I remember a girl that almost messed up her life....

Life comes in stages, it seems. My daughter, Elizabeth, has just graduated from college, and is now home for good after working as a camp counselor for 6 weeks. It seems like, in a four-day-span, her life just ratcheted down into slug mode. I can feel her pain. She was in a bubble away at school, a senior year filled with deadlines -- last year of college volleyball -- first semester with 19 hours, last year of college basketball -- second semester with 21 hours (not to mention the class she took over Christmas break), then her Senior Capstone project just for fun..... and to top that, she kept her Hope scholarship all four years and made Dean's List this last semester..... But college can be an artificial environment compared to the real world. Then away to a hyper-intense camp situation for six weeks. Back home, where I've let her sleep and rest for the last four days. As we ate supper tonight, I felt her decompressing .....realizing for the first time that now she is facing the rest of her life without a plan. Without a coach in her face, a schedule to follow, a class to go to, a deadline to make. The world is out there, a still, sullen, stagnant place for now. Nothing is stirring. The humidity is stifling. There is no wind, no rain, no change. This is finally, it. Childhood is over, high school is over, even college -- is over. Mr. Right has not made his swoop into her life. No ready-made job was waiting for her upon her exit. It's all a great mystery, waiting to unfold. In truth, it's not really a fun place to be. 

I remember a desert time in my own life, many years ago. I left college after two years, defeated, deflated. I was a rock star going in, a stupid and foolish girl going out. I came home where my best friend, my sister, was leaving for her own college adventure and my heart was lonely and sad. All my aspirations and dreams had fallen flat. I had come close to marrying someone in college and realized I had been deceived into believing he was my soulmate, when truthfully his heart did not at all share the God that I loved. I had been simply stupid. My eighteen years of a respectful, accomplished life before that were no reflection of how I behaved those two years in college. I felt ashamed of my littleness, my inability to discipline myself apart from my parents and coach's boundaries. I ran home, realizing that I had to be cocooned under my family's protection or I might be lost forever. 

It was the best thing I could have done.

I came home, humiliated. In humiliation, you are ready to hear from God. I went to work at my old summer job in an office (which I hated), went to the community college at night, hunkered down and worked hard. I confessed my sins. Put my nose to the grindstone, no longer expecting oohs and aaahs from the crowd. Went to church with my family. I bought a used bicycle. Started riding it around the country roads near our house. I picked blackberries with my sister that summer, talking blue streaks with her, then meekly cried when she left to go off to college in the fall.

The world was lonely. The people I worked with did not understand (or care) who I was, urged me to drink and party with them, but instead I went to school at night and then home to my parents for the weekends. The world was a dry, parched land. To me, there was nothing else exciting that was ever going to happen. Nothing was going to change. God had forgotten me.

It seemed that way for a long time.

I was tired of playing games. Tired of dating people that didn't love God with all their heart. Tired of guys that were too attached to their Mamas. Tired of games, so many games. Sick of performing and sick of trying so hard to not miss God's will and never knowing what that was anyway.

I surrendered. To God. I just gave up. I said, "Hey, it's You and me." I cried in my car, alone. I prayed. Cried some more. I sang songs. Some jammin' rock songs. Then surrender-to-Jesus songs. Then love songs, but to Him, not to anybody else. My heart was quieted and I learned what it meant, finally, to really fall in love with the Lord. I had been stripped of man's accolades and ideas of what success were. I felt like I was nothing.

God sent me two crazy friends. Ken and Brian. Two funny, smart guys who loved the Lord, but who treated me like a sister. They were both very desirable men, but we had a summer without those kinds of expectations. They would pick me up for lunch, for weekend outings, for whatever. We would talk and laugh and laugh some more. It helped heal me. I was crispy-burnt from that wrong college relationship and needed the agape/phileo love that comes from brotherhood. They would say really offensive, edifying things like, "Hey Rose, we don't think there are any guys in this church tall enough for you, you Amazon!" Or -- "Rose, we think you're cute. But there's NO guys around here for you." Or -- "Rose, don't you want to go out with __________? Oh yeah, he's too short." Or, the worst one of all: "Rose, we love going out with you, because you're safe." Wow. Just what a gal wants to hear (who's being simultaneously hit on all the time at work by a bunch of heathen men). 

