Pierce the Dark.

We stood in church, Christmas Eve, holding our candles up to the heavens, our voices raised in unison, an old familiar hymn chorusing off our lips. I love those candle-light services, where our worship illuminates the dark.

His little hand was wrapped in a big, strong one, worn with years and wrinkles. His three-year old body standing on the chair; his grandpa propping him up from behind. Together, their fingers linked around the same candle, generations uniting, lifting worship and light as one.

I watched from afar, their faces glowing from the candle near. I wished for a camera, something to capture the moment, to measure eclipse. The vision stayed in my mind, those little hands covered in the larger ones, together bringing light, a heritage in the present.

My inward monologe began. I watched their legacy pierce the dark, and wondered where mine began.

My light, too, was a candle held high. Was a aria in the night. But what about my life, what about that light? Where did my life pierce the dark? Or, and, does it at all?

And the instant response came: Teaching. Without a doubt, without hesitation, this is where I pierce the dark. This is were my light burns. Brims. Brings flares and radiates in the dark. This is where my Christ-light is a bursting array of reds and yellows, oranges, crimson hues. This is where students lean in, where they ask questions, where they ponder responses. This is where my light flickers and catches spark. Where it ignites others, and emits strength.

And so, I am, I was, encouraged. Knowing my lit candle was burning, unabashedly. Knowing it was spreading flame. Knowing it was piercing the dark.

I looked back at the little boy, the old man. I looked at the heritage of faith being held there, amidst their hands, a candle in the night. As their amber light lingered on their lashes, I was thankful. For them. For me. For light. For the Christ-light. For it, me, we, as we pierce the dark.

Remind Me Who I Am.

This song spoke such truth to the hearts of my friends and I, listening to his voice melody over us at Andrew Peterson's Behold the Lamb concert. The only Truth we wear is that pronounced to us by the Lord. For it is Who I Am.

On C.S. Lewis.

My hand raised in abrupt frustration, mouth pursed and tense, sitting rigid in my seat. "Um, are we ever going to read the Bible?! Isn't this "Bible" class?!" I gnawed at my lip, smoldering in my desk.

Eleventh grade. Bible class. Ethics. Mr. Hoekstra. His student-teacher. Blue-grey carpet with creamed walls, desk lined inside. Books and texts and backpacks and pens strewn about.

Thus began my aversion to everything C.S. Lewis.

Oh, how many times have I heard, "C.S. Lewis says..." or "Well, C.S. Lewis..." or "According to C.S. Lewis..." or "I was reading C.S. Lewis...." Oh to hear the tone of my voice and inclination in my jaded reprieve; even sarcasm lacks the growl that vents into my words.

Then, to add insult to misery, even Taylor University set up The Center of Study for C.S. Lewis the year I graduated.

It seems everyone is fascinated, mesmerized, captivated, and enthralled at this Master. Like he alone is Aslan. And they are mortal readers, bowed at his feet, sucking from him their very lifeblood.

But I, stand alone, hedged against this mortared piling of essays of poems of books of quotes of writers of readers of film, of everything labeled, or every known to be touched by the mystic power of C.S. Lewis.

Then along came Jonathan Keenan and his handing over of Sheldon VanAuken's words penned in love story form, A Severe Mercy (link to blogpost). Only in this book, did I find myself peeking and peering in to this legacy of man with respect and honor and admiration and interest for the first time. Only in reading VanAuken's words did I dare quiver to turn the page, find more of their letters exchanged, script induced with profound yet so-simple language that I sat back often, perplexed with understanding, to mire through the understated and grapple with its applications. It was their relationship that opened the door to a mellowing of my soul. I was fascinated by their intimacy -- shared in pen -- and the intellectual depth that gave breadth to faith.

This past month, I was handed a second book, my own copies of Mere Christianity and The Screwtape Letters still as dust gathered on the shelf. Rachel (Mark's mom) lent me Through the Shadowlands and I mauled through it in one transcontinental flight from Seattle. Though written in prose, in factual and biographical style, its intricacy of detail further propelled the quelling of my brooding ostracism.

