Lordy, Lordy I'm Finally 40!!!

I write for many reasons, but today, I’m writing to document.  I’m writing because I want to remember.  And it’s funny . . . because this day I want to remember?  I dreaded it.  I avoided thinking about it, talking about it, planning for it.  I cursed it by the minute for hurling towards me with no regard for my feelings.  Heck, I even left town so I could bury my head in the sand and pretend it wasn’t actually happening. 

I turned 40 this weekend.  I know it beats the alternative people, but man did I waste a whole lot of days and weeks and, let’s face it, years wishing my 40^th birthday wasn’t looming on the calendar.  I think I started fearing this day immediately upon turning 35, when I could no longer say I was in my early 30’s and the next big one was a REALLY big one.

My disdain was never really about the age.  Yes, 40 is often considered middle age, and I suppose it might be.  But my middle age could have been 20 and today might be all I have left on this side of heaven, so it wasn’t the “middle age” title that invoked such fear about a specific birthday.  I want to grow old.   I want to see my children mature into the people God intends them to be.  I want to hold grandbabies and sit by my husband in a rocking chair somewhere and eat ice cream for breakfast and say whatever I want and all those other things old people get to do.  I want those things in my life.  40 is just a number . . . a single stop on the way to a lifetime.  I get that.

It wasn’t the age that upset me.  It was the significance of having had four decades to get things right, and realizing I still have so very far to go.

For some reason, I truly believed I’d have it all together at 40.  I don’t know where I got such a ridiculous idea, but somehow I thought when I turned 40, I’d be the person I always imagined myself to be – calm, loving, patient, trusting, selfless, humble, generous, peaceful.  Do you think of those words when you think of me?  Yea, me neither.   What pops into my head are words like worried, anxious, impatient, busy, selfish, greedy, envious, striving. 

When I thought about turning 40, I honestly thought God would have shaped and molded me into who I wanted to be by then.  And there, of course, lies the problem.  You see, this life isn’t about who I want to be.  It never has been.  It’s about who HE wants me to be, and clearly, He’s not done with me yet.  On Saturday, my fortieth birthday, I finally found comfort in that.

It was a wonderful day.  The stars aligned from the moment I woke up and looked at the clock.  7:11 am on July 11^th.  I grinned and felt God wink at me.  Only He could remind me he was there the moment I awoke.

There was a back rub in bed, big morning hugs from the kids, coffee by the pool.  I decided several months earlier that I needed something to help me look forward to turning 40, so I told Adam I wanted to give the kids the two things they most wanted on my birthday – a phone for our rising seventh grader since, according to him, he’s the only kid in his whole entire grade who doesn’t have one (but mainly because it’s time for him to have one), and earrings for our rising fourth grader, since she’s been asking to get her ears pierced for over four years now and Adam finally consented if it would help me deal with my 40^th birthday. J

I sat them on the couch and turned my phone on video mode.  Reminded them that the thing that makes mamas happiest is when their children are happy.  Libby opened her earrings first.  She reached into her bag, pulled them out and smiled.  I told her she was getting her ears pierced later that morning, and that daughter of mine . . . she lit up like a star.  Joy.  Pure joy right there in front on me, despite my still sinful heart.  Charlie began to pick up his gift bag and suddenly, it was ringing.  The bag was ringing, and his eyes opened up so big and bright and blue I thought I saw heaven inside.  More glimpses from God.  Reminders I needed.

The morning was a blur of happiness.  There was a smoothie while the kids went swimming, sweet text messages, emails, and phone calls from family and friends, and a quick trip to the outdoor mall, where our almost ten year-old sat in a chair brimming with excitement over the aqua gemstones in her ears and our twelve and a half year-old said, as though all was finally right in his world, “This phone just feels so natural in my pocket.”  What could be better?

We walked on the beach after lunch and God was everywhere.  His creation stretched out before us in all directions – shells under our feet, the sun shining overheard, the ocean whispering his name with the crest of every wave, beckoning us to look out at the vastness and remember – only Him.  Only He could conjure such wonders.  Only He could make such beauty – the sandy beaches and shimmering blue waves as far as the eye can see.  Only His love is so wide and so long and so far. 

We went parasailing.  The kids and I, floating 1200 feet above the gulf with a gorgeous parachute trailing behind us, the boat bouncing below like a toy on the water.  It’s quiet at 1200 feet up.  Our legs dangled and the breeze blew gently and we talked about how cool it was, and they might not remember it forever, but I will.