God has His own highly-honed sense of humor. He intended Ken and I to be together and make awesome progeny, from the foundations of the world. When the electricity ignited, we got married in a fever and the rest is history. It has been pretty much a 32+ year whirlwind. 

Could I have believed what God had in mind for me, all those lonely evenings and seemingly-stagnant days before? No. He never does anything the way we plan it. Not my original words, but they bear repeating: "If you want to hear God laugh, tell Him your plans." It makes me happy to hear Him laughing.

I think you can fry crickets....

Babe's quilt. (Babe was Ken's maternal Grandmother's name). It is gargantuan, like a patchwork field in a giant's neon-lit dream.
Seriously.
It was made, apparently, for either a king-sized bed or to cover field crops before the earth warmed up in the spring.
It is the ugliest combination of colors imaginable: neon green and pink, brown, orange, yellow, bright blue, and the odd patch of some other color. Zillions of tiny octagons, crafted with thousands of hours of hand-sewn quilting.....and all done in a fabric that has stood the test of decades: polyester knit. For those of you who do not remember that revered fabric, suffice it to say, it doesn't breathe or tear. I'm pretty certain it's still off-gassing and putting chemicals into our home. My husband is nearing 60 years of age, and his earliest memories of childhood include this quilt. Here it is, all these years later, in full, bright color, unscathed and unmoving, heavy as lead and probably as radiation-proof as that. Babe gave it to us when we got married, because it was his favorite quilt when he was a child.

It accidentally got left out in the rain a few years ago, for months, when we were building our last house. It was covering the whirlpool tub we were storing in the yard (because I bought it too early). When I salvaged the Quilt, it was covered in mud and looking quite sad. I was ashamed of myself for not paying attention, for disrespecting Babe that way. I took it to the laundromat and dutifully washed it in one of those monster machines. It came out completely clean and bright, like a newly-minted penny. Garish and unashamed, ready to face another century or two.

We have raised four children to adulthood and this has always been known as the Beach Quilt. For heaven's sake, who could actually put it on a bed, in these politically-correct, Martha-Stewart-infused times......though it did serve us well when our heating system died last winter. You could insulate a house with that thing.

The beach.

We always drag Babe's Quilt to the beach with us. It's some trouble hauling it out there, with all the other necessities. But it's also always worth it. When you unfold it in all its tacky glory, you have a huge area to throw your towels onto, easily seen for thousands of yards. Our kids never had trouble finding out where the family was stationed. This year's trip was especially memorable, as our three brand-new grandbaby girls shared it for the first time. Call it tacky, vintage-tacky, or just plain embarrassing, it's the only one of its kind.

This summer, we hit the jackpot. We got two trips to the beach. We have some dear friends who invited us to go to the beach with them, and they provided the condo. Not just any condo. A  million-dollar penthouse suite, up in the ozone where you can see the sky, the moon, the stars, the beach, the water....in ways you didn't know existed. I don't know if they know, still, how much that meant to us. Ma and Pa go to the beach! Ken and I have enjoyed various blessings in our life and we'll start bantering back and forth like two country bumpkins, seeing things for the first time (or maybe it's just seeing)...."Look Pa!" Opening God's box of delights is always an adventure.