"You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call him Lord and God." (p58)

I again stirred. Liar and Lunatic, or Lover and Lord. C.S. Lewis. Perhaps, this man, this human born of flesh, remained of flesh, is one to be modeled after, crafted towards. Perhaps he was a prophet of his own right, regarded as the twentieth century instigator of intellectual faith, by merely his simplicity in complexion.

I comb through the pages, struck and stunned by his words shared in letters, regarded in speeches, broadcast in radiowaves, printed in pamphlets, and languaged in rows on shelves. His way is of ease, his life quarantined to the closest few. His faith, though, a source of friendship for those ruminated with questions for conversation.

And so here I find myself. Sitting too with C.S. Lewis. Pondering the complicated and the elementary. Asking him fusions of my own thoughts, a synthesis of questions and statements, remarks and rhetoric.

And wondering, if all my perceptions were a misnomer. If perhaps the jarring I felt, the onslaught of contempt, the banishment of his print, the scorn tied to his name, is all derived from.... truth. If instead, this man, this C.S. Lewis, and I would find ourselves at The Eagle and Child stewing and sharing and writing together, and forge a friendship on such behalf. If perhaps, C.S. Lewis is more of a great orator than I lended. If perhaps, he was just a man, used by the God-Man, to make heaven a little more understood to earth, and earth a little more accessed to heaven.

~~~~

Footmark from Trish:

There was once a 9 year old boy who was afraid he loved Aslan more than he loved Jesus. Here is CS Lewis' response:

"Tell Laurence from me, with my love," Lewis wrote in a detailed letter, "[He] can't really love Aslan more than Jesus, even if he feels that's what he is doing. For the things he loves Aslan for doing or saying are simply the things Jesus really did and said. So that when Laurence thinks he is loving Aslan, he is really loving Jesus: and perhaps loving Him more than he ever did before. I don't think he need be bothered at all. God knows all about the way a little boy's imagination works (He made it, after all)."

Automobile Angels.

Clunk, clunk, clunk. The churning slows and lurches at a sloth pace and I stare out the window, rain pelting against the shield and clouds dreary and casting over me. The solemn process plugs to a halt at the side of an off ramp and I sit back and sigh, sinking inside and slouching into the leather. Rain. A Sunday. "Christmas" day. A borrowed car. A gas-less engine.

Stupidity falls like shadows cast by clouds, as the brightened gage leaks orange at me. But I humph and decidedly shrug it off. Oh well. I'll figure it out, I tell myself, and slouch back a little more.

A beige Buick pulls up, speedily past me, nails the break, that backs into parallel-park position against me. He hops out and lets the rain dance around him as if natural unaffects him. I roll down my window to his fifty year old face, wrinkles and glasses not withholding optimism.

I laugh at myself, explain the situation, and with eagerness and apt energy, he says he'll be back in less than ten minutes, here's his card and number, and he has an extra gas tank in his trunk. Then, voila, as fast as he came, he disappeared into the Buick and into the rain.

Surely, ten minutes later he zooms past, yanks into park, and exits the car, mini red plastic gallon in hand. I offer to pay, for gas and his service, but he smiles. I ask if he's on his way to or from church, as he is dressed in navy slacks appears so, he responds "something like that" and refuses my second offer of cash. I ask if he simply looks to aid, working to help, remarking that he's an angel. He shrugs and says, "probably the ugliest angel you've ever seen" and finishes spilling the 3-odd dollars of petroleum into the tank. My dollars still protrude towards him from my hand. He says, "No, put it in the plate the next time you go to church. And if you don't go, then start." Then smiling and dutiful, he slips the cap on, rain dripping from the creases of his coat. I thank him overly again, and slip into the leather and let my thankful heart rise.

Roadside assistance. Some call insurance, some call family, some call their legs to walk to a station. But I call on angels. Automobile Angels.

