so long, july

Drowning alternately in sweat and okra,

Counting down mousy-still afternoons,

Trying to be a little more like the zinnias,

Resilient on a sandy side of the shed.

a christmas for remembering

Christmas marks the natural end of a year, and holding true to themes of this particular 12 months, its surface is strange. A little off kilter, unpredictable, an exercise in showing up while holding plans loosely.

It’s easy to feel exhausted as we limp across the finish line of 2020, but in every sense the good news of God-with-us is the good news for right now. What better season to feel His covering of grace and peace over our chaos and uncertainties. What more certain place to seek joy than in Jesus alone.

I’ve had to take time to remember these truths in all the lightening speed of December. As beautiful as the lights shine, and as sweet the smells at our Christmas feasts, the truest and most lasting gift is Himself. Fully Lord and fully man, here to reconcile sinners with a Holy God.

Merry Christmas. xo

five minute friday: young

Age has become a slippery topic for me. Feeling static in mind while the body changes.

And sometimes I feel like I’m regressing. Instead of advancing in confidence, it seems that each year brings more honest eyes to see how far I have yet to grow.

From a heavenly view however, I know our time is only adding up to eternity. Each day isn’t a signal of me slowly sliding away from youth.

It is one day closer to the Finished line. A few days closer to home. Another season to practice trusting God.

O Great God

“Help me now to live a life
That’s dependent on Your grace
Keep my heart and guard my soul
From the evils that I face
You are worthy to be praised
With my every thought and deed
O great God of highest heaven
Glorify Your Name through me”

And these lives changed by the washing of His grace can be bold in their message of joy.

^“For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.”  ~Mark 8: 38

This simple Gospel is enough. That while we were still sinners; He saw, loved and saved for an eternal purpose.

This, the answer to our troubled, divided world. Let’s not be swayed by shiny messages on all sides but fix our eyes on the simple goal of a Worthy God praised; in every word, thought, song, deed & life.

Humble hearts and willing hands.

 

these are the days

These are the days for taking deep breaths, walking humbly, exercising patience. Welcoming all to the table.

Days to step away from online voices and feast more fully in the Word.

     

And to know more than ever our position as image bearers, valuable because of an Authority far greater than any on earth.

These are the days of peace in a stormy June.

               

12:10

“For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”

~2 Corinthians 12:10

A verse that has had me wondering all weekend, am I content with my weaknesses? Too often, my moods toward others are rooted in dissatisfaction with myself. Grumpy at my own inability to be right and do right. Yet far from a humble reckoning, it morphs into irritable self-obsession that is too far from Paul’s reminders repeating through this letter.

Your weakness is a blessing, your boasting needs to die. Contentment, not in the good things of your life, but even these weaknesses, the hardships, the calamities. All this, so that “the power of Christ may rest upon me.”

a mother’s day poem

Last year, my father-in-law told me in kindness not to worry, next May I would be celebrating Mother’s Day too. In the least expected way, it turns out he was right.

I did become a mother this year and for a few short weeks in October we imagined our lives forever changed as parents. It’s hard to understand what plans of the Lord could be better than the gift of sustaining life, but that was this baby’s story.

A poppy seed sized soul, given and then gone.

I read something this week that brought many of the what-ifs and struggle to peace for awhile. A quote from Grant Colfax Tullar:

“Oft’ times He weaveth sorrow

And I in foolish pride

Forget He sees the upper

And I the underside…

The dark threads are as needful

In the weaver’s skillful hand

As the threads of gold and silver

In the pattern He has planned.

He knows, He loves, He cares;

Nothing this truth can dim.

He gives the very best to those

who leave the choice to Him.”

I believe we’re all probably struggling with some kind of providence in our lives, especially these days. No matter the blessings, belongings, children or empty arms, He is always sanctifying.

This weekend, I’m thankful that He is also and always sustaining.

xo

a moment with the moon

The other night, over-caffeinated and under-stimulated, I went to the shop with Wesley. While he bolted new cutting blades onto a machine, I went and laid flat on a trailer bed, staring at the darkening sky.

The quick moving and dark clouds threatened rain, obscuring any physical clue as to the time of day. The sky felt close, oppressive like the fidgeting, fretful feelings in my own heart.

I listened to a man talk about the bittersweet providence of God, the “meaning-ness” of God’s using what man means for evil. We will never live in His Plan B.

Then without warning a perfect crescent moon slipped out from the clouds, so bright it hurt my eyes, so suddenly it made my heart jump. A few seconds and then it was gone again into the cloud cover, and then soon the sky was completely dark.

And then the mosquitoes came out and I went home to eat soup; calm, happier, and ready for bed.

 

 

nothing but time

Wesley jumped out of bed on Sunday thinking he was late for work until we consulted the calendar.  And this week I switched from baking therapy to quilting, and that’s basically how I’m marking memory sign posts these days.

Otherwise, life can be a confusing stretch of days full of nothing and simultaneously the possibility of everything.

In a time when we’re thinking about numbered days – of both life and isolation – the time is also the most tremendous gift. A spotlight onto the abundance we truly have under our roof.

Warm clothes or air conditioning as the climate dictates, books, ideas, White Lily flour, a milk frothing whisk. Watching Lord of the Rings in bed or learning to make homemade yogurt.

What a colourful and inventive world God has given us to exercise dominion over, no matter how small that sphere may currently be.

So happy quarantining, friends! There is value in all kinds of small days.

new pages

Here we are suddenly, April showering outside even as I write. And it’s the strangest experience to turn over a new page in the planner and see only blank spaces.

My whole life I’ve thrived on filling my time. With people, events, things to look forward to as seasons change and turn. It’s been my privilege, which until now I never had cause to second guess.

It would seem the Lord is teaching something different however. A different way to measure the weight of our days.

Less production and more consideration. To know that a month spent watching the neighbour’s seed fed birds is no less of a life than all the bustle of the past.

More time to stop and think. More time to pray. What am I stumbling and summarizing words for? More than ever I have the space to learn what lifting up a friend to the Lord’s help means. What lifting a stranger’s sad story might begin. What listening to conviction, instead of rushing past it looks like.

There is nothing settling about this April 2020, but I am certainly learning.

To fill only this day I’m dwelling in, moment by moment.  To leave His redemptive purpose unquestioned reign over the rest.