Category: Thoughts from my Quiet Time

Continually, Always, Day and Night

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“What did you do today?”

“We did a math activity and stuff.   Then we went outside and played on the swings and stuff.  I had my reading group so we read this book together and stuff.  And then…..and stuff…..and stuff….and stuff.”

We have discovered this pervasive verbal tic in our home and it is called, “And Stuff.”

At first, I thought it was just one particular child who loves talking.  “And stuff” became her go-to descriptive phrase about everything.

Book summaries.  TV show summaries.  Her daily activity summaries.

No matter the topic, if she is talking, “and stuff” will slip out of her mouth every 30 seconds or so.

But it wasn’t just her.  It’s me.  It’s other children.  Listen to any of us talk for a few minutes and it’s there, this two-word crutch we’re all relying on.

Me:  “Did you practice soccer and stuff?”

My Child: “I played on the playground and stuff.”

How the invasion began I cannot say, but I’m onto this pest now.  I’m trying to catch that annoying “and stuff” beast in action and toss it out of here for good.

“Maybe  shake things up a bit,” my husband suggests, so my daughter tries some other phrases on for size and she feels self-conscious and a bit awkward.

“How was your day?” we ask her.

“I read my book and wrote a story…..et cetera.”  She cringes at her purposeful replacement for “and stuff.”  Why oh why can’t she just stick with her good old, tried-and-true and oh-so-comfortable descriptor?  “And stuff” seemed to work just fine!

Bad habits sneak in with expert stealth and they take over without us noticing most of the time.  Then, one day, we realize we’ll have to battle our way on out of there, one intentional choice, one purposeful decision at a time.

Every time we replace “and stuff” with a better description or an alternative phrase over here at our house we’re winning a little victory.

And that’s what these victories look like, daily, moment by moment, intentional.  We won’t kick the “and stuff” monster habit by  accident.

I need the reminder about habits and their power, so I  can be intentional, purposeful and on guard against sin, so I can quickly see and quickly hand bad habits over to the Lord and ask for His power and strength and to overcome them.

But also for this: to know how to walk in step with Christ, to battle the bad, but also cultivate the good.

How can I choose godly disciplines and refresh and renew them whenever they grow stale or stagnant?

Being on guard against sin is good, but being purposeful about pursuing Christ is what makes my faith a living, breathing, growing, thriving part of who I am. 

True Christian maturity is so much more than just standing against sin.  It is abiding with Jesus.  It is becoming more like Jesus.

So I need to know more than just what to stop.  I need to know what to do.

I’ve been meditating on this for months, seeking Scripture with my trusty pen in hand to find out what God says we should do continually, always, day and night.  What are the Spiritual habits that should define our faith-walk?

HOPE continually

Psalm 71:14
But I will hope continually and will praise you more and more.

SEEK Him always.

1 Chronicles 16:11
Seek the Lord and his strength; seek his face always.

PRAISE and GIVE THANKS continually.

Hebrews 13:15
Therefore, through him let us continually offer up to God a sacrifice of praise, that is, the fruit of lips that confess his name.

REJOICE always.

Philippians 4:4
Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!

PRAY CONSTANTLY

1 Thessalonians 5:17
pray constantly

SPEAK WITH GRACE always.

Colossians 4:6
Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you should answer each person.

MEDITATE on His Word day and night.

Psalm 1:2
Instead, his delight is in the Lord’s instruction, and he meditates on it day and night.

Serve THE LORD WITH EXCELLENCE ALWAYS

1 Corinthians 15:58
Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, be steadfast, immovable, always excelling in the Lord’s work, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.
Maybe I’m checking off some spiritual boxes every day, reading my Bible and praying.  I’m building spiritual habits and choosing good spiritual disciplines….but am I speaking with grace always?
Do I hope continually?
Far from it!  And I won’t be able to do those things ever in this lifetime if it all depends one me.
But Jesus.  He is ABLE.
Lord, do this work in me.  Reveal the sin, remove the rotten, the diseased, the dead.  And do a new work.  Plant, cultivate, grow in me this spiritual fruit . 

