An Origami Failure Learns to Fold

August 26, 2013May 19, 20141 Comment

I am a failure at origami.

My oldest daughter, crafty soul that she is, begged me to help her with some origami projects. Knowing my handicap for all things artsy and craftsy that require following a pattern, I decided that our best option was to purchase an origami book for kids, complete with simple step-by-step instructions and special papers.

Surely if children can supposedly follow these directions and magically fold panda bears and peacocks, I (in all my grown-up wisdom) could also understand and succeed in folding a paper zoo. I can, after all, read, and that seemed to be the minimal requirement here.

I was wrong (of course).

Our origami sessions together typically go like this:

Open book, choose the simplest pattern we can find and then select an appropriate paper.

Fold the paper in half. Then open it back up.

Fold it in half the other way. Then open it back up.

Crease here, flip the paper, crease there.

Smile in confidence at one another in the assurance that we have finally mastered this whole origami thing. Look at us! Our paper absolutely totally matches the diagram in the book.
We return to the instructions with renewed confidence.

Reverse internal fold, flip, crease, outside reverse fold, open up, fold to center, reverse, flip, spin around, repeat, pull out the flap, push in and squash, inflate, rotate, fold and unfold, mountain fold.

Wait, what?

Pretty soon I’m sputtering in frustration and my daughter is just randomly folding and flipping her paper. I’m talking to the book as if it could answer me, “What does that mean? How do you do that? How come you don’t show a picture of the step in between this and that? Is this what it is supposed to look like?”

I begin sighing those deep-shoulder heaving sighs that say, “Oh, I should never have bought her this origami book for Christmas.”

Then I declare with supreme Mom-wisdom that what we really need here is a YouTube video with step-by-step instructions. We Google search. We find a video. We pause it after each step and make our paper look like the paper on the computer screen.

We fold. We create. We conquer (sort of).

The fact is that I’m not adept at following picture patterns in books and matching my every move to the instructions given, not with origami, sewing, knitting or crafts of any kind.

I have too many questions that the pattern doesn’t answer and too many places where I can go wrong. I can’t visualize the finished product and the steps needed to get there.

What’s true for me in arts and crafts is sometimes true in life also. We all can choose the patterns for our lives and then we make continual choices, daily decisions, to yield, bend and fold . . . or not.

Paul tells us:

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will (Romans 12:2 NIV).

The pattern of the world isn’t meant for us. The world’s priorities, its pursuits, its dialogue and messages, and its destination all fold us into a crazy mess of disorder and frustration.

We can choose instead to “follow the pattern of the sound words . . .in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus” (2 Timothy 1:3 ESV) and to “obey from your heart the pattern of teaching that has now claimed your allegiance” (Romans 6:17 ESV).

Yes, Scripture is our pattern to follow and Christ is our model: the picture in the book that tells us what we should look like in the end.

Yet, while we may choose which pattern to follow, the world or the Word, God Himself takes a hands-on approach to our lives. “We are God’s handiwork,” after all—the result of His efforts, the creation He forms and re-forms daily (Ephesians 2:10).

So, He is at work folding and unfolding—sometimes moving us forward and then back again.

He creases us now, teaching us and working on us in ways that we won’t understand until years later when He uses those grooves as part of His plans for us and our ministry.

He flips us around. He pushes us beyond what we thought were our limits. Sometimes He trims our edges.

Sometimes we complain and balk at the confusing pattern as it unfolds. We look at the folds He has made in us and think He must be getting it all wrong. Surely this can’t become that. It’s confusing and we don’t see and understand.

But He does. He knows what it takes to transform a piece of paper into a penguin or a peacock. He knows how to conform us “to the image of His Son” (Romans 8:29).

Originally published on August 6, 2012

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader. Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness. Her upcoming book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, will be released in November 2013! To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Turning Aside and Saying Yes to God

August 21, 2013January 23, 201417 Comments

I wasn’t ‘supposed’ to be there or so I thought.

Shopping off schedule, not on my normal day, shifting things around to accommodate other schedule shifts, cramming activity into the overstuffed container of life. And now here I was, shopping at a Wal-Mart in the middle of the afternoon instead of during my normal morning jaunt through the store with a shopping cart and a coupon book before the crowd arrived after lunch.

I pushed my way through the sale items at the front of the store with my focus on my mission—shop, gather the items on my list without distraction, save money, and leave.

But then I saw her, a friend at the pharmacy counter. Stopping for a quick ‘hello,’ the kind of cheerful greeting we small-town folks exchange in the Wal-Mart all the time, I pushed my cart to the side of the aisle hoping not to be in the way of other annoyed shoppers on mission.

This friend, though, didn’t need just a cheerful chat, but a sharing-the-heart kind of talk, a prayer right there in the middle of Band-Aids and Tylenol.