We had dinner on the beach.  There was delicious red snapper and a piece of key lime pie with drizzles of raspberry sauce and a candle to blow out.  We watched a young man propose to his girlfriend by the water, and it seemed like just yesterday my own husband was down on one knee like that.  The kids played with the frisbee while we watched the sun go down, sinking into stunning streaks of pink and orange behind clouds of the deepest gray. The crowd, hundreds of people there to see the sunset, cheered as it finally disappeared below the horizon.  My heart was so full of gratitude at that moment.  For God’s abundant blessings.  For life and love and family and friends.  And yes, even for turning 40.

The perfect day turned into the perfect night with a poolside foot rub and a dip in the hot tub with my best friend on earth, the man I’ve now spent almost half my life with – the one who only sees good in how the years have changed me.  The stars twinkled and the gratitude grew.

I’m two days past 40 now.  Our trip to the beach is almost over.  We head back to Atlanta tomorrow to a house full of boxes and a dream come true – for my 40^th birthday, I got a new house.  We move in this week and I can hardly wait to make it our home. 

I don’t have it all right today, as I once thought I would.  I guess the reality is, I never will.  But God is right here beside me every step of the way.  I’m absolutely certain of it.  He will not stop working in my heart to make it look more like His, no matter how many days I live.  And that’s the best part of being 40.  Knowing.  Knowing myself.  Knowing Him.

I don’t like broken.

I turn from broken.  I avoid it, ignore it, run from it.  Every single time.

I like neat.  I like clean.  I like pretty and healthy and easy and safe.

Broken scares me.  Broken makes me feel out of control and insufficient and completely and utterly vulnerable.  If I’m honest, and it really hurts to think this, let alone write it . . . I’m pretty sure the reason people sometimes turn away from me, is because I turn away from their broken.

And so, I think what blows my mind about the week of Easter, about the whole Easter season, is that Jesus went to be broken.

He knew exactly what was coming.  He knew he would be betrayed.  He knew he would be forsaken by his own.  He knew he would be accused and arrested and beaten and battered and bloodied and broken.

And y’all . . .

He went anyway.

He walked towards it, into it, right through the ugly, painful, frightening mess without ever looking back.

Jesus was broken, my friends, so you and I could be whole.

Whole in Him and wholly for Him.

He broke and the whole world broke and as he died on that cross, he broke the chains of our sin forever.

Thank you, Jesus.

I hope you all had a wonderful Easter.  I hope you enjoyed family and friends and egg hunts.  I hope you ate jelly beans and chocolate bunnies.  I hope you sat in the sunshine and admired the tulips opening their petals to the light.  And I hope you felt the undeniable, unimaginable, indescribable love of our risen Savior - the only one who can take the broken . . . and make it beautiful.

He is not here, for He has risen, just as He said.

Matthew 28:6a

I've Become A Circus Act

Since I haven’t had any time at all to sit down and write, I thought I’d give you a quick update on what is taking up the hours of my life.

It goes by the very exciting, and equally exhausting and overwhelming name of . . . work.

Yes.  I’m officially a working mama now. 

I got my real estate license late last spring and started getting my feet wet with a few clients during the summer and fall.  In January, things began to kick into high gear, and my feet are no longer a bit wet.  These days, life’s a deluge.  I’m soaked from head to toe, my hair hanging  damp and stringy in front of my eyes as I hunch over to block the piercing rain shooting darts on my back.

Working is hard, y’all.

Having a job where people need you to perform duties that are still new to you, and therefore take much more time than they probably should, means all those other duties you’ve been performing quite efficiently for the last twelve years get pushed waaaaaay down to the bottom of your to-do list.  And let’s face it.  Many of those items on my to-do list for the last decade or so were to-do’s.  My list now includes a multitude of activities that can’t really be called to-do’s.  They are must-do’s, and there’s a difference. 

Working is a juggling act, as life often is, but suddenly I’ve added all these balls to my act.  Things are flying around all over the place and here’s the thing . . . I was never any good at juggling.  I’m dropping balls left and right and most of them involve the duties that are old hat, the things that were once second nature, almost automatic – the people I know will love and forgive me despite the fact that I’ve dropped their ball and it’s rolled so far away I can’t even see it anymore.