 

Bible Verses for the Brokenhearted

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  • Psalm 34:18 ESV
    The Lord is near to the brokenhearted
        and saves the crushed in spirit.
  • Psalm 56:8 ESV
    You have kept count of my tossings;
        put my tears in your bottle.
        Are they not in your book?
  • Psalm 69:20 ESV
    Reproaches have broken my heart,
        so that I am in despair.
    I looked for pity, but there was none,
        and for comforters, but I found none.
  • Psalm 73:26 ESV
    My flesh and my heart may fail,
        but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
  • Psalm 147:3 ESV
    He heals the brokenhearted
        and binds up their wounds.
  • Isaiah 61:1 ESV
    The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me,
        because the Lord has anointed me
    to bring good news to the poor;
        he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
    to proclaim liberty to the captives,
        and the opening of the prison to those who are bound;
  • Matthew 11:28 ESV
    Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
  • John 14:27 ESV
    Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.
  • 1 Peter 5:7 ESV
    casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.
  • Revelation 21:4 ESV
     He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more,neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”

Hope is worth fighting for

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There’s an abandoned house in my neighborhood and I pass it every time I drive out and I drive in, or when I  walk  my normal exercise route.

It took me a while to notice.  Mostly the grass is the telltale sign.  It’s not just uncut for a week or two.  The grass reaches to my knees before someone runs through it with a lawnmower, mostly for mercy I think.

There are other hints.  The lack of cars coming in and out.  The missing mailbox.  The tiles on the front porch that are stacked up and never, ever move.

It’s surrounded by the cutest bunch of houses all down the lane with well-tended gardens.  They have gazebos and bird feeders, wind chimes, and color-coordinated flower beds,  porch swings, garden flags and pinwheels.   Every house around it looks loved and still this one sits, not just empty—abandoned.  That’s how I think of it:   Abandoned.  I’m not sure if that’s a technical truth;  it’s just got the aura of ‘left behind” around it.

A friend told me the house’s sad story, of the family who lived there and of their sorrow.  Perhaps it is all just too much to return to  this place of memory?  Perhaps it is too hard to let it go?

I have entertained myself with big plans about this house: Of the person who might one day fall in love with it and move in.  Or maybe one day I’ll even buy it and rent it out to my young adult children. Or what if….?  Or  maybe….?

There is potential here!

There is still hope!

Maybe that’s the reminder I need in this season as I pray over some requests in situations that  seem too far gone.  It’s all over  now.  A hopeless mess. Doomed.  Broken beyond repair.

I realize as I look at this lost little house that it would take serious work to restore it.  You’d have to  wage a great battle against aggressive vines that are threatening to overtake the whole  side.  And you’d have to cut through the knee-high grass and paint over the cracking trim.  You’d have to  clear out the overgrown flower beds and plant new life.

That’s when it  hits me:  Hope takes effort and hope is worth fighting for.

We hope, but if hope is just  this passive emotion, just  this feeling  that we may or  we may not have and it can flit away in an instant,  then what’s the point of hoping?

Instead, Scripture says:

“We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure….” (Hebrews 6:19a CSB).

This unshakeable, strong anchor that keeps us from being swept away and overcome is the hope we have in Christ, that He came, that He saved us, that He intercedes for us now and is preparing a place for us in heaven.

So, we hope because of who He is:  Jesus redeems.  He restores.  He revives.  He resurrects.  He renews.

We might have to fight to hold on to hope, though.  It might take effort to maintain hopefulness in circumstances that seem hopeless, but still “we put our hope in the Lord” because “He is our help and our shield.” (Psalm 33:20 CSB emphasis mine).

We put our hope in Him.  We renew that hope  and tend that hope and rebuild that hope  when it’s close to crumbling.

It’s not that we hope for a specific answer or particular deliverance.  We hope in the Lord–in His character, in His ability,  in His mercy.  We know He is able and that we can trust Him to do what is right, best, compassionate, loving and perfect.

I can place needs,  worries, fears,  conflict, disappointment, dreams all in His hands.  Because He will do this:

Redeem.

Restore.

Revive.

Resurrect.