God sent her to the Wal-Mart at just that moment and then He rocked my world all crazy, turning my schedule upside down and sent me right on into that Wal-Mart at the exact same time she would be there.

I like to hold this white-knuckled control over my calendar and my agenda, fitting everything in just right and not being willing to bend, to flex, to rearrange and adjust, not without whining and complaining at least.

Yet, here is what happens when I release, open my palms and offer up the plans, saying ‘yes’ to God even in the daily.

A few days later, God over-turned my normal routine again with special school events and unexpected trips to the post office. There I was driving down the Main Street of town when I ‘shouldn’t’ have been and I was thinking of the to-do list items to cross off, the errands to run, the destination and the mission all over again.

But He opened my eyes to see ‘her,’ a woman I knew limping along the sidewalk painfully slowly.

I didn’t even debate over my plans. Instead, I zoomed into the nearest driveway and she climbed into the mini-van (after I shoved aside the napkins, papers, and other Mom mess) so I could drive her to work.

A little blessing for her.

A huge blessing for me, this reminder of God’s divine agenda, the appointments He sets for us and the way I can miss them so easily in my stubborn addiction to having my own way.

C.S. Lewis wrote:

“the great thing, if one can, is to stop regarding all the unpleasant (or unexpected) things as interruptions in one’s own life, or real life. The truth is, of course, that what one calls the interruptions are precisely one’s real life.”

God’s involvement in my agenda isn’t always painful or unpleasant, but it does have this way of being unexpected. Like Proverbs 19:21 says:

“Many are the plans in a person’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.”

Yes, I’m a ‘many plans’ kind of person who learns slowly to yield to this God with a perfect purpose.

God interrupts, intervenes, and now I must choose—whine and complain, reject and insist on my way, or submit and adjust and trust His plans, like Moses in the wilderness outside Mount Horeb as he tended his father-in-law’s sheep.

Moses wasn’t meandering along, aimless and purposeless. He had a plan to lead “the flock to the back of the desert, and came to Horeb, the mountain of God” (Exodus 3:1).

But God lit a fire within a bush and captured Moses’s attention.

What if Moses hadn’t stopped? What if he waited until later, choosing to finish his own plan and then return to check out the curiosity? Or if he’d ignored the interruption, adamantly determined to do things his way, in his own timing, and in his own strength?

Oh, how Moses would have missed out on God’s glory and God’s purposes for his life and his people!

Instead, Moses yielded. He said, “I will now turn aside and see this great sight” (Exodus 3:4).

This turning aside is what God teaches me in this walk of obedience, the willingness to be interrupted, the trusting Him with my agenda and not worrying and fretting over the unexpected and the out-of-control.

Turning aside when I see God at work, I join Him there and give Him praise.

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader. Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness. Her upcoming book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, will be released in the Fall of 2013! To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Magic Tricks, The Family Calendar and Radical Obedience

August 14, 2013January 23, 20144 Comments

He made rabbits appear out of nowhere. He seemed to read minds. He pulled colorful bouncy balls out from behind children’s ears.

The magician at our local library amazed my kids, particularly my middle daughter who checked out four books on magic that day and altered her future career plans.

“I want to be a magician who tells jokes,” she declared.

Today, I am feeling a little like a magician without the recognition and the jokes. No fabulously mysterious cape, no collapsible magic wand hiding a bouquet of flowers, no long flowing sleeves to stash cards and colorful scarves, and no top hat from which bunnies appear. My Mom-attire is much less impressive.

And yet, every year at about this time, I perform a seemingly magical feat that defies all explanation, a trick that doesn’t necessarily astonish audiences, but probably should.

I set the family calendar for the new school year.

Astonished? Amazed? Flabbergasted? Speechless?

Maybe you should be.

Even those of you without kids or with grown children can easily find your calendar as overstuffed as ours.

Of course, there are things outside of my control, like the school schedule and when ballet classes are offered. So, I wait for official announcements and postings, hoping God performs the necessary miracle to make it all fit just right.

Then I sit down and scan the mess.

There are non-negotiable activities that instantly earn a place on the weekly agenda.

There are the things I believe God has asked me to do this year, which I choose to obey.

There are the “Oh please, mommy . . . .” activities like gymnastics, soccer, swimming lessons, 4H, Girl Scouts, fencing (yes, fencing), art and sewing classes. This we carefully narrow down.

Then there are the 50 other possibilities that are wonderful and good: The Bible studies, prayer meetings, committees, volunteering, and classes.

When we think we’ve made it all fit, unexpected birthday parties and get-togethers, after school activities, and events squeeze into the corners of Saturdays and evenings.

Of course, it’s all good. And maybe, just maybe, if I don’t let my kids take swim lessons every time they are offered my daughter won’t make it to the 2024 Olympics. That would obviously be the world’s loss.