I'm thinking about one of our days on the beach. I was out in the ocean, floating idly about, when I noticed a cricket floundering in the water. I have no idea why or how a cricket was swimming in the gulf of Mexico, but poor thing, he was going to drown for sure. So I slid my boogie board up under him so he could get a footing. He promptly sprung towards the shore. I did this a few more times until he could get onto land....then I went back to my floating duty. Eventually I flopped myself out onto dry land, onto Babe's Quilt. Twenty minutes or so go by as I'm sunning and drying out. I look down and notice the cricket, yes, the cricket....sitting on Babe's Quilt. There are hundreds of people around us on the beach, but that cricket found me. How could it not?! I told Ken and our friend, Kent, about how I had saved that cricket. They laughed and made jokes about it. I reached down and kind-of petted it. It sat there quietly for a few more moments. Suddenly, it popped up as only a cricket can, straight towards my face. It flew into my (typically) open mouth! Yelling and spitting, I got the thing out without killing it. As I calmed down, I realized it had either bitten or poked both my upper lip and the inside of my bottom lip. I spent the next few days nursing my poor lips and pondering life. What did this mean -- that a cricket tracked me down after I saved it and then tried, in his own little way, to kill me? There are so many deep and meaningful stories that follow us through life, so many things we can use to illustrate spiritual truths and drive home all the important stuff.

That's not what this was. 

Sometimes life is just weird and we are given things that make us laugh hysterically. And ponder the life of a cricket. Or a quilt.

The Promised Land

Ken says that I am a tent dweller. But, at least for now, I don't live in a tent....so I don't know what he is talking about. When I hear that term, "tent dweller," it makes me think of the Israelites wandering around in the desert for those fourty years. They'd set up their tents, take them down, drift around for awhile and then start over. God didn't let the original folks who had made it out of Egypt cross over into the promised land because of their sin and lack of faith. 

There is much said about The Promised Land in Christian circles. I used to walk down the aisle as a child and teenager, in an upheaval, in an attitude of surrender to the Lord. There were all these emotional appeals at revival services, appealing to the lost and to the backslidden....but also to anyone breathing. There was the clear inference that if you were still alive, you were missing something and that you needed to muster up a boatload of emotions and vows and renewals so that you might cross over into the Promised Land, yes, while you were still here breathing. I so wanted to please the Lord. I wanted to do the right things. I loved Him, prayed all the time, read my Bible, went to church, lived morally.... but the message I was getting was that there was more. More. More. And that I needed to figure out what God's best was for my life. Heaven forbid, if I missed what that was, because then my "diamond" would get shattered and I would have to settle for smaller but more brilliant, if I ever were able to figure out God's best and then to actually implement it. 

Eventually, many, many moons later.... as I studied the Word and pondered what it ACTUALLY said, I began to see that God's will is not as plainly laid out as I thought. There were obvious things, like sin, that I seemed to figure out pretty well. Especially that I was one of those (sinners). As far as discerning God's will, I was often taught that I needed to pray, seek counsel and then wait on perfect peace. Perfect peace was my signal that, yes! -- this is God's will. Peace goes way beyond some fuzzy, ethereal emotion that can be used as a green flag. Peace, believe it or not, does not always mean I feel great about something. It's hard to explain. 

We can spend our lives and our emotions trying to manipulate God. That's really what it comes down to. God as Santa Claus. If I "discern" His will, and then I do all the little steps just right, then I'll get God's best. Is this Scripture or wishful thinking?

I am no theologian. 

But the Gospel is simple, yet profound. Man wants to muck it up and turn it into a badge-earning-contest that, in the end, glorifies man, not God. 

Here we are, cracked and sinful beings. Proud in our posture. Needing redemption but not willing to bow the knee to our Maker. I've known sweet old ladies who seem to be loving and accepting of most everyone and everything, until the subject of Christ comes up. They are okay with Him, until I suggest that I need Him or that I am a sinner....then suddenly a prideful ball of fire erupts from that formerly sweet demeanor. And I'm not telling this dear lady that SHE needs Him or that SHE's a sinner. I'm talking about my own life. But it hits a chord, a sour note, and I see the wall that is separating this dear person from God and from true peace. 