Renew.

Yes, I can hope in Him.

That means pulling  out the plow and breaking up some hard, stony ground.   It means yanking away that overgrown vine and mowing down that too-tall  grass.  It means tending the garden and replanting with new life.  It means pulling  out the paint brush and the hammer and the nails and all the tools I can grab to rebuild hope in the places I’ve let it crumble into hopelessness.

Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you believe so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit (Romans 15:13 CSB).

Bible Verses about Shining

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Shining for Christ

  • Ecclesiastes 8:1 CSB
    Who is like the wise person, and who knows the interpretation of a matter? A person’s wisdom brightens his face, and the sternness of his face is changed
  • Isaiah 60:1 CSB
    Arise, shine, for your light has come,
    and the glory of the Lord shines over you
  • Daniel 12:3 CSB
    Those who have insight will shine
    like the bright expanse of the heavens,
    and those who lead many to righteousness,
    like the stars forever and ever.
  • Matthew 5:16 CSB
    In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.
  • Matthew 13:43 CSB
    Then the righteous will shine like the sun in their Father’s kingdom. Let anyone who has ears listen.
  • Philippians 2:15 CSB
    so that you may be blameless and pure, children of God who are faultless in a crooked and perverted generation, among whom you shine like stars in the world

How the Lord shines

  • Numbers 6:25 CSB
    may the Lord make his face shine on you
    and be gracious to you
  • Psalm 4:6 CSB
    Many are asking, “Who can show us anything good?”
    Let the light of your face shine on us, Lord.
  • Psalm 18:28 CSB
    Lord, you light my lamp;
    my God illuminates my darkness.
  • Psalm 31:16 CSB
    Make your face shine on your servant;
    save me by your faithful love.
  • Psalm 67:1 CSB
    May God be gracious to us and bless us;
    may he make his face shine upon usSelah
  • Psalm 80:1 CSB
    Listen, Shepherd of Israel,
    who leads Joseph like a flock;
    you who sit enthroned between the cherubim,
    shine
  • Psalm 80:3 CSB
    Restore us, God;
    make your face shine on us,
    so that we may be saved.
  • Psalm 80:7 CSB
    Restore us, God of Armies;
    make your face shine on us, so that we may be saved.
  • Psalm 80:19 CSB
    Restore us, Lord, God of Armies;
    make your face shine on us, so that we may be saved.
  • Psalm 94:1 CSB
    Lord, God of vengeance—
    God of vengeance, shine!
  • Psalm 119:135 CSB
    Make your face shine on your servant,
    and teach me your statutes.
  • Psalm 139:12 CSB
    even the darkness is not dark to you.
    The night shines like the day;
    darkness and light are alike to you.
  • Isaiah 60:19 CSB
    The sun will no longer be your light by day,
    and the brightness of the moon will not shine on you.
    The Lord will be your everlasting light,
    and your God will be your splendor.
  • Luke 1:79 CSB
    to shine on those who live in darkness
    and the shadow of death,
    to guide our feet into the way of peace.
  • 2 Corinthians 4:6 CSB
    For God who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of God’s glory in the face of Jesus Christ.
  • Ephesians 5:14 CSB
    for what makes everything visible is light. Therefore it is said:
    Get up, sleeper, and rise up from the dead,
    and Christ will shine on you.
  • Revelation 21:23
     The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, because the glory of God illuminates it, and its lamp is the Lamb.

 