But today, as I was reading in 1 Corinthians, I was reminded of the one thing that sometimes gets nudged out of our lives by the incessant activity we magically jam, cram, and squeeze into our calendars until they burst.

Paul wrote:

“If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3 ESV).

Even if we invest our time in everything good and noble, we might be mis-managing our calendars.

Ultimately, speaking God’s language, knowing God’s Word, giving away to the poor, and sacrificing our very lives are all worthy, but even they are utterly meaningless if we don’t do them in love.

So then, what about committee meetings and weekly groups and gymnastics lessons?

Yes, meaningless without love.

Thus, I’ve been praying this year about leaving room for God’s love in our family calendar.

We’ll do what is necessary, what God has asked us to do, and we’ll love our children by allowing them to (within reason) develop gifts and talents God has given them.

And then I’ll refuse to feel guilty for declining to do every other good thing that comes my way.

Sometimes radical obedience is missions trips, quitting jobs, massive moves, full-time callings, speaking up, reaching out.

Sometimes what’s radical is obeying the smallest promptings of His Word, and this is how I determine to obey God, asking for His direction and choosing not to commit or promise or enroll until He confirms His will for our year.

May my agenda be His agenda. My plan, his plan. My schedule, His schedule.

I’m instantly challenged—an activity I planned on for the fall may not happen. I think of ten things I could do to replace that on my schedule.

I pray instead.

And I hear this prompting, “Embrace rest.”

That’s a radical call for a doer like me and it takes radical obedience to let it go and enjoy the breathing room over the suffocating schedule.

After all, in the end, Paul tells us that “the greatest of these is love” (1 Cor. 13:13) and love doesn’t require magic, but it does require time.

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader. Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness. Her upcoming book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, will be released in the Fall of 2013! To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

When Holy is Dishes, Laundry, and Homework

August 7, 2013October 27, 20149 Comments

Five puzzles, six books (or more), one game of Memory, word searches, and some tricycle training . . .

That’s what happens when we lose power or Internet at our house. Life slows down. When a daughter appears with board game in hand and a pleading look on her face, I have no excuse to give, no busyness to distract, nothing to prevent me from sitting . . . and playing . . . and resting with my kids

I complain and whine with the best of them about the loss of conveniences and comfort, and I’d prefer running water with temperature control and the ability to cook meals and refrigerate food any day of the week.

But a day without email and the telephone . . . well, that’s a welcome vacation sometimes.

Christ Himself called His disciples away from the crowds and busyness of their lives to spend time with him alone, like unplugging from ministry life with its hectic pace and demands.

Mark tells us:

“Then, because so many people were coming and going that they did not even have a chance to eat, he said to them, ‘Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest’” (Mark 6:31).

In Jesus: The One and Only, Beth Moore notes that:

“the original word for rest in this verse is anapauo. Pauo means “to cease, give rest.” Guess what ana means? “Again!” We don’t need this kind of rest just once. We need it again and again” (p. 116).

And again . . . and again . . . and again.

Sometimes we need to go away–or unplug– to escape all that distracts us here so we can fix our attention on Him there. We anticipate seeing God in the specifically designated portions of our lives we call “Spiritual” and the times we have set aside as “Holy.”

But then the real work begins.

Then we must return to the daily life in all its mundane activity and we must carry into that everyday behavior all that we learned in the holy moments we had set aside.

I’m trying to see Jesus while my hands are elbow-deep in dish water and the laundry piles stack up.

Can mopping the floor be spiritual? Can folding clothes be a God-moment? Can doing dishes be part of my quiet time?

If we deny Him a place in the mundane day-to-day life, confining Him instead to a corner of our hearts designated “God stuff,” then we miss Him and what He’s doing in us and through us.

It’s what the prophet Jeremiah wrote: “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart” (Jeremiah 29:13). Not spiritual heart pieces and holy corners, but all that is in our heart searches after God.

In Scripture, Naaman almost missed finding God. He was a big-shot, who commanded the army of the king of Aram, a great man, a valiant soldier, but he had leprosy (2 Kings 5:1).

Hearing about Elisha the prophet, Naaman sought healing from the man of God, but Elisha didn’t even come out of his house to meet with him. Instead, Elisha sent out a messenger with some simple instructions: “Go, wash yourself seven times in the Jordan, and your flesh will be restored and you will be cleansed” (2 Kings 5:10).

This was so . . . .basic.

So unimpressive.

So nonspiritual.

And Naaman was annoyed, angry even.

Naaman wanted a magic show with special effects rather than an order to take seven baths in the Jordan. But, his servants challenged him: “My father, if the prophet had told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much more, then, when he tells you, ‘Wash and be cleansed!’” (2 Kings 5:13).

A few dips in the Jordan later, Naaman’s leprosy was totally healed. All because he obeyed God in something simple and unimpressive.

If we have our eyes set only on the spectacular, we will miss God’s healing and cleansing work in the mundane and the everyday.