If I set myself as good enough to work my way into heaven, then really what I'm saying is that I am God. I am my own God. I call the shots, I say what goes and what doesn't. The world according to me. What is right in my own eyes. Yeah, that's the way we like it. No rules. Just right. Don't try to tell me I'm not good. Don't try to tell me I have to bow my knee or to admit that I do anything wrong. 

This is human nature. 

I have one of those.

I was a child when I became a believer. It was so simple then. When I think on it and the things I've come to realize from the Scripture as a mature person, it all comes around. I remember lying in my bed with my sister at night in our hot oven of a brick house, with the dark all around and the thin curtains blowing gently at the window.... the stars were intense, the moon so round and full. The night sky inky and blue. I felt God whispering to my heart, over and over. I would talk to Him as only a child can, honestly and full. I came to know that He loved me, because He wooed my heart to Him. I would be afraid of the dark sometimes, but then would be comforted by the thought that He was cradling me like a baby. 

I was lucky to have had a secure childhood (but not without its warts, mind you) and two parents that loved and nurtured me. I didn't have to sleep in a nasty bed or on a floor. I didn't have drunken parents fighting it out or neglecting to feed me. I had a father who played with us, worked to provide for us, and a mother who kept us clean, warm and safe. We had a house, food, a yard, a school, a dog. Probably lower middle class, but we didn't know that. We were happy.

It could be said that becoming a Christian was easy and natural in that environment. It would seem so, but I know many others, and often with way more creature comforts and securities than I, who reject Him vehemently. It's because coming to Christ is His work, not mine. Given my natural nature, I'd choose me every time. Not Him. Not bending my knee. Not choosing the narrow road. Not choosing to ever deny myself and follow anybody, much less Christ. Our pastor used to put it this way..... I was dead on the bottom of the ocean. Dead. Dead in my sin. I couldn't save myself. He reached down from heaven and purchased me with His Son's life blood. He gave me life and pulled me up off the bottom of that ocean. He redeemed me from the pit. It's not my goodness or my figuring everything out that made me special or measured me up to getting picked. Redemption is about rescuing someone who is not able to rescue themselves. 

The rest of my life is lived in a grateful spot, because I realize, in part, what He has rescued me from.... and what the marrow of life is about. I am thankful for the Scriptures, all that milk and meat and veggies, that feed and help me see the path that is in front of me. I am thankful for Him, that once I was blind but now I see. This ain't the Promised Land, ya'll. There's thorns, critters, and lots of desert. And we are pilgrims, wandering in the middle of it. We will get there in His time, but until then, we have a Well in the desert. 

Librarians and soggy Reader's Digests....

Stillness. There it is. From rushing here and yon, planning, preparing, going, doing.... it is rare. If I look for it, I can find it. That's easy to say now, that my four children are grown. I can remember when a trip to the bathroom was fraught with perils beyond the door lock. You never knew what was going to happen and what you might miss, just because of your tiny escape to the bathroom. I kept a Reader's Digest in there, because, well, because.... you could read a whole book in, say, 20 minutes, if you were fast. So I learned to read super fast. And type super fast. And fold clothes super fast. All those Wonder Woman skills that I remember seeing my Mama whip out in record time....I would say to her, "How do you do that so fast?" She'd say, "Lots and lots of practice." Then eventually I became the skilled one. There's not a lot of room for perfection-worry when life's going on without you if you don't get stuff whipped out in a jiffy.

