Tag: endurance

HOLY WEEK 2019: Living Between the Crucifixion and the Resurrection

It is tempting to forget that there were three long days and nights between the crucifixion and the resurrection beause the way we observe this season rushes us past the pain to embrace the promise.

But it’s not hard for me to imagine how the disciples felt when they saw Jesus was dead.  It was neither what they expected nor what they prayed for.

There were many points in the story when things could have gone a different way:

  • When taken by the religious leaders-surely, they thought, He will explain Himself, they will let Him go.
  • When taken before Pilate-Rome will refuse to get involved with our spiritual squabbles, Pilate won’t authorize His death.
  • When presented to the crowd-no Jew would rather have a wicked murderer released instead of a humble, healing Rabbi.

At every turn, every expectation they had for a “happy ending” was dashed to the ground.

Read the rest here:  Living Between the Crucifixion and the Resurrection

God’s Provision is Adequate For My Pilgrimage

This is a hard, hard thing to grasp.

A painful lesson to learn.

But it is truth:

The provision of God is adequate for my pilgrimage. God does not fail to see, know, understand, care, love, and ultimately to work all things ‘in conformity with the purpose of his will’ (Ephesians 1:11). His love is constant, though sometimes unfelt. His presence is assured, though sometimes He seems far away. His plan is good, though sometimes I hurt. For this present time I see dimly, mere faint outlines of all God’s purposes and plans. Yet I believe that His ways are better and His thoughts are higher than my own. In my time of trouble, my understanding is not crucial. It is my confidence in the person, the goodness, and the sovereignty of God that is the great, indispensable necessity.
~James Means, A Tearful Celebration

When my children were young, we made a habit of listening to classic books on tape as we made the miles between our rural home and all the places we had to go.  It was glorious to learn together, explore together and build up a reservoir of common literary references.  

pilgrims progress cover

One of the books we listened to was Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan.

In it, Christian, the main character, is making his way toward the Celestial City.  Along the way he meets all sorts of characters representing various temptations and snares common to all of us as we journey through this life.

I learned much from that book, the most important of which was this:

“To go back is nothing but death; to go forward is fear of death, and life everlasting beyond it. I will yet go forward.”

The road is hard.  The journey long.  The way perilous and uncomfortable.  

But I will go forward, trusting that the Lord has made every provision for my pilgrimage. 

“Blessed are those whose strength is in you, who’ve set their hearts in pilgrimage as they pass through the valley of Baca they make it a place of springs. The autumn rains also cover it with pools. They go from strength to strength until each appears before God in Zion.” 

~Psalm 84:5-7

blessed are those whose strength is in you

 

Baby Steps Count

When my daughter was learning to walk, I would hover near-ready to catch her if she fell.

I covered sharp corners or moved furniture so that the chance of injury was minimized. I clapped and cooed each time she made a little progress-pulling up, cruising around the edge of the sofa and coffee table-those tentative moments when she was brave enough to let go and then plop on her bottom.

And finally, when she made her first unassisted steps between the security of holding on and my waiting arms.

It was a judgement free zone.  

I wasn’t looking for technical perfection or measuring progress according to any external metric.

crawling walking baby huff post

I didn’t rush the process. I couldn’t do it for her.  I could only support her own efforts toward the goal we both had in our hearts.  I never despised her baby steps.  

They were a beginning.  

And everything has a beginning.

When Dominic ran ahead to heaven, I felt like I was physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually knocked to the floor.  I had no idea how I was going to make a life after this great blow.   I could barely get dressed, much less do anything that took more thought or energy than that.

I was overwhelmed.   I had to learn to walk all over again.

And I did it with baby steps, in a judgement free-zone I created for myself where I refused to gauge my progress against anyone else’s.

its all about the baby steps

Because baby steps count.

Here are some of the baby steps I’ve taken and am still taking:

  • Got up, got dressed, bought groceries.
  • Cooked dinner.
  • Cleaned the bathrooms.
  • Went to church.
  • Remembered a birthday and sent a card.
  • Drove to an unfamiliar place to meet someone for lunch.
  • Exercised.
  • Made phone calls.
  • Went to work.
  • Volunteered.
  • Slept through a whole night.
  • Organized a party.
  • Showed up to graduations, a couple funerals and a wedding.
  • Kept doctor’s appointments.
  • Laughed.

I have yet to hit my stride and I don’t think running is in my near future, but I am moving forward.  I’m making progress.  I don’t have to meet a timetable or get anyone else’s approval.  

It’s my journey.

And baby steps count.  ❤

feet on path

 

 

 

Falling Down and Getting Up Again

I hate that question that every doctor’s office asks now, “Have you had any falls in the past twelve months?”

I always say, “no” even though that’s rarely true.  

Because I know what they are looking for is evidence of disease that might be impacting balance and I’m perfectly free of that so I don’t want to place a red flag in my medical chart.