I was sixteen. A late night scooping cones of Butter Pecan and Superman, and then driving "home" to Gun Lake, nearing 12:30 at night. Lights sped across the median, swishing side to side, approaching the cross street at with increased pace. Drunk, labeled, known. I lay on the breaks and wait for impact in the dark. He crushes the railing, bounces against my rear tire, and squeals to a stop fifty yards behind.

I'm trembling. Scared. Wondering. What will he do? I'm sixteen and alone. In the middle of fields. Under the cover of only night.

My fingers tremble at the keys, plugging numbers into the phone. "Mom, I just got hit. And I think he's drunk." The call no mother cares to hear.

I wait. Watching him beat his truck, kicking the tires and throw materials around. Darkness only protruded by our headlights. The stop sign still yards away. I wonder. Unmoved.

A Taurus, green and normal, pulls beside. She rolls down her window, a mom, perhaps. Nearing forty. She calls the cops. Says she'll stay until arrival, and for me not to get out of my car. I wait. Still watching the uproar behind.

He approaches my car. I squeak down the window an inch or two. Ask if he's drunk. Only six beers he says. I turn to steel and say nothing more.

My mom arrives, the cop arrives, my dad surveys the scene. My mother, in her robe, issues her anger "Don't you ever drink again!" while hugging my shoulder.

The cop makes him walk the line. He passes out on the side of the hood. My dad calls a wrecker.

I should have been dead. I should have been killed. Ten feet forward and he would have hit me face on, killed instantly. Ten feet back and he would have hit me front center again, bounced from the guardrail, killed dead. Done.

But I wasn't. Divine? But I looked for her, to thank her for her protection on this lone night. And she was gone. The mother in the Taurus. No where to be found. Seen by no one, but me. But she was there. Reigning protection over me.

I can't help but see angels. But wonder how they are near. But know their presence. But share their story, sought in me.

I-94. Connector of Chicago and Detroit. Five lanes of traffic, whizzing by. I join the race, like Fast Five, speed and swerving my companions. Pride my badge. Another wedding behind me. Then without warning, the thump, thump turns to thump, thump, thump, thump with fast, swirling motion speed. I know the sound. I recognize the beat of it in the car.

I find myself on a crowded five-lane highway, full with semis and traffic, void of off ramps or aid stations. Encompassed with field, brown stalks standing up, only cut by the slice of road I sit on. I get out, walk around, and see the damage. A flat. Sure enough. I refuse to learn to fix one. Even looking at it, I still do. Its a man's job. I am not a man. But I am a woman, alone on the side of the highway, with nothing to help in sight.

Hands on my hips, I lean back into my heels and wonder, peer around.

The cattails behind me shift. I turn to watch. From their overgrowth rises a man, full beard swallowing his mouth, eyes shining with cheerful anticipation. I let my perplextion go wayside and explain the dilemma. He grabs the spare from the trunk, and gets to work, jacking the little Cavalier up.

He works with sure hands, I chat at his side. We talk about church and faith and life and being believers. He tidies up the equipment and I shove a twenty toward him. He refuses. Says this is what believers do, and smiles. I try again, but find his confident, peaceful demeanor refuses my offering, blessing me instead.

I crawl back inside my car and start the engine. The man, I watch. He crawls back into the cattails and disappears, no other vehicle insight.

I shrug.

Wouldn't that just be God? Brining an automobile angel from the brush of cattails? Wouldn't that just be his protection, a woman waiting at midnight? Wouldn't that just be his mysterious way, sending a man in the rain?

I am awed by automobile angels. I am in wonder, in faith, in mystery. I am thankful, I am fulfilled, I am sharing, his provision over me.

The Friends I Keep.

The friends I keep leaves cars at houses. They give airport rides, they open their homes to me. They wake for 7:30 breakfast at Maries. The friends I keep clear calendars and mark moments. They bake muffins at morning. They crawl in bed for movies at night. The friends I keep text daily for love in Michigan living. They give big hugs at weddings, and gather with sisters even when they should eat. They share cars with hubbies, drive toggle-switch heaters, and work with refugees. The friends I keep discuss Jesus with art and work and the in-between. These are the friends I keep.