On another note, but talking about Reader's Digest made me think about it. The Library. Oh how I love the library and books. I would (and do) get two armloads, one for me and one for our kids. We'd carry them home in a milk crate. I still like to read 4-5 books simultaneously....one in each bathroom, one beside the bed, one in the living room by my chair.... The number of bathrooms in our house has always dictated how many I might be reading at any given time. Oh yeah, and there's the tub too. Tub adventures. Hmmmm. One day, years ago, I asked my brother to borrow a book and he wouldn't let me borrow it. He told me that he would only be BUYING me books from now on, and that I would not be borrowing them from him. I was offended. Until he told me that the last book I borrowed came back looking like one of those old Reader's Digest Christmas trees we used to make out of folded books....not to mention that it also had bite marks on the cover. He checked and said that the bites were definitely human and definitely adult-sized. How can I help it if the book slips into the tub while I'm trying to balance my ice cream in the other hand?!!! He's been true on his promise to buy me books, thankfully, and gets me the awesome ones. Back to the Library. Libraries would be just peachy if it weren't for those people they employ, Librarians. Librarians do not like me. I don't understand that. I have lots of joy and happiness when I walk in there. Most people really do like me. I love books. I love lots and lots of books. And so do Librarians, correct? But Librarians believe that those books belong to them and not to me, the tax-paying public.  They are always really nice when I first come in, and then they seem to get upset when I don't bring books back, when I make too much noise in there, and especially when I DO bring the books back but they have bite marks on them. What gives?! I mean, how many times does that one book actually get read? Surely only a few, right? Especially if they're paperbacks. They get read a couple of times then go in the 25-cent bin, where I buy them and then trade them in at the used book store for more books. Why would I keep most books? I'm only planning on reading them once, maybe, maybe twice, unless it's the Bible, so why all the hostility? Either way, when we moved to Villa Rica, I don't think these Librarians here got the memo, so somehow I have been able to remain incognito for a year and a half. Maybe it's because I've gained some Ninja-Library-Sneaking skills. I don't know..... Meanwhile, if I call you a Librarian, that is not a compliment and it probably means that you need to lighten up (don't mention what it is that I need to do). Since I don't actually call anyone that to their face, maybe it will go well and I won't get tarred and feathered yet. Many apologies to all decent and good Librarians that I may (and surely) have offended in this life. You are truly better than me and I mean that from the bottom of my heart. 

What is that buzzing in my head-- A tumor, low blood sugar, or is my brain actually working today?

What a season! I have never been so happy for the Christmas season to be over as I was this year. We have much more to be thankful than a year ago (three new grandbaby girls, Liz' senior year of college, the house is all painted inside, both still working, I've lost a total of 60 pounds now, busy in Villa Rica doings, God is merciful, etc.) but wow, all this holiday fal-de-ral (sp?) I know that it should not be this crazy and that Jesus is supposed to be the reason for the season and all that, but it was hard to find any serenity this year. When did we get so gift-crazed and nuts? I've never seen more grumpy shoppers than I saw this year. We are missing it. I need to take some serious time and contemplate what needs to change in our family. We now have precious grandchildren and I want our traditions to be sweet and memorable, not rushed and guilty.

The real problem on this corner is me. Yes, me. I see that I blogged, what, about three months ago, about the trial I was going through concerning a MRSA staph infection. Here it is, technically four months into this trial, and I am finally starting to truly get to the roots of my stubborn heart. You think ya know, but then.... time, trials and twists begin to affect what is really in there. Trusting God is a platitude that we speak often. It's tritely thrown out there like a mint after dinner. Neat, tidy, refreshing. Sugar, saccharine-sweet. Godly. Appropriate. But when things in the real world begin to go sour, when I don't get the answers that I desperately seek, or when my timetable and God's timetable don't seem to be in sync.... well, yuck.

We all have sin tendencies, whether we admit it or not. It can be a tendency towards bitterness or worry or fear or addiction, to mention a few. I tend towards debauchery and fear. Two opposites that love each others' company for some reason. As we drove Liz back to college, right after the holidays, I was sad and angry. I was not happy that she only had a few days at home and had to go back so soon for her basketball team. Reallllly not happy that her dorm apartment is off campus and that she would be alone down there without a car or transportation for a month. Also not happy that I have to trust God to protect her from everything, especially aggressive, non-qualifying male-types that flutter about her smoldering beauty like moths to a flame. Except these moths carry blow-torches and bombs. The coach put another teammate with her in the apartment, but of course it was not the one that I would have wanted to stay with her. I wanted her to be 100% safe. Meanwhile, I have a couple of MRSA spots pop up and Liz contracts a strange rash right before she goes back to school. Am I going mad? Sounds like it. 