What I very clearly didn’t realize is that all those things I’ve been doing for so long – the ones that have suddenly been relocated from their position of top-priority to one of the many things that have to be done today -  those age old duties are not just going to automatically take care of themselves.  Those long juggled balls are not going to stay up in the air on their own, my friends.  I have to keep them there. 

I’ve been trying to explain to my friends and family that I could really use their patience and understanding right now, as I’m going through a major period of adjustment trying to settle into my new existence as a working mom, but no one seems to get it.  I’m sure you’re doing fine, they say.  You can handle it, they tell me.  I, on the other hand, am pretty sure I’m not doing all that fine.  In fact, I’m rather certain I’m not handling it at all.  I could give you many reasons why I believe this to be true, but for the sake of time, I’m just going to share one with you today.

Last week, I FORGOT TO PICK UP MY DAUGHTER.

Yep.  You absolutely read that right.  Libby’s cooking class ended at 4:30.  At 4:45, a wonderful friend of mine sent me a text offering to bring her home from said cooking class the following week.  Thank goodness for that interruption, because I was knee deep entering a listing and there was nothing breaking my working mama concentration.

It was fine.  There were contractors putting in new lights at my house and they had to move their truck so I could get out, but thankfully, we only live about a mile and a half from school and I arrived by 4:56. 

I cried the whole way there.

The worst part about it was that this wasn’t the first Libby ball I’d dropped that week.  Honestly?  It wasn’t the second either.

So . . .

How do you feel about my juggling now?

I know I will get the hang of things, and so will my children.  Women all over the world manage to be excellent wives and mothers while simultaneously having a career.  There will be many positives to this new adventure – I believe that.  It will be good for my kids to witness their mother learn the value of time management.  It will be good for my husband to have some financial support.  It will be good for me to contribute to our family in new ways.  It will all be good, because God is good.  I have asked Him into this endeavor and I have faith that He will show up in it.  In fact, He already has.

I saw his hand when things recently worked out with a deal I wasn’t sure had a chance of working out. I saw his hand when I received my first paycheck in over twelve years and instantly felt a deep new appreciation for my husband.  I saw his hand in the generosity of a colleague who supported me every step of the way.  I saw his hand in the friend who texted me at just the right time, offering a reminder that my top priorities must remain just that – above everything else.  And I see his hand each day in the faces of my clients, who have trusted me enough to help them buy or sell a home, and who make me smile while doing it.

To all the working mamas out there - bravo, well done, nice job, and hang in there.  You are a true inspiration to me, and no doubt to many others trying to turn their own circus acts into successes. To all the mamas who are working at home – I have a newfound awareness of just how much important work you do on a daily basis.  Keeping children safe, fed, clothed, educated, healthy and happy are life’s greatest and most difficult calls, and they require endless amounts of kindness, energy, and grace.  I pray we can all support one another as we juggle the balls in our lives, and that we can forgive one another when we drop a few.

Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might . . .

Ecclesiastes 9:10

Grace

She’d been in bed for half an hour, chatting and singing and dancing and hosting the usual evening soiree she has every night with her baby dolls.  I’d hugged him good-night, told him to sleep well, reminded him we’d be up early for his sixth grade Bible study in the morning, and sent him off to bed as well.  There were no more emails to answer or phone calls to make.  The laundry was going and the dishwasher set to run. 


With the duties of the day complete, I sat down in the leather chair with my laptop and invited the puppy up to snuggle beside me.  (I know you’ve just fallen out of your own chair at the thought of OCD me allowing a dog on the furniture, but just so we’re clear, it’s the only piece of furniture she’s allowed on, it’s leather so I can easily clean it, and there is a huge blanket covering the seat so she’s not even really touching it.  I know.  What can I say – it happened when I was recovering from my surgery last year and needed her warmth while watching hours on end of HGTV, and you know what they say about teaching an old dog new tricks?  That saying is spot on, my friends, and it’s been her chair ever since). 


I opened Ann Voskamp’s blog, attempted to make sense of the prose turned poetry she pours daily into my soul.  Sometimes, I think she’s writing to me, though I know it isn’t true.  Her words, in all their backwards, reversed order beauty, offer exactly the reminders I shouldn’t need, but do.

Her post that night was about kids and fame and the insatiable need for attention epidemic that’s currently sweeping our land, and how funny, I thought.  I just wrote a little something about that myself.  I need to meet this woman one day.  I think we’d be fast friends.

I didn’t hear anything unusual upstairs.  He was going to the bathroom, brushing his teeth.  Doing the things he always does when I send him up to bed each night – stalling tactics, if I’m honest, because he never spends that much time on his teeth in the mornings.  