Bible Verses About Summer

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  • Genesis 8:22 ESV
    While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.”
  • Psalm 32:4 ESV
    For day and night your hand was heavy upon me;
        my strength was dried up[a] as by the heat of summer. Selah
  • Psalm 74:17 ESV
    You have fixed all the boundaries of the earth;
        you have made summer and winter.
  • Proverbs 6:6-8 ESV
    Go to the ant, O sluggard;
        consider her ways, and be wise.
    7 Without having any chief,
        officer, or ruler,
    8 she prepares her bread in summer
        and gathers her food in harvest.
  • Proverbs 10:5 ESV
    He who gathers in summer is a prudent son,
        but he who sleeps in harvest is a son who brings shame.
  • Proverbs 26:1 ESV
    Like snow in summer or rain in harvest,
        so honor is not fitting for a fool.
  • Proverbs 30:25 ESV
    the ants are a people not strong,
        yet they provide their food in the summer;
  • Isaiah 28:4 ESV
    and the fading flower of its glorious beauty,
        which is on the head of the rich valley,
    will be like a first-ripe fig before the summer:
        when someone sees it, he swallows it
        as soon as it is in his hand.
  • Jeremiah 40:12 ESV
    then all the Judeans returned from all the places to which they had been driven and came to the land of Judah, to Gedaliah at Mizpah. And they gathered wine and summer fruits in great abundance.
  • Amos 8:1 ESV
    This is what the Lord God showed me: behold, a basket of summer fruit.
  • Micah 7:1 ESV
    Woe is me! For I have become
        as when the summer fruit has been gathered,
        as when the grapes have been gleaned:
    there is no cluster to eat,
        no first-ripe fig that my soul desires.
  • Matthew 24:32 ESV
    From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts out its leaves, you know that summer is near.
  • Luke 21:30 ESV
    As soon as they come out in leaf, you see for yourselves and know that the summer is already near.

What matters more than age

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My son says he is “five-ish.”

He’s actually four and his birthday  is in October, so it’s not that his birthday is coming soon.

He’s simply feeling five, so  this is his new token answer.

“How old are you?”

“I’m five-ish.  I actually look five.  Actually.”

It’s because of a little playground encounter a few weeks ago  with two little boys who became his insta-best-playground  buddies.  They climbed all over the pirate ship together, took turns on the zip line, and then spun in the tire.

Finally, they exchanged names and ages.

That’s when my son realized these other guys were five and they were shorter than he was.  So, therefore, he must look five, or at least “five-ish.”

Maybe it’s the  fact that my baby is trying to age himself or the fact that my girls all finished off another  school year and are off to bigger, higher grade levels, like finishing up middle school of all things–maybe it’s me nearing 40 and feeling all the weight of what that means and how that  looks on me….

Whatever the reason, age is on my mind.

I’ve been thinking how age is inevitable.   Growing older just happens, even if we’d rather it didn’t.

Maturity, on the other hand, is not guaranteed.

In her book Unseen, Sara Hagerty says it this way

We’ll mature without effort into  wrinkles  and gray hair, but our hearts won’t mature deep  into God by default.

But what is this maturing, this  growing up  in Jesus?

It doesn’t come by default, so then it must take discipline.  Yes.  Spiritual disciplines.  Digging into  prayer and digging into His Word and serving and listening to the Lord and worshiping.   Yes and yes and yes and again.

It’s not all so  concrete and straightforward, though.  It  isn’t just about studying and reading and knowing what God’s  Word says.

There’s the discipline of repentance and humility.  It’s stumbling our way through living out faith.  It’s getting it  wrong, humbly confessing that and asking Jesus to  renew, revive, refresh and redeem.

There’s the discipline of weakness, maybe that’s the hardest for me.  When I  am feeling most  dependent on Jesus because I’m not strong enough or capable enough on my own,  I  have to lean.  Leaning can feel like so much brokenness and that’s hard, but it’s also sweet because that is exactly when I know Jesus more.

Failing, messing up, making mistakes, feeling frazzled and overwhelmed:  It’s all my weakness on display, but  I cannot pull away from the hard season, from the difficult or the wearying or the unknown or even what I just haven’t mastered yet.

Christianity isn’t about being perfect; it’s about being transformed.

Then there are the quiet seasons, when life seems to just roll  along day after day, seemingly stagnant, same-old, same-old.

Restless.  I can be so restless.

I want to see big results.  Big change.  Big impact.

Then I read the reminder in Isaiah of how to grow in the discipline of waiting:

but those who trust in the LORD will renew their strength; they will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not become weary, they will walk and not faint (Isaiah 40:31 CSB).

I love  this verse in all of the nuances in each translation.

“Those who TRUST in the Lord”  (CSB).

The NIV says “Those who HOPE” and the ESV says “those who WAIT.”