But I fall down pretty regularly.  Mostly because I trip over something as I’m walking from one animal enclosure to another, hands full of buckets and mind somewhere else.

The other day was one of those moments.  

I was done feeding our beagles, headed back to the house when my feet found a random piece of looped wire on the ground.  (I still have no idea where it came from!)

There’s that split second when you know a fall is coming and your mind tries to figure out how to stop it even as your body is giving in to gravity.

Down I went!  Hard!  On my left knee and right wrist but sparing my head.  

It really, really hurt.  In fact, it hurt so badly that I simply rolled over and rocked back and forth for a second or two.

helpless turtle

Then I realized there was no help for it but to put weight on those knees and wrists and get up.  So I took a deep breath, counted to ten and pushed myself up.  I hobbled back into the house to survey the damage and put ice on my knee.

And I reminded myself once again that I can do things that are hard, that are painful and that seem impossible.  

strengh grows when you go on anyway

Life is full of falls-real ones that bang up body parts and figurative ones that wreak havoc with hearts.

They all hurt.  

When I find myself down and out I have a choice. 

I can sit in the pain and lie helpless and hopeless. 

Or I can take a deep breath, gather my courage and get up.  

Every time I choose courage, I build up my reserve and strengthen my resolve and make it more likely I’ll get up every time.  

fear is a reaction courage is a decision

 

Cheerleaders Are More Important Than You Think

I‘ve never been the cheerleader type. 

No long legs, long hair or graceful moves that might have caught the eye of the ever watchful gatekeepers who picked the favored few each year to represent beauty on the sidelines.

So (I’ll be honest here) I really didn’t give the position much thought beyond the fact that those girls always got asked to dances first.

But in these years since Dominic left us I’ve learned something very important about cheerleaders-both the ones in the cute clothes at sporting events and the ones that come alongside others in real life:  they make a difference.  

word of encouragement is the fuel for hope

Cheerleaders are more important than you think.

Someone calling courage can mean a heart holds on when it’s about to let go.

Someone reminding you what’s at stake if you give up can help you dig deep for that last bit of effort hiding inside.

Someone chanting rhythm to your plodding forward progress can provide another focus for your mind besides the throbbing pain in every step.  

Someone showing up and standing by your side even when the odds are against you says, “You are worth the effort-win or lose!”

courage-dear-heart

You don’t have to be a certain size or a certain type to be a real-life cheerleader.  

You don’t even have to fit into those cute little skirts.

The only qualification is an unqualified commitment to showing up and being seen and holding on and hanging in no matter where life takes the ones you love.  

You have the power to be the difference in somebody’s life. 

I guarantee it.

So get out there and cheer them on! 

❤

cheerleaders

Wife, Mother, Daughter, Sister, Friend

It would be helpful if the world could just stop for a day or a week (or a year!) when your heart is shattered by the news that one of the children you birthed into this world has suddenly left it.

But it doesn’t.

And immediately all the roles I have played for decades are overlaid by a new role:  bereaved mother.  Except instead of being definitive or even descriptive, this role is more like a foggy blanket that obscures and disorients me as I struggle to fulfill all the roles to which I’ve become accustomed.

Now I’m a bereaved mother AND 

  • wife,
  • mother to surviving siblings,
  • daughter,
  • sister,
  • friend.

In addition to all the challenges those various roles represent, I have a new challenge: 

How can I be the person I need to be for the ones I love when I’m barely able to be any kind of person at all?  How do I encourage THEM when I have to give myself a pep talk just to get out of the bed?  How do I navigate my own emotional landmines and help them navigate theirs so we all arrive safely on the other side of birthdays, holidays and special occasions?

I have to admit that I have. absolutely. no. idea.

I’m trying.  I don’t give up (although I want to!).  I keep showing up and having conversations (even some that are one-sided as I take the brunt of another’s emotional explosion).  I try to be a middleman and get first one person’s perspective and then another’s-negotiating for common ground and some kind of compromise.

But it often backfires.

No matter how hard I work at it, I can’t please everyone.  And the problem with being seen as the negotiator is that if things don’t turn out well, you are the scapegoat too.

I’ll be honest.  There have been more than a few days this past month I wanted to crawl up in the bed, pull the covers over my head and not answer the door or the phone.

After nearly five years of this, I’m worn down, worn out, feeling sick, feeling incompetent and feeling like no matter how hard I try it really doesn’t matter. 

I know it’s not true.  

But it feels that way.  

And it takes another giant bolus of energy I don’t really have to drag my butt out of the bed, make a list, make phone calls, do the things that need doing and then show up, smiling, to whatever event is next. 

Because that’s what wives, mothers, daughters, sisters and friends do.  