It drifted down slowly, floating around me like a cloud.  It took me a second to realize what it was, and when I did, the words on the screen in front of me blurred into nothing.  I breathed in, deep and long and full, and the weight of it all lifted right off my heart.  

The tears spilled over, the screen now just a mass of swirling colors as I took another breath, drawing it in, allowing it to fill the emptiness.

He had sprayed his cologne.  He had sprayed it again, finally, after days and weeks that seemed so heavy with the guilt of my mistake, and I know it’s ridiculous to read anything into an eleven-year-old boy putting cologne on.  I know he hasn’t forgotten and neither have I.  


Still.   


That scent . . . .


It smelled like forgiveness to me. 

I wonder sometimes when this screwing up thing will end.  I think I’m starting to realize it won’t.  Being a parent equals messing up, often in a BIG way.  I did it, again, recently.  I messed up, screwed up, did it all wrong, and my child is paying the price.

A harmless text to a few friends, or so I thought.  I thought it was too adorable not to share – his newfound appreciation for smelling good after receiving cologne for Christmas.  I meant to be open and funny and bond with other moms over the preciousness of a child on the brink of puberty.  But I forgot something important.  I forgot that those moms might decide to share the story with their own little boys on the brink of puberty, and that’s where it all went to hell.  You see, little boys can be cruel to one another, much like adults I guess.  They see a place to poke and they go in for the kill.  I’m sure they meant to be open and funny too.  But all he felt was the sting.

Damn.  This parenting thing really sucks sometimes.

He’s already teetering on shutting me out.  He’s quiet, reserved, moody.  He’s almost twelve, and so I expected this was coming.  Expected and dreaded, even while knowing it’s exactly how things are supposed to go.  This becoming independent – it all hinges on his ability to pull away from me.  He has to do it.  It’s healthy for him to do it, in fact, no matter how much it wounds my soul. 

I had hoped I could do it well – parent a child who has begun to realize he won’t always be parented.  It’s difficult, but I thought I could do it well.

I knew something was up when he came downstairs that morning without the cologne on, and deep down, I knew it was my fault.  I should have kept it for me alone.  I should have relished in the way it made my heart feel - both wide open with joy and torn to shreds with sorrow - to see him doing something so indicative of where he’s headed.  To see my son showing an ounce of concern over his appearance because that’s what growing up does to little boys – it makes them self-aware.  It’s a good thing, in many ways, and there is a thread of relief woven through those moments when you realize your child might actually brush their teeth one day without being asked because they are changing in exactly the ways they are supposed to change.  

I should have kept it to myself.  But there was pride mixed in with the joy and the sorrow.  There was pride and wonder and fear and even hopefulness for what is to come, and when all those feelings intersect, you are left with nothing to do but laugh.

And so that’s what I did. 

I laughed about how much cologne he was using and shared it with my friends because that’s how you find relief in those moments that feel like they will crush you.

And instead, I crushed him.

I’ve apologized.  I’ve cried and lost sleep and cried some more, and I’ve apologized.  But like all those other times I knew I’d messed up in such an incredibly huge way, I can’t let it go.  Because I know, he’ll remember this one.  That time I spanked him and sobbed for weeks afterwards.  That time I intentionally broke a Lego creation because he had been so mean to his sister.  He was little then.  Too little to remember.  But this one, he will carry.  The time his own mom turned him into a joke.  He will remember, and so will I.  And hopefully, it will be a lesson well-learned.

Damn.  This parenting thing really sucks sometimes.

Light Me Up In 2015!

 
If you ask me, the end of 2014 felt heavy.

There is often a bit of a letdown after Christmas.  I get that.  The anticipation is so great for all those weeks and the celebration of his birth means everything and then, it’s all over. 

I usually feel sad for a few days after Christmas, when I know I must wait another year to honor our baby king with beautiful lights and nostalgic music and, of course, gingerbread cookies.  As much as I love putting the decorations away, because that’s what people with OCD delight in after a hectic month, when everything is packed up neatly in tubs and tucked away for another eleven months, I instantly miss the tree and the manger and that Christmas feeling.  You know the one – that comfort you feel deep inside that all is right and peace will reign and love is the only thing we need. 

Christmas is twinkly and bright and exciting.  It’s full of surprises and celebrations and smiles.  Christmas is magical, and when it ends, all that joy that’s been building up for a month seems to fade as we face the reality that it will be a while before everything feels so special again. 