We trust Him.  We hope.  We wait.

The discipline of waiting tucks itself into seasons of quiet and of hiddenness and of not knowing.  It’s about lingering for direction and looking forward to  seeing God at work, but not seeing that work just yet.

When we trust and we hope in Jesus even in the discipline of waiting, we can soar and we can run,  but oh friend,  we can also walk.

Somehow that walking seems  like the greatest feat to me.  Soaring can be exhilarating, running shows great power,  endurance and strength.

But walking takes unique courage.  Walking takes persevering hope.   We’re not seeing leaps of progress, but  we will  not give up.  We aren’t quitting and setting up camp in a land of complacency or dormancy.

We’re being steady,  daily, consistent, steadfast, and faithful.

When the soaring is done and the running is finished and we’re feeling  bone-tired, still  we walk with the Lord today.   Then the next day, we get up and we walk with Him again, and we will not faint nor fail.

I remember that it takes discipline to repent humbly, to fail graciously,  and to wait patiently.   That means I can buck less against what feels uncomfortable or hard and instead embrace what God is doing in me right here and now.   I’m not just arbitrarily aging; I’m maturing in Christ.  Lord, be at work in me.

How could I forget?

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I am a postcard hunter.

My kids tease me about this and when I head into the gift shop at the art museum, they whine about my postcard search.  I show them what I’ve collected–one postcard for each of us, specially matched to our own interests.  Like the  Egyptian mummy cat for  my daughter who loves cats and the African giraffe sculpture for my son (giraffes are his favorite).

On our trip to Wisconsin, I search for four days for postcards only to finally track down a nearly hidden rack of them in the Minneapolis airport.

I’m pleased.  My kids are indifferent at best.  Postcards.  They don’t get the point or the value.

But for one  thing, I’m the one with the money and few souvenirs are as inexpensive as a postcard.

Plus, I have  a long history  of postcard memories.  I have some from my sixth  grade class trip to  Amish country in Pennsylvania and from the time I flew to visit my grandparents in Texas when I was  12.

I can flip through the postcards and remember  trips to  amusement parks and caverns and historical  sites and  museums. Those  help  me remember where I’ve been.

And I have  the collection of postcards others sent  to me.  Those  help me remember the people I’ve loved.

I have postcards  from  my dad, sent as he traveled with the military bands when I was a girl, and postcards from my grandmother on her trip to St. Petersburg, and even postcards from my great-grandmother  on her  travels in the 1950s.   They all  passed away so long ago,  and yet here in my collection I have their handwritten notes and a connection to their travels.

Maybe my kids don’t  really get postcards because they think  they’ll  remember.

But I know how often we forget.

How forgetful I can be.  Life pushes me faster and faster, rushing through this day and the next, and even those moments you most expect to remember blur into the fog of it all.

Memory isn’t passive, not the way we expect it to be.  No, remembrance is an active discipline, a choosing not to forget despite our humanness, our busyness, our moving on.

We think we’ll remember the miracles, the accounts of how God delivered us, the times He carried us right out of the pit, the stand-still encounters with God when it seemed like He cut through all the noise of this world and the cacophony of our own emotions and He spoke to us, God to person, one clear voice cutting through it all with a message we’ll never forget.

Yet, we forget it after all.

Psalm 78 shows how fickle remembrance can be.  Israel strayed from God.   He disciplined them.  Then:

They remembered that God was their rock,
the Most High God, their Redeemer  (verse 35 CBS).  

So,  they repented and returned.  He extended  grace and they followed closely for  a while,  until:

They did not remember his power shown
on the day he redeemed them from the foe (verse 42). 

They remembered and then they didn’t.

Asaph the Psalmist relays all the details of God’s miraculous provision,  the plagues in Egypt manna and water,  wilderness direction, victories  in the Promised  Land.

Still, they forgot all  that God had done. .

Could this be me?

Could forgetfulness  in my own heart lead not just  to apathy,  but to  waywardness?   And not just that, but to worry?  If  I forget what God has  done, I also forget all  that God  can do.