Will I manage to keep this perspective over time? Probably not. I will likely grow weary and burdened with the stresses of daily busyness. I’ll need to retreat again, stepping away from it all to focus solely on God.

But then I’ll come back home where dishes and laundry and homework is what happens here and in that, yes even in that dailyness and routine, I can seek God’s presence, His input, His fellowship.

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader. Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness. Her upcoming book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, will be released in the Fall of 2013! To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

VBS for Grown-Ups: Prayer Helps Us

June 19, 2013January 23, 2014Leave a comment

All week long I’m thinking about the Bible points for our Vacation Bible School and what they mean for adults. This week will be a mix of some old and some new as I share these lessons.

Today at Kingdom Rock VBS (Group Publishing), we’re learning: Prayer Help Us…Stand Strong!

Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything (Philippians 4:6)
Originally published as “Run to the Throne,” May 6, 2011

“Teach me to run to you like they run to me for every little thing.” That’s what Caedmon’s Call sings in their song, Sacred.

Yes, that’s true in my house. I button buttons and zip zippers, diffuse arguments and mediate disputes, kiss bumps and supply Band-Aids for nearly invisible scratches, refill juice cups and find lost toys, help with homework and hard-to-sound-out words.

I answer to “Mom” all day, every day. And, while at times I would like to sit still for more than five minutes at a time, I love that they turn to me for help. At some point I know they will feel too grown up to bring all their problems to me. Or maybe they’ll still come, but their problems will be so big that my supply of Band-Aids and apple juice won’t fix them anymore.

God must love when we turn to Him for help with all of the hopeful innocence that I see in my daughters’ eyes. We could struggle to solve our troubles in our own strength or we could offer them up to Him—both the life crises and the daily concerns—-giving them over to a God both big enough to handle them and compassionate enough to care about them.

And as we do, we confess belief. We say, “God I believe that You are Lord over all things, that no situation is too much for Your strength or too small for Your compassion. I believe that You have saved me and will continue to save me. I believe that You are Love.”

Years ago, a godly woman gave me this advice: “run to the throne before you run to the phone.” Before we call on our friends and our own mommas with a problem, we should bring it to the God who can actually solve the problem we’re facing.

Too often we don’t. We worry, we fret, we gossip, we chatter with others and seek solutions of our own making.

And all along, God’s waiting for us to just bring it all to Him.

Philippians 4:6 says:

“Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.”

and Ephesians 6:18 says:

And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people.

We are to pray “in everything,” and “on all occasions.” We should drop to our knees over a health concern or a family in crisis or a daughter’s lost toy. It’s all too much for us anyway.

That’s what men like Daniel and Nehemiah did.

When King Nebuchadnezzar had a dream no one could interpret, Daniel and his friends plead “for mercy from the God of heaven concerning this mystery” (Daniel 2:18). When the decree was signed saying no one could pray to any god but the king, Daniel went home in front of an open window and “three times a day he got down on his knees and prayed, giving thanks to God, just as he had done before” (Daniel 6:10).

Nehemiah prayed when he heard about the horrible state of the walls surrounding Jerusalem. When the king asked him what he wanted, Nehemiah “prayed to the God of heaven” before giving an answer. Enemies threatened the work of Nehemiah and his crew, “but we prayed to our God” (Nehemiah 4:9) and when the enemies tried to frighten the Israelite construction team into quitting, Nehemiah prayed to God: “now strengthen my hands” (Nehemiah 6:9).

They went to God with every annoyance, difficulty, burden, sadness, disaster, enemy, and worry.

At times, I’m overwhelmed by the weight of the requests I’m carrying to the throne. I’ve been duped by impossible-appearing circumstances into thinking that it’s fruitless to pray any longer. That there is no hope. That the marriage is truly dead. That the housing situation will not be solved. That the cancer statistics are too certain. That the job market is too sparse. That I’ve prayed for so long with no answer, nothing could possibly change now.

A friend confessed this in a whisper to me this week: “I’m just tired of praying about it.”

I knew exactly what she meant. Fighting and fighting to have faith for so long, to pray and pray with no evident answer, no release, no deliverance, it makes a body tired.

But we are to “always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people.” And God, who is so gracious and compassionate, knows the exact moment when we need to see a glimmer of His light in the dark places and when we need the smallest reminder that He is active and alive where we only see death.

And He does this. He gives us these glimmers of hope and hints of His glory and it becomes prayer that helps us stand a while longer, stand no matter what, and even stand strong.

Finding God While Folding Clothes

June 5, 2013January 23, 20142 Comments

I was crying and laughing at the same time.

All these years, I’ve heard about that, how you’re spilling over with overwhelming emotions and your body just doesn’t know what to do. Cry out the tears? Burst out in laughter?