It never lasts more than a few days, and so I expected the same this go round.  But this year, it was different.  This year, the afterwards felt more empty than usual.  The sadness felt too deep.  My shoulders ached and my neck felt sore and I found tears lying just beyond everything I saw. 

There was no reason for the burdens that pulled me down.  God is good and my circumstances are too.  Great marriage.  Happy kids.  Our family is healthy, clothed, fed, sheltered.  We are warm and dry and so incredibly blessed.  I’m literally drowning in blessings.  But, drowning is still . . .

Drowning.

The guilt overwhelmed me as the new year began.  Get it together, girl, ran constantly through my mind.  You should live in a constant state of thankfulness with this life you lead.  People are hungry and scared and sick and alone and You. Should. Be. Nothing. But. Grateful.

GET IT TOGETHER. 

Then, I realized what was happening.  We do this thing every year, as one draws to a close and another begins.  We take stock.  While simultaneously pressing forward – making plans and goals and wishes - we can’t help but look back, and all that remembering fills us with emotions that have massive weight.

The last twelve months?

They were heavy.

Call my life blessed all you want because it is.  Call me fortunate because I am.  It doesn’t change the fact that for me . . . 2014 was hard.

2014 did not go as planned.

2014 had many messes and lots of tears and a whole heap of pain.

There was sadness and sickness and shame.  There were dashed dreams and unmet expectations and altered friendships that will never be the same.  There was loss and there was anger and there was the realization that God’s plans for me might not ever line up with my own.

It was a difficult year, and aren’t they all, my friends, on some days?

Doesn’t every year come complete with longings that can’t be fulfilled, relationships that can’t be mended, and conditions that can’t be changed?  Doesn’t every year have drought and doubt and darkness?  

Don’t we all have those days when we just can’t seem to find the light, and isn’t it okay as long as we let His light be the one that leads us out of our dark places?

It always does, you know.  He always shows us the way back to Him, and once we sit again at his feet, we can remember the rest. 

We can remember that amid the inevitable sorrow every year brings, there was SO MUCH beauty and joy to behold.  There were countless fun times and new friendships and a ton of laughter.  There were overcome challenges and memorable experiences and exciting opportunities.  Dashed dreams paved the way for new ideas.  Unmet expectations encouraged improvement.  Altered friendships taught us about forgiveness.  There was growth and gain and greatness in every single day, if we simply choose to look back on each of them through the lens of his glory and grace.

January brings sadness for me.  It just does.  I’ve blamed it on many things over the years – the end of the holiday season, the cold weather, the gray skies.  Yet I’ve realized it’s not a specific situation in my life weighing me down.  It’s simply because the flip of the calendar to a new year, to a new month in which I actually get to slow down long enough to be still with my thoughts, ignites in me the desire to evaluate the state of my heart.  And y’all, when I look long and hard at my heart . . . I’m sad.  Because I can see, my heart is still not where I want it to be.  I’ve had 12 months to give more, and I haven’t.  I’ve had 52 weeks to serve more, and I haven’t.  I’ve had 365 days to be a better wife and mom and daughter and daughter-in-law and sister and sister-in-law and aunt and friend, and I haven’t. 

Another ENTIRE YEAR has gone by . . . and I still don’t look a whole lot like Jesus. 

I’m not giving up.  This year has already started off much better than last year, because I spent the first week of this year with family and friends, instead of in the hospital (can I get an Amen for the one year birthday of my fabulous semi-colon?!). 

Without a doubt, 2015 promises to be another year of fullness.  I am certain it will be full of some familiar heartaches, because life will always have valleys this side of heaven.  There will be mistakes and missteps over the next twelve months, just as there were over the last twelve, and some of them might push me into those dark places where life feels hard and heavy.


I will not remain there. 


Because I know, His light is brighter than any darkness I face.  My heart may still be full of sin, but I know He is at work inside it, and He’s. Not. Giving. Up. Either.  


He is using every dark place in my life to shape me.  To change me.  To mold me in his image. 

And with every mountaintop I reach, I pray that I will be better able to reflect Him.

Happy New Year, my friends!  Wishing you health, happiness, and an abundance of His light and love in 2015!!!

Then spoke Jesus again to them, saying, I am the light of the world: he that follows me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.  John 8:12

'Twas The Night Before Christmas

It’s Christmas Eve . . .  