And He is faithful. He is so  faithful.  He is generous and gracious.  He is compassionate.  It’s not just that He provided, but HOW He provided that  I want to treasure and honor.

It’s been a year almost since we moved into our new home and people still  ask me, “How do you like your new house?”

I  tell  them the same thing all the time.  How I  drive into our neighborhood and round this one curve in the drive back to our home.  As I  do, I  see our house come into view and I breathe a  prayer of thanks.

It has been a year.  I am still thankful.  I keep breathing out that prayer of thanks because I do not want to forget.

And when I need new help  and new provision, , when there is trouble, when I am struggling, I remember the goodness of the Lord and how I celebrate every time I drive into this neighborhood.

We think we’ll  remember,  but how often we forget.

So we choose to remember.  We choose to  collect these postcards  of faith.  We choose to  commit over and over again to  gratitude and praise.  We choose to  give testimony to ourselves and to others:  Come hear what God has done.   Come know who our God is.

Consecrated, Lord, to Thee

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“Lord, we consecrate this trip.”

This is what I prayed over my daughter  as  we sat side by side in the airplane.  It was her first time flying. I’m not a flight expert by any means, but I still  explained every step of the process from security checks to  boarding to  seatbelts and the runway as if I knew exactly what was  happening.

She still  didn’t really know what  to  expect,  so when the plane picked up  speed and the engine roared, she glanced at me for a reassurance that  this was  normal.  And then we lifted off the ground and she gave  me one shocked look of, “are we living through this?”

I  squeezed her hand and reminded her not  to fear, but to marvel, nudged at her to enjoy the awe and the wonder of it.

With the initial take-off over with,  we put aside the nerves. She settled into her book  and I settled into mine.  We were beginning an adventure, heading with other students and her teachers  to a competition in a state we’ve never before visited.

My prayers started out tentative and nervous.  What to pray?   Not that she wins.  That’s  not it.

I prayed for peace and strength and favor.

As we flew, though, I read these reminders from John Eldgredge in his  book  on prayer called Moving Mountains, about consecrating ourselves for God’s work and for His Kingdom purposes.

Consecrate.  I know the definition.  Make holy.  Make sacred.  Dedicate to  God.

We sing it, don’t we? We sing, “Take my life and let it be, consecrated Lord to Thee.”

I  consider what this means, though.  What  is it I’ve been singing all these years  in one of my favorite hymns?  Do I know what I’m singing?   Do I mean it?

John Eldgredge writes:

“the act of consecration is….the fresh act of dedicating yourself…or whatever needs God’s grace–deliberately and  intentionally to Jesus,  bringing it  fully into His kingdom and under his rule.”

The night before, I’d read it in my Bible reading, how the nation of  Israel  gathered to dedicate Solomon’s temple and how Solomon prayed for God to  direct them, to answer prayer, to  be present, to forgive, to lead, to guide, to inhabit this physical building with the fullness of His spiritual  presence.

They set it apart.  They made it  holy, all the stones  and the wood and the linen made sacred,  not because they were sacred materials,  but because they were dedicated and anointed for God’s purposes.

Solomon prayed  over the people:

And may your hearts be fully committed to the Lord our God, to live by his decrees and obey his commands… (1 Kings 8:61).

In Scripture, we see it elsewhere.  Joshua told the nation:

“Consecrate yourselves, for tomorrow the Lord will do wonders among you.” (Joshua 3:5 ESV).

And the priests were instructed:

Also let the priests who come near to the Lord consecrate themselves, lest the Lord break out against them (Exodus 19:22 ESV).

In the Old Testament, they anointed priests.  In the New Testament,  they anointed apostles and evangelists.  As the church gathered in Antioch, praying and fasting,  the Holy Spirit called out Barnabas and Saul for a special  work.  Scripture says,

Then, when they had fasted and prayed and laid their hands on them, they sent them away.  So, being sent out by the Holy Spirit, they went” (Acts 13:3-4)

John Eldredge writes:

First ,  they consecrated themselves.  Meaning,  they dedicated themselves afresh to  God.”