There’s Sarah in the Bible, who waited month after month, year after year, decade after decade for a baby…and then when God said she’d have a son, she laughed. She just couldn’t hold that in, that joy….that disbelief…that incredulity….that moment of shock when your whole life changes in one second and you’re thrown off balance and grabbing onto a furniture or to an outstretched hand to steady yourself.

Me? A son?

Sarah had her moment; I had mine. Lying there on an exam table while an ultrasound tech rolled a wand expertly over my pregnant self. She tells me these are kidneys, this is the stomach, there are the chambers of the heart….My baby looks so beautiful and healthy, and I’m already exhaling that big held in breath and each of my muscles slowly relaxes just hearing the good news.

Then she says the words, “It’s a boy.”

This momma to three daughters laughed through tears. I can’t even remember what I said, but it was something like: No way! I can’t even believe it. Are you sure? Are you sure your sure?

My husband asks me later if I’m disappointed, but it’s not that. I’m excited, yes, just still in a bit of shock.

All these years, I’ve become a girl’s mom. I’ve learned all things girl and prayed over all things girl, read the books and considered the truths about being a mom to girls.

Truth be told, I’m feeling pretty confident most days, not always but often, thinking maybe I’ve gotten the hang of this. Maybe I know what to do.

Bringing up girls is what I do and being a mom to daughters is who I am.

Now I’m reading blog posts and books and listening to podcasts about raising boys. I’ve watched sons with their moms in the store, in the park, at the school. I’ve leaned in close and listened to friends and made mental notes about being a mom to boys.

And I’ve prayed.

Maybe that’s the point.

Nine years ago, pregnant with my very first baby, I thought I’d have all boys and thought I’d be a great boys’ mom. That was when the news of a daughter first shook apart any foolish confidence I had.

How I had prayed then when God gave me this unexpected gift of three daughters, and my Mom-life still holds together simply because of my worn-out knees from constant prayer.

So here I am now, stumbling down onto my knees again and I’m reminded: I am insufficient. I don’t know. I don’t have it all together and I’m not sure how to do this right.

I start by dragging out bag after bag of girls’ clothes from the Rubbermaid containers in the garage and sorting them into piles to give away to friends.

Then I remember how over the years some people mis-heard the news and thought we were having a son when we were having another girl, so they gave me gifts for boys. Then there were those who worried that ultrasound techs got things wrong, so they gave me gifts of yellow, green and white just in case.

I pull out the collection I’ve amassed over 9 years of having babies.

And right there God meets me. Right there as I’m folding these tiny boy’s clothes and watching the pile grow.

I had no idea how long He’d been at work preparing me for a son. I didn’t realize how much abundance He’d provided unexpectedly and beyond all reason. Blue outfits, blue t-shirts, little boy washcloths and towels, hats, blankets, mittens, sleepers, and socks: it all piled up on the back of my sofa as I folded the clothes until the piles were about falling over.

God had been at work all along, making room for grace.

I still feel insufficient. I still feel overwhelmed with all that I don’t know and amazed that He would trust this gift to me when I feel so incapable.

Paul said it, though:

He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.” Therefore, I will most gladly boast all the more about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may reside in me. (2 Corinthians 12:9)

This grace of God’s is sufficient.

But we don’t realize it, don’t rely on that, don’t allow Him to be fully sufficient until we realize just how insufficient we are. The more we are driven to our knees by our unworthiness, the more we declare Him worthy of all praise.

Just This and No More

May 31, 2013January 23, 20141 Comment

My older girls picked up their knitting needles this week.

They have big plans of what they can make with one ball of yarn and two thick needles: Hats with pom poms to match stripey scarves for every family member and friend.

For now, I tell them: Keep it simple. Practice the steps, row after row. No need for fancy patterns or agendas. Just stitch after stitch until they are even and right.

We’ve corrected our fair share of lost stitches, tangled yarn and strangely elaborate knots. Mostly, though, we’re fighting against extra.

I started my oldest girl out with 15 little loops and within 3 rows, she’d nearly doubled the length of her project. I counted them out—27 stitches now. We counted out 5 stitches for my next daughter and she immediately increased that to 10.

How do they do this?

It’s not purposeful, of course. Just an inadvertent grabbing of yarn in the wrong place, slipping on two loops where there should be only one, until finally their project has doubled in size. And if I let them continue unhindered, it’d triple and more.

So I pull out the row and start them again.

This is how you grab just one loop at a time. This is how you count your stitches after each row.

But it’s just so easy with momentary distractions and the way we pick up speed to do this, too.

God starts me out with 15 simple loops of yarn. He establishes the rhythm and the pattern, and He measures out the resources so I’ll have enough for all I need.

I focus at first and watch each stitch carefully.

Then I begin to rush and think about other things. People ask me questions. I look away instead of on my project.

Somehow I’ve slipped on extra stitches. God asked me to do 15. Just 15. So simple. He gave me enough.