Don’t be the innkeeper.

Make room for him, my friends.

Don’t tell him no and don’t shut him out and don’t send him away.

Open the door to your heart and let him in.

He just wants to come, like any baby waiting so long inside a mother’s womb.  He simply longs to enter your world, to stay with you always, to be present in every moment of your life.

His light is shining all over the world tonight and it is too bright to ignore.  Hear him knocking on your soul and understand that He is enough for you.  His forgiveness overshadows every failure.  His grace overcomes all guilt.  His glory abounds forever.  He alone provides hope and peace and comfort and salvation, and his great, unfailing love for us KNOWS NO END.

So please, don’t be the innkeeper. 

Let that baby king come in.  Draw him close to you, place him on your heart as you would any other tiny child, and breathe in the incredible goodness of him, our Emmanuel.

Our Savior.

Our Jesus.

Emmanuel

It’s December 13^th.   Twelve days until Christmas. 

Plenty of time.

Plenty of time to get the shopping done.  Plenty of time to wrap the gifts.  Plenty of time to trim the tree and mail the cards and bake the cookies. 

Don’t panic, my friends.  There is plenty of time.

I know how it goes.  We hustle and bustle all month long.  We rush around in a flurry, here, there, and everywhere.  Our minds race with all that must be done.  The commitments pile up and the lists grow longer and we wake up in a cold sweat fretting about whether we’re on track to accomplish all that we need to accomplish to pull this thing off. 

Did we remember to move the elf?  Did we remember to read the Jesse tree devotional?  Did we remember to put a treat in the advent calendar?  Did we actually order that gift for our mother-in-law, or did we just dream that we did?

It’s okay.  Christmas is busy.  We try to get things done early, but it’s tough to put much of a dent in the responsibilities that go along with making this much magic in a single month.  There are expectations this time of year – BIG ones – and most of them fall on us moms.

In addition to the myriad of roles we play every other day of the year - you know the ones – nurse, cook, housekeeper, chauffer, psychologist, rule enforcer, wife (that usually does seem to come in last, doesn’t it?), in December, we add a slew of duties to this mama position that can make our heads spin.

We do the planning and the decorating and the shopping and the baking and the surprising.  We create the cards and order the cards and stuff the cards and address the cards and stamp the cards and mail the cards.  We rack our brains to come up with the perfect gifts for everyone in the family and fuss about how much money we’ve spent to make everyone we love feel equally special.  We plan school celebrations and ornament exchanges and tacky sweater parties.  We cut and tape and tie and hide packages in places we might never find them again, and y’all, at six o’clock this morning I was using the tip of my pinky finger to spread Nutella on the tiny mouth of our elf, because, ya know, that sneaky little fella got into the candy jar last night while we are all sleeping lying awake trying to think of new elf tricks.

It’s okay.

Christmas is hard and I’m tired too.  My body shifted into overdrive the second we put away the pumpkin pie and my brain is turning to eggnog as I try to fulfill all the requests and requirements that go along with the biggest holiday of the year. 

But it’s okay.  I won’t get it all done and I won’t get it all right.  I will forget to send someone a card.  I will burn a batch of gingerbread cookies.  I will get him the wrong color and her the wrong size and I will worry about presents when the whole thing . . . the whole month . . . our whole life . . . is all about His presence.

I will screw up this Christmas because I am a mess, and isn’t it funny how He came?  Not in a royal palace, surrounded by the splendid majesty he deserved.  No.  He came in a barn.  He came in the middle of the dirt and the muck and the animals and the mess.

He came to be human, and the barn was the perfect place for him to enter the world, because it wasn’t perfect.  A king born in a messy barn was exactly the right setting, because he wants to settle himself in our mess.  He wants to settle in our messy hearts and stay forever.

So don’t panic, my friends.  Enjoy this Advent season.  Enjoy the hustling and the bustling and the extra obligations.  Enjoy the rushing and the racing and the added commitments.  Amid your shopping and wrapping and celebrating, feel the comfort he provides.  Feel the peace he brings.  Feel the hope he offers.  Feel his light and love envelop your soul as he settles deep within, content to stay as long as you let him.


There is plenty of time to get ready for Christmas. 


There is plenty of time to get ready for His coming. 

Because He’s already here.

Grateful

Thanksgiving.


Giving thanks.


To Him.


For Him.


Because every blessing . . . all of them . . . come from Him.

Happy Thanksgiving, friends!  May you gobble 'til you wobble, and may your day be filled with His abundant blessings!