So, I’m on an airplane with my daughter at the start of an adventure, and as we fly I read these reminders about consecration.  I consider what I most want here.

May my daughter see God at work and may others see God at work  through her.  May this whole journey be a part  of God’s plans for her; His hand deeply molding and preparing her for the future.  We dedicate this trip to you and set it aside for your Kingdom purposes.

That’s consecration.

It’s a prayer that feels truly fitting for  any new season or endeavor.

For this opportunity…for this new ministry…for our marriage…for a new baby….for our new house… for this job or this project…for the start of this summer….for the beginning of a new school year….for this trip.

We give this over to the Lord.  May it  be sacred and holy,  God at work, God present, God-directed, God-glorifying.  Amen and amen.

An Epidemic of Growing Up

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We have an epidemic of growing up going on over here.

Some of that is reason to rejoice, like the end of another school year ushering in summer break.

But some of it I feel the need to grieve over a bit, like how my youngest daughter is about to turn 9-years-old and 9 is a big deal to me.  Bigger than 10. Bigger than 11.

Nine is the halfway point to her 18th birthday and halfway through the time I’ll have with her at home.

When my older  girls turned 9, I found myself clinging even more to family time so I could treasure it and enjoy it while it’s here.  Of course, they wanted more friend time instead.

And then there’s my son, finishing up his preschool year.

I remember when he used to call his sister, “Tat-Tat” instead of “Catherine.”

“Tat Tat go to dance?  Tat Tat go to school?  I want Tat Tat home.”

Seriously.  It was adorable.

But then he transitioned to calling her “Caperine,” and now it’s a straight up “Catherine,” because he’s lost that little hint of babyhood.

I’m sad.  I really loved hearing “Tat Tat,” and it’s another way we had to let go of something we’ll never get back again.

Then there are my oldest girls, making tough decisions. I’ve been stepping back and coaching more then directing, encouraging them to personally pray and seek counsel and then choose.

We’ve talked round and round and we’ve prayed and prayed over their choices about classes, activities, commitments and more.  If they do this, they can’t do that.  Is it worth it?  What is best in the end?

Many years ago, when I had just two kids who were both under two years old, a lovely older woman told me, “It’s harder to be a parent of adult children than it is to be a mom with young kids.”

I think I blinked two tired eyes at her in disbelief.

Now I understand a tiny bit.  This is what she was talking about, how it stretches us as moms and weighs heavy on our faith to let our kids make their own decisions and then handle the consequences of those decisions.

That’s starting to make a bit more sense now.

This week, I read in Psalm 127:

Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD,
the fruit of the womb a reward.
Like arrows in the hand of a warrior
are the children of one’s youth.
Blessed is the man
who fills his quiver with them!
He shall not be put to shame
when he speaks with his enemies in the gate (verses 3-5 ESV).

Mostly I hear these verses quoted when people talk about the blessings of having a large family with lots of arrows in the quiver.

David Jeremiah, though, said:

The psalmist says our children are like arrows. And what does an arrow do? It goes to a place we can’t go, to accomplish a purpose we can’t accomplish (Hopeful Parenting).

He also quotes Stu Weber:

“…our children are the only messages we’ll send to a world we’ll never see. They are the only provision we have for impacting a world as a distance.”

I need the reminder just now that I’m not losing these “arrows” of mine as they grow up and they grow into independence.

No, I’m sending them out.

THEY GO WHERE I CAN’T GO.  THEY ACCOMPLISH WHAT I CAN’T ACCOMPLISH.

THEY HEAD INTO A FUTURE I CAN’T FULLY INHABIT AND HAVE IMPACT BEYOND MY ABILITIES TO IMPACT.

So I value this brief time with my children all the more because as I pour into them and teach them and pray over them, I prepare and equip them to hit the targets of God’s good and perfect will and plan for their lives.

But it also helps me let go a little.

I still mourn some. I mourn not getting to make decisions FOR them or even WITH them, but instead allowing them to decide.

I mourn the loss of “Tat Tat” and how my baby isn’t a baby anymore.

But I find myself letting go and trusting God.

He is with them.  He can teach them and carry out His will and hold them in His hands.