But now I have 30 and I’m frantically working, trying to keep up with it all. I’m running out of resources and fretting over how I’ll ever be sufficient for all this need.

When I finally hand over the tangled mess to this patient and gracious God, He takes me back, eliminates the excess and starts me over again. Just 15 stitches, Heather. I only asked You to do these. No more. Nothing extra. And I’ve given You all You need, more than enough, for this alone.

It’s busyness, of course, that rushes us into grabbing more. We say “Yes” when He wants us to say “No.” We feel pressured into volunteering and there’s the pride that convinces us that we can save the day and make it successful.

Usually, it’s all good things: Bible studies, meetings, committees, volunteering and relationships. Then we find ourselves doubling up those stitches again, and when we read those words of Jesus, they don’t even make sense. How could He promise us this when we feel so worn?

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light (Matthew 11:28-30 NKJV)

There’s another way, though, that those stitches slip right on and we don’t even know it. It’s not busyness; it’s expectations. We tell ourselves what a Good Mom, a Good Wife, a Godly Woman and a True Friend does.

We’ve condemned ourselves right there, always trying to measure up to some perfect standard, tossing on stitches until we just collapse in failure and then we feel it: I’m a failure and a mess. I can’t keep up with it all, even these 15 stitches. Not like “her,” so perfect and together.

But God didn’t ask us to be perfect. He doesn’t impose impossible standards or withhold grace.

In the Message, the same verses in Matthew say:

“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly(Matthew 11:28-30 MSG).

It takes purposeful determination to protect the few stitches God’s entrusted to us, to fall into those unforced rhythms of grace rather than frantic rushing and condemnation. No slipping on extra loops of string, not with busyness and commitments or expectations and burdensome requirements.

Protect what He’s asked You to do and do it well, with all Your heart and mind, knowing that He’s given you all you need for just this much and no more.

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader. Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness. Her upcoming book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, will be released in the Fall of 2013! To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

I Failed Napping

May 17, 2013January 23, 20142 Comments

Part guilt, part pride. That’s the odd tangled mess of emotions I feel about rest.

Yes, guilt. Napping is difficult for me; sometimes impossible. All those years of new motherhood when the wise older women are telling you, “Rest when the baby is resting….” and you understand their gray hairs mean wisdom, but your body just doesn’t DO that, doesn’t nap and feel better for it.

Mostly I toss and turn. I count to 100 and then back from 100 and then up to 100 again, fighting hard for sleep because I’m fatigued and maybe even tired, but I’m failing so often.

And even if I can kind of sleep, it’s not deep and restful. It’s semi-conscious and mostly I just lie there thinking of how I’m wasting that time in that bed. When I finally give up all frustrated and still tired, I’m a groggy mess.

Napping frustrates me rather than refreshes.

My husband teases me about never watching TV or movies. “You don’t watch; you just listen,” he says.

It’s true. I like to listen to the dialogue while cleaning up the kitchen, packing the lunches, folding the laundry, sweeping the kitchen floor, dusting the furniture, signing homework slips and agenda books. Or maybe I am done with my chores, so I busy my hands with knitting or sewing projects or the crossword puzzle.

But sitting totally still, just watching the television…that’s not rest; that stirs up restlessness in me.

I read the verses, how Scripture tells me to rest, and all this time I thought I just failed at this.

Could this be sin? Could I struggle with this so much that I’m a hopeless case of incessant busyness? A certifiable Martha who can’t possibly be Mary at the feet of Jesus?

Oh, the guilt.

But there’s the pride, too. This secret truth: how it feels good to confess to a “weakness” that’s really all about my strength.

I’m a doer. I like to be busy. I get things done. I don’t need rest like others do because I have this superhuman ability, this super-mom power to do and do and do. I have a strong work ethic and I’m not lazy or unproductive.

That’s never what I say; it’s never that blatantly boastful. But I know they pride is there. I live with that arrogant inner dialogue every day.

Oh, but this week there is freedom and I keep coming back to this again and again. Daily I return because I don’t want to wrestle this Guilt/Pride monster any longer.

In her book Wonderstruck: Awaken to the Nearness of God, Margaret Feinberg writes:

“But rest isn’t a purely passive activity. Rest invites us to participate in restorative activities….Sometimes what’s most restful and restorative to you might involve activity…Sometimes what feels like rest to you may feel like work to someone else (and vice versa)…

Some people experience rest and rejuvenation through physical exercise, others prefer a creative outlet like painting, sculpting or finding a project on Pinterest. Still others experience rest through spending time at the rifle range, reading an entertaining book, working on a car, enjoying a comedy, or cooking a new recipe” (p. 72).

Rest doesn’t have to mean napping. It doesn’t have to mean Hallmark movie watching, a day on the sofa or a morning spent late in the bed.