❤

hope whispers blinding light

When Endurance IS The Victory

Sometimes people outside our experience toss Scripture at us who are suffering like confetti in a parade-as if we are heroes who only have yet to take the podium and declare the victory.

But what if  there IS no victory in this life for some of us?

What if there is only endurance–which is a sort of victory but one not highly valued?

Read the rest here:  What if My Testimony is Endurance?

And If Not, He’s Still God.

It’s a hard, hard lesson to learn.

It’s even harder to carry it like a precious burden in the bosom of your heart.  

Because while it is oh, so true, it does not take away the pain when circumstances just don’t change no matter how hard you pray, how long you endure or how much you wish they would.  

God’s ways are not my ways.  His thoughts are not my thoughts.  He is not required to fit into whatever box I wish to place Him.

I came to child loss with what I thought was a pretty good understanding of Scripture, of theology and of Who God is.

What I realized was that no matter how much HEAD knowledge I had, it was only HEART knowledge that could sustain me in the Valley of the Shadow of Death.

He [Christ] said not, ‘Thou shalt not be tempested, thou shalt not be trevailed, thou shalt not be dis-eased,’ but He said, ‘Thou shalt not be overcome.

•Julian of Norwich•

Some people live lives that make sense.  They connect the dots-even of the hard and tragic things-into a picture that looks like something. They emerge from the ashes like a phoenix, wings outspread in victory and rising to new heights.

Not me.  

I can’t figure out what God is doing with my life. 

I don’t feel victorious. 

Mostly I feel tired. 

But I am absolutely convinced that God loves me and that He is doing SOMETHING.  What that is and how He is doing it are hidden from me.

I don’t understand.

I can’t trace His hand.

But I trust His heart.  

If there is anywhere on earth a lover of God who is always kept safe, I know nothing of it, for it was not shown to me. But this was shown: that in falling and rising again we are always kept in that same precious love.

•Julian of Norwich•

gods stor doesnt end in ashes

One Day at a Time

A friend who is now battling a new challenge in addition to child loss posted this on her Facebook timeline:

You’re not going to master the rest of your life in one day.  Just relax. 

Master the day. 

Then just keep doing that every day.

I LOVE it!  And it reminded me of this quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson that has been on my refrigerator for years:  

Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities no doubt crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day. You shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.

Truth is, no matter how much we may TRY to live life in weeks or months or years, we really are only able to live it one day at a time.

And as Jesus said over 2000 years ago:  “Don’t worry at all then about tomorrow. Tomorrow can take care of itself! One day’s trouble is enough for one day.” (Matthew 6:34)

If I never knew it before, I know it now. 

I am good for a single 24 hour period-one revolution of the earth. 

That’s it.  

Sure I put stuff on my calendar.  I have to.  But I never take it for granted.  I never assume that what I think is going to happen next week really will happen next week.

I know better.  

And I’ve also learned there is absolutely NO use in worrying about what MIGHT happen.  Because worrying does not rob tomorrow of its problems, it only robs today of its joys.  

corrie-ten-boom-empties-today-of-strength

So I work each day to do THAT day.  I make it the most productive, most love-filled and life-giving day I can.  

I go to bed satisfied that I’ve done my best.  

Get up the next sunrise and do it again. 

One day at a time.

not going to master your life in one day

Anchoring Our Hearts In Christ: Faith That Endures

I don’t wish storms on anyone.

They are frightening, often life-shattering and terrible.

But nearly every heart will be battered by the waves of life eventually.

Illuminated Splash

And if a heart isn’t anchored firmly in the promises and Person of Jesus Christ, there’s no telling where the waves might toss them.

Even anchored, I’m battered and bruised, worn and weary, struggling to endure.

The book of Hebrews can be challenging.  It’s full of imagery intended to help early Jewish Christians understand that they no longer needed to cling to the old sacrificial system in addition to believing in Messiah.

But it’s also beautiful-because it weaves a tapestry that helps a heart see how God was working His plan of salvation all the way from Adam through Christ to us.

I love these verses:

16-20 Among men it is customary to swear by something greater than themselves. And if a statement is confirmed by an oath, that is the end of all quibbling. So in this matter, God, wishing to show beyond doubt that his plan was unchangeable, confirmed it with an oath. So that by two utterly immutable things, the word of God and the oath of God, who cannot lie, we who are refugees from this dying world might have a source of strength, and might grasp the hope that he holds out to us. This hope we hold as the utterly reliable anchor for our souls, fixed in the very certainty of God himself in Heaven, where Jesus has already entered on our behalf, having become, as we have seen, “High Priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek”.

Hebrews 6:18-20 PHILLIPS

The hope I have in Christ is an “utterly reliable anchor” for my soul!

Let the waves come! 

Let the winds blow! 

I am assured that nothing and no one can rip me from the ultimate safety of my Savior’s arms!

hope the anchor for your soul