Originally published May 2016

When You Can’t Do Over But Have to Move On

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We’ve been giving do-overs here at my house.

Snarkiness has been on the rise.

So, when we hear, “Move!  I can’t see!”

We respond with, “You want to try saying that again in a kinder way?”

Or we hear, “Put that down!  That’s mine!”

We say, “Try that again.  I’m sure you could say that differently.”

I love do-overs.

I love the utter grace of it all, that even though you made a mistake, you can have another go at it.  Maybe you’ll do better this time.

Learn from those errors.  Make some corrections.

Maybe this time you won’t miss or forget.  Maybe you’ll study harder or speak with kindness or choose not to gossip.

My hope is that the do-overs now will help those lessons sink in before it’s too late, because we all know you can’t always have a do-over.

Sometimes, bad things happen and once it’s done, it’s done.

A missed opportunity can’t be regained.

One day, those words will slip out and they’ll be said.  You can’t take them back.

Sure, you can apologize.  You can attempt restoration.

BUT WORDS ONCE SAID CAN’T BE UN-SAID, AND THE COLLATERAL DAMAGE FROM AN OUT-OF-CONTROL TONGUE CAN BE DEVASTATING.

In those moments when you can’t have a do-over, though, you have to learn a new skill:  Moving on after you’ve messed up.

Shame from mistakes can drag us right down and bolt us to the floor.  We can’t move forward.  We’re chained to the past.

At night, I rumble through conversations I wish I’d handled differently.

I consider the mistakes I wish I could un-do and the decisions I wish I could un-decide.

It’s hard to let it go and just rest already.  I keep thinking, “if only….”

If only this hadn’t happened….

If only I’d done this instead…..

I want a do-over.  I want to rewind back to the start of the day and just try again.

But I can’t.  So I replay the wrong over and over and over.  I’m stuck in a perpetual loop of embarrassment and self-condemnation.

Paul makes this sound so easy:

Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, 14 I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus (Philippians 3:13-14 ESV)

Just forget what’s behind, look forward to the future and move on?

If only it were that simple!

Then I consider Paul’s words, how he’s straining forward and pressing on.  This is discipline and endurance.  This is refusing to get bogged down.

It’s falling down in the middle of a race and yet choosing to push to your feet and keep on going to the finish line even if you’re limping all the way there.

Surely this is how David felt after being confronted with his own sin of adultery and murder.

One bad decision led to another bad decision and now here he was, unable to have a do-over.  He couldn’t un-commit adultery with Bathsheba.  He couldn’t un-murder her husband.

But he prays for God’s mercy, for God to “blot out my transgressions.  Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin! (Psalm 51:1b-2).  He asks God to:

Create in me a clean heart, O God,
    and renew a right spirit within me (Psalm 51:9-10).

This I understand.

When I’m weighed down by mistakes that I can’t do-over, I’m compelled to cry out for “mercy!”  I rely on God’s grace to wash my soul and renew my heart for Him.

But then David does something more.  He doesn’t just stand there in the cleansing flood of grace.  He doesn’t keep re-hashing his need for mercy.

No, he begins to look forward.  He talks of moving on.

This is where I lean in to David’s Psalm today, because too often I’m stuck in the cry for mercy and can’t shake the shame.

Yet, David prays:

 Restore to me the joy of your salvation
  and uphold me with a willing spirit.

 Then I will teach transgressors your ways,
    and sinners will return to you…

and my tongue will sing aloud of your righteousness (Psalm 51:12-13, 14b)

HE’S FINDING MERCY IN THE MESS, RECEIVING RESTORATION, LEARNING FROM HIS MISTAKES, TEACHING OTHERS, AND WORSHIPING GOD FOR THIS SALVATION-GIFT.

I have to choose to accept the grace, too.

I have to choose to forget the past.  Every time my face heats up with shame, I remind myself that it’s done.  Over with.  Behind me.  Forgiven.

I have to choose to move on, choose to learn and grow and worship and teach others.

And the next time I’m reminded of how I messed up, I make all of those choices all over again because even if I can’t do over, I can do better next time.

Originally published April 2016