It can. If that’s how God hand-crafted your heart and mind, then that’s how He asks you to rest.

But finally I see how all these years of feeling like I never rest just meant I rested through creating or growing.

….Baking the bread and the cookies and huddling around the kitchen table with three daughters and a new recipe.

….Pulling out the sewing machine on Mother’s Day and spending hours pinning and running the fabric through the machine and then hand-stitching the corners.

….Pressing the trowel down deep in the dirt, pushing away the soil with fingers and sinking the herbs deep down, and then fingering the buds on the miniature roses, on the echinacea, counting the un-ripe strawberries and giving up because of the abundance.

….Walking a mile and breathing in the air, hearing for the first time that day the sound of the birds and smelling the mown grass and the roses in bloom.

….Finishing that book, filling in the crossword puzzle, reading the Bible un-rushed without a to-do list to beckon.

This is how my Shepherd leads me, knowing and loving this non-napping sheep as He does: “He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he refreshes my soul.” (Psalm 23:2-3 NIV).

And yes, that’s doing, but it’s resting. It’s deep soul rest for me, the kind where I see beauty, and I create and know God as Creator, and I take time long enough to catch the slightest hint of His glory as He passes by.

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader. Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness. Her upcoming book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, will be released in the Fall of 2013! To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

“Facts” About Mom and “Facts” About God:

May 15, 2013January 23, 2014Leave a comment

It seems to be a Mother’s Day staple for elementary school children. Both of my older daughters made these projects and, according to my Facebook feed, so did the kids of most of my mom friends.

On Mother’s Day, my daughters presented their handmade creations: An ice cream cone picture with six adjectives to describe their sweet momma and a worksheet with “Facts About My Mom.”

Mostly as various moms posted their own kids’ responses to similar projects on Facebook, we laughed over the outrageous things kids say about us.

Like when they get our names wrong (!!!) or guess that we’re either 15 years old or 100.

But I opened the handmade gifts on Mother’s Day and didn’t read silly, mistaken or perhaps outrageously funny comments from my kids.

Somehow my daughters got it right.

Sweetly right, but maybe painfully right, too.

(Well, other than the “fact” that I’m probably 20 feet tall and probably weigh 45 pounds. That’s a little off.)

Yet there were other “facts,” too.

There was the objective data, of course. Adjectives to describe her mom? “Married” and “pregnant” made it on the list. Undeniable truth.

My other girl included “musical, gardener…..and competitive.”

What second grader diagnoses her mom as “competitive?” My girl. The one who has heard me apologize for my struggle to her face, and the one I held close while confessing how wrong I was to fret and worry over foolish competitions and how sorry I was that I ever put even one ounce of pressure on her shoulders when I’m so proud of her just as she is.

What does your mom like to wear? Pants and a sweater.

Simple and sweet truth-telling right there. Those are my happy clothes.

What is something your mom always says? Do your homework. Play piano. Hurry up. Go to bed.

Oh, here I pause. Because last year on this same little assignment, she wrote that her mom always says, “I love you.” And now here it is in pencil on paper, how I’m always giving instructions, always directing, always focused on getting those daily tasks done. Why is it so hard to make the words, “I love you” ring truer and louder than the drill sergeant commands of everyday necessity?

What makes your mom mad? When everything is out of control and no one listens.

When everything is out of control…..

Yes. Isn’t that what smashes down all of my hold-it-together personal strength? Isn’t it what makes me grumpy, short-tempered and anxious?

When I feel like I’ve lost control so therefore there must be no control, always forgetting that God is in control…. yes, that’s what makes me “mad.” That’s what God uses to plow right through my heart and break up all of that well-tended ground covering over my insecurities and my deep-down sin attitudes and misplaced trust.

Second graders can be so wise at times.

But I wonder, given a worksheet like this, what would I say about God?

Would I get the “facts” right and answer the questions correctly? Not giving the dictionary facts or the Bible study answers. Not the good church girl responses or the pat Christian phrases that tie Mighty God up in neatly packaged paper with a perfect bow on top.

No: Would I know Him? Would I know His heart? What makes Him happy? What makes Him mad? What do I love about Him the most and why is He the perfect Father for me?

Or would I get it all wrong?

In the book of Job, one man lost family, friends, servants, status in the community, riches, property, and physical health. And without sinning, he questioned God. Why this seeming injustice, he wondered, why this tragedy and pain for a righteous man?

Job wants to call God into court and question Him on the witness stand.

Yet, God remains silent. He waits. He listens and doesn’t answer. Finally, after almost 40 chapters of Scripture, God speaks.

In her book Wonderstruck, Margaret Feinberg writes,

Instead of focusing on the Why’s of our life circumstances, God calls our attention back to Him and reminds us of the Who that controls everything (p. 37).