Give thanks to the Lord, call on his name, make known among the nations what he has done.
Psalm 105:1

The Skinny on TOO MUCH SKIN

Can we talk about nudity today, friends?  A tough subject, perhaps.  A bit taboo, maybe, or at least it used to be.

Naked was once a term found in the same sentence with words like ‘forbidden,’ ‘prohibited,’ ‘unacceptable.’  There’s a reason underwear used to be called ‘unmentionables.’  Since Adam and Eve listened to that sneaky snake and ate that darn apple and realized they were running around in a garden without any clothes on, people have tried very hard to keep important areas of their bodies covered, concealed, and contained. 

So WHAT IS UP with nudity these days, people?  Seriously, how did the naked human body become something so easily shared?  So readily flaunted it’s as if modesty never existed . . . as though nothing is sacred, special, saved? 

What happened to privacy?  What happened to restraint?  How in the world did we come to equate nakedness with confidence? 

Confidence?

Sharing pictures of your naked body with the entire world doesn’t scream confident to me.  It screams desperate.  It screams impulsive.  It screams . . . lost.  And not Have you lost your panties?   Not Have you lost your mind?  But lost, as in . . . Have you lost your sense of self-worth?  Have you misunderstood what it means to have respect, both for yourself and from others?  Have you forgotten you are so deeply loved by God that you don’t need anyone else to adore you?  

Those people?  Those people gawking at your nakedness on their computers and their phones and in magazines?  They might be gazing at you and staring at you and ogling you.  They might be wishing they could talk to you or touch you or even be you.  But they don’t respect you.  They don’t love you or adore you.  They don’t even know you.  And yet, you’re sharing yourself with them so casually, so carelessly . . . without any real consideration for what it means to be naked in front of another human being.

There are headlines about cleavage and curves.   There are articles about nip slips and side boobs.  Stories of nude photographs leaked to millions come out so frequently that teenage girls all over the country now think it’s okay to send sext messages to every boy they know on a regular basis.  Y’all, there are songs that refer to our intimate body parts as junk. 

Junk?

These parts . . . they are given to another in our most personal and vulnerable moments.  They connect us to those we have committed to love though everything.  They express our desire and they fit together perfectly to create generations.  They bring forth life and provide for the life they usher in.  These parts?  They are special.  They have purpose.  They are NOT junk. 

It scares me.  All of it.  I have a daughter and a son and a husband and it scares me to death.  This frivolous overexposure.  This tolerance.  This condoning of what was once so off-limits and this relegating of our bodies, which have true value, to junk that has none.  It scares me. 

I know it’s not the biggest of our problems. There is poverty and hunger and there are millions of orphans.  There are women and children who are sold into slavery Every. Single. Day.  This nudity epidemic isn’t the only issue in the world, nor the most important, and I’m certain many might not think it an issue at all.  But shouldn’t we at least consider the possibility that we are perpetuating dangerous attitudes with our failure to address the way nudity and sex have become absolute obsessions in our culture?  Might we be fueling a fire that suggests women are merely objects of pleasure, and not worthy human beings with an abundance of gifts to offer?

In the midst of a nation spellbound by the blatant undressing of so many, how do I teach my son that a woman is to be cherished and treasured for who she is, not what she looks like?  How do I teach my daughter that she doesn’t have to bare her body, because the right people will care about her soul?  How do I remember that I don’t have to live up to a specific standard . . . that I was created in the image of God, and that’s what makes me beautiful?

The world says other things.  The world fixates on physical appearances and applauds immorality, and there is no doubt about it, in this world, sex sells. 

I live in this world, but I can’t be consumed by the deterioration of society’s values.  I must hold on to the truth.  I must teach it to my children every day, as the world bombards them from every direction, begging them to buy into the myth that attention brings happiness.

Because the truth . . . the truth of Him . . . Him.  He is the only real source of contentment in this world . . . in this life.  The truth says my body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within me (1 Corinthians 6:19).  The truths says I can glorify God with my body (1 Corinthians 6:20).  The truth says I do not have to be conformed by this world (Romans 12:2).  The truth says God does not look at outward appearances, but at what matters most (1 Samuel 16:7). 

The truth is Jesus.  And grace.  And the kind of love that transcends and transforms, from the inside.  The truth is what God sees when he looks at us, and that’s what we should be sharing with others. 

Not our flesh . . .

Our hearts.