"My yoke is easy and my burden is light." Jesus said that. I think about that a lot. 

The next day, after Liz goes back (and I find out about the "wrong" roommate, not remembering that God chose her)....I go into freak-out mode. I wanted to go back up there and get her, bring her back home. I'm so twisted inside about everything, I can't see straight. My body is betraying me. I have lost all this weight, just to go into some sort of nutso sickness....in fact, I can't keep from getting sick. I've had a stomach virus, several colds and the flu, on top of the constant threat of anything resembling a pimple on my body turning into a monster.

I go into the kitchen before church, mad at God (and Ken for always being so cantankerously calm). I sit down with my bowl of probiotics (read: yogurt) to restore my impoverished gut flora (can I scream now?).... and I said, in so many words and thoughts...."God, I don't know what to do. I can't make myself well. I can't hover over my daughter and protect her from the wolves, the devil or even herself. This was all so simple when I was young and my children were small and things were answered with a yes or no, a swat on the butt or a hug. Do You mean for me to die of this MRSA crap? I'm scared of the public pool now....so how am I supposed to exercise? Why don't we ever have any money? Why is Christmas such a guilt trip? I think everybody is mad at me and I'm not sure why. We need to paint the outside trim on the house or it's going to rot and fall down. Are they going to let me play flute at church anymore? I don't know if I like this new pastor they are calling. I want Pastor Jon back. Where is Pastor Jon when you need him? In Charleston, whaaaaaa! Who in the heck is going to take down all these (4) stinkin' Christmas trees? Why is Ken so calm when it's a perfect time to panic?!!!"

I laid my head on my chest and let it pour out. I started bawling. Ken ran into the kitchen and asked if I were okay. Then, "Should I stay in here or do you want to be alone?" "I DON'T KNOW!!!!!" These poor guys. You have to feel for them.....

I suddenly realized how much I had not trusted God for anything in the last few months. I didn't believe that He could take care of anything and that it was all up to me and my devices and decisions. I had worked myself into panic and fear. Sure, there are decisions to make and things that I can and should do. But in the midst of that, you can get so overpowered that you end up muffled, two inches under the surface of the water. You're close enough to reach up and get a breath but you can't, because you're paralyzed and your feet are stuck in the mud. Not to mention that you can't seem to know or remember what it is you are supposed to do. And then you are reminded that you haven't juiced a thing in months..... maybe we really are all just insane. 

As I poured out my heart to the Lord, I mentally, again, wrapped my arms around the cross and laid my head at His feet. I confessed my sin of unbelief, my lack of ability to trust Him, and asked Him to carry me through. If I think about the trials other people face, well....I don't know how they do it. Because those aren't my trials. These are my own trials. He allowed them, just in time, just enough. I asked Him to speak peace to me through the sermon that morning. Dried my tears, hugged Ken really big, and then we got on with our morning. Of course, when we got to church, the pastor that is being interviewed for our pulpit spoke:

http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=123013829497

It was about the birth of Christ, the impossibilities of the day, and God's sovereign hand over the tiniest, dirtiest details (like poop in a stable) and how God directed the most beautiful redemption of His people through the humblest of situations. He sent me His message of peace then and there. Not to mention, answered my questions about our new pastor right along with it.

Rest. Go quiet, restless heart. (Oh yeah?! But, yeah). Go to His Word. Know that He is God. Do I believe that? Yes. Do I trust Him and His Word? Yes, by the faith He gives me, I do. Not by my own internal buzzing, that's for sure. Listen. His Holy Spirit is here. He's got it all.