That’s God’s answer to the incessant questions. He never answers “Why,” but He tells who He is in one thundering declaration of sovereignty and power over all creation after another.

It isn’t until the taking away, the sorrow, the mourning and the grief that Job doesn’t just know about God; He knows Who God is.

And that is enough.

Job says, “I know that you can do anything, and no one can stop you” (Job 42:1). Yes, now he knew, not about God, but now He had seen God with his own eyes (Job 42:5).

Intimacy in silence. Intimacy in the listening, the waiting, the mourning. That’s how we know Him, too.

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader. Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness. Her upcoming book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, will be released in the Fall of 2013! To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

How Was Your Day?

May 8, 2013January 23, 20146 Comments

“How was your day?”

It’s my husband’s first question to me at the end of his work day every single evening.

This answer used to be easier. How was my day? Mostly that depended on work. How much I accomplished, how difficult the tasks were, how successful I was, how many goals I’d met, and how well I juggled Mom-life with the job.

But now he asks, and I stumble and stutter. How to answer a question that’s always been objective and quantifiable?

What makes a day good now? Do I share my excitement over a new homemade bread recipe or the smell of the from-scratch spaghetti sauce bubbling away in the crock-pot? Does vacuuming count as an accomplishment (it is, after all, on my to-do list)? Do grocery store savings and coupon clipping validate me as a home manager? Should I count the number of socks I matched and folded?

And beyond that, beyond all the tasks and tedium, how was my day relationally? How many squabbles did I break up between my daughters? How many lessons did I teach, conversations did I have, kisses did I bestow, Barbies did I undress and dress?

And even beyond that, if I close my day without any measurable way to evaluate my productivity at all, could the day still be “good?”

If I’ve listened to a hurting friend spill out all the ugly and the pain on the phone or if I’ve collapsed at the kitchen table with tea and my Bible and lingered there out of desperate dehydration and an aching hunger for His presence….does this mean today I have failed?

This slide into a works-based life tricks and deceives. I don’t feel the gradual move from grace to law, don’t sense that I’ve shifted from relational priorities to measurable productivity.

But then someone asks about me, about my day, and I hear my own words and I know it for what it is: My value has become dependent on the items crossed off my to-do list.

It’s the pitfall for working moms, the trap for single women in the workforce, and the snare of stay-at-home moms whose identity becomes tangled up with their children and the cleanliness of their home.

We all fall in the pit some time.

In her book, Stumbling Into Grace, Lisa Harper reminds us that God “cares far more about the posture of our hearts than our productivity. Even “good” things can become the enemy of God’s best for us” (p. 114).

It’s not that busyness itself is sin. Sometimes busyness is just life with a job, a ministry, a husband, or kids. Chances are you’re busy. Chances are you get tired sometimes.

When Jesus commissioned the disciples for activity, they traveled for weeks of uncomfortable, on-foot missionary service to towns where they weren’t always well-received (Luke 9). They weren’t overloading themselves with busyness; they were serving in obedience, following Jesus’ specific instructions about the journey.

Yet, they were tired.

When they returned home, “Jesus took them away, off by themselves, near the town called Bethsaida” (Luke 9:10, MSG). He knew they needed time away, alone time with Jesus.

Our need is the same.

But it begins here. Not what did I accomplish, do, or achieve? My good day begins with simply this: Did I do what God wanted me to do today?

The Lord promised, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28), but if we just keep throwing on the same burdensome loads, we’ll never feel truly rested. That’s the weighed-down fatigue we choose when we do and do and do rather than obeying Him whether He’s sending us out or asking us to rest.

Oswald Chambers wrote:

An active Christian worker too often lives to be seen by others, while it is the innermost, personal area that reveals the power of a person’s life.

We must get rid of the plague of the spirit of this religious age in which we live. In our Lord’s life there was none of the pressure and the rushing of tremendous activity that we regard so highly today, and a disciple is to be like His Master. The central point of the kingdom of Jesus Christ is a personal relationship with Him, not public usefulness to others

God alone can determine the value of our day, the need for productivity at times or the requirement of rest in other seasons.

If He has told you to rest, are you resting? If He has asked you to work, are you working?

Others might glance at your calendar and think, “She’s too busy” or “She’s such a slacker.” But it’s not up to them.

It’s up to Him.

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader. Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness. Her upcoming book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, will be released in the Fall of 2013! To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Heather C. King – Room to Breathe

"He's solid rock under my feet, breathing room for my soul" Psalm 62:1-2 (MSG).

Category: ‘Presence’

An Origami Failure Learns to Fold

Turning Aside and Saying Yes to God

Magic Tricks, The Family Calendar and Radical Obedience

When Holy is Dishes, Laundry, and Homework

Finding God While Folding Clothes

Just This and No More

I Failed Napping

“Facts” About Mom and “Facts” About God:

How Was Your Day?

My devotional for today:

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My devotional for today:

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