring is on its way.  Winter is nearly over.

This truth is exceptionally meaningful for me right now.  The past few weeks have been rough.  My brokenness has been felt in all its fullness.  Emotionally, I’ve been in a place that isn’t at all unfamiliar.  And I’ve been so irritated with myself for that!  After all, hasn’t God spoken to me about this issue or that in the past?  Shared truth with me that permeated my heart and, in another time and place, left me hope filled and expectant?  So what am I doing wrong or not doing right?  Where have I erred?  “Shoulds” and “shouldn’ts” scream at me:

“You’re just not a very good Christian!”

A week or so ago, I was in a particularly painful place.  The Tenth Avenue North song “Worn” played over and over in my head, so I pulled it up on the computer and watched the music video.  As I watched, I began to weep as the words of the song resonated with the cry of my heart.

Let me see redemption win
Let me know the struggle ends
That you can mend a heart
That’s frail and torn
I wanna know a song can rise
From the ashes of a broken life
And all that’s dead inside can be reborn
Cause I’m worn

“God,” I prayed, “I, too, feel like I need to know that what is dead inside can be reborn.  But, God, don’t I already know that?”  Certainly I do; many times over, the very thing I knew would crush me was a catalyst for rebirth.  So why was I feeling such a need to know a truth I already knew?

As I sat crying and praying and listening, I glanced out the window.  On that particular day, snow was falling.  I happened to think, “This won’t last much longer.  It’s almost spring.”  One season changing into the next.  Happens year after year.

It’s okay.  This is a season.

As the Holy Spirit whispered that to my heart, it occurred to me that maybe the way I viewed seasons of life was a bit off.  Perhaps seasons of life are more like the four seasons of weather change than I’d ever considered.  I suppose I viewed a life season as a one-time, it’s done and over with, end of the chapter sort of a deal.  If that were the case, then my frustration would certainly be warranted.  It would mean that I’ve been in one very long season of perpetual “blah”.  But it hasn’t been perpetual.  I’ve experienced sadness that lasted a night followed by gladness in a morning.  I’ve surrendered ashes only to have them exchanged for beauty.

John 16:33 tells me that while I exist in this world, trouble will come my way.  Trouble:  tribulation; pressure; anguish; distress.  And maybe some of those troubles will be dressed up in the same clothes as a trouble I’ve already dealt with.  But I’m encouraged by this thought:  This spring is looking to be quite similar to many other springs I’ve experienced; but it’s not exactly the same because this spring has never been before.  Likewise, I may (and most likely will) come to another season of crying out to God, “I need to know that all that’s dead inside can be reborn!”  And it may feel very much like every other season of internal “deadness” I’ve experienced; but I’ll be different.  I’ll have come through more, grown more, experienced more of God’s love and grace… And it’s all okay.  It’s okay to feel what I feel right now.  Jesus told me it would come.  He also told me to take heart, because he’s overcome the world.  When I need encouragement, he’ll give it to me.  When I need reminded that it’ll be okay, he’ll remind me.  And when it feels like all is dead inside, he’ll show me a sign of life.

Oh, how he loves me!