Thank you Laura, Jenny, Missy, Brandt, Don, Ryan, Bekah, Hannah, and Anne for being the friend I keep.

Death Doesn't Leave.

Morning begins with me sleeping in. With seeing eight o'clock on the stand next to my bed. Morning begins with a pot of decaf coffee, with Trader Joes pumpkin pancakes slathered with peanut butter and doused with suryp. Morning begins with me, thinking, lingering, hurting, wondering.

Mourning begins with the phone call. Mourning begins with the plans of that day. Mourning begins with the images of faces. Mourning begins with funeral plans to be made.

Mourning begins, but does it end?

A favorite author of mine, Ann Voskamp, writes oracles about life and grace and thanksgiving and love. But homily of her book prefaces her sisters death: a slow motion of events, years before the her stories take place, as if a way of setting the stage for all else she knows.

I hear the same prelude in my voice, beginning or finishing half my sentences with "before my mom died" as if all identity is locked in that one moment, that one defining phrase, that one clinching statement. As if life existed before, and then since. But something in the pattern of it, the knowing of it, changed during the hinge.

And I wonder, does mourning end? Morning turns to day, turns to night, turns to faithfulness renewed (Lamentations 3:22-24). But mourning lingers on like wanton toddler, dragging from its mothers cloak.

I feel it in my chest; I know it in my heart. It is in the depletion of energy, the quickness of anger, the rushed tears. Its the unidentified slump, the fog clouded brain, the pushing to perservere. My desire to embrace every day, to live like summer sun, collides with this strain and I cannot figure out how to make it go away. Death has become a part of me. It lingers on. it doesn't leave. I don't understand. I want to be the woman I once was. The energy I once knew. The advocate I once became.

But now, I feel those in glimpses, instead of patterns. The weight of mourning a sheeth over renewal. Desire gives way to apathy, and I look for a place to hide. I used to protest social justice, design programs to recycle, be excessive in class instruction, and advocate fair trade. But my heart nows gives way to survival, my endurance exasperated by the midpoint of day.

I wish I could be those things again. I wish I could see that power in me. But death and trial and teaching, has knocked it all out of me.

Morning turns to day. Winter turns to spring. Loss turned to living. But death's sting doesn't leave.

Thankful.

This Thanksgiving I am thankful. I am thankful for a warm house to be welcomed into, with Italian pie baking fresh in the oven and hugs awaiting. I am thankful for a boyfriend who picked me up and drove me all over, and let me rest and relax against him. I am thankful for car-ride games and colored turkeys and little notes left. I am thankful for family gathered around two big tables, and for all the hands who served and held there. I am thankful for old uncles who chatter and gravy poured over dressing. I am thankful for omelets prepared, tea bought, books discussed, pies displayed.

I am thankful for Friday mornings in the kitchen. For Mark's mom who went and printed out recipes, bought Gladware, and purchased ingredients. For our aprons tied around and our men at the table. I am thankful for flour spilled and oats strewn and mixing soda and powder. I am thankful for heart-filled conversation and words shared and raisins stirred in. I am thankful for ESPN on male laptops and M&Ms pressed to pretzel. I am thankful for a mom to hug and laughter at my side and Mark and Jerry across.

I am thankful for what was made in that kitchen. For oatmeal raisin cookies and pretzels kissed with Hershey's. For the communion and connection of women, of family, of home, of love. For that, truly, is what was made in that kitchen.

And I am thankful.

Allow Joy.

In the last few years, I have seen scars and hurt and reoccurring disappointment. The relationships I thought were covenanted, the pieces of life I thought promised, the hopes I thought secure lie aimlessly or wasted or piled like torn rags.

I prepared myself for hardship, talked my way out of dreaming, and learned to struggle well through trial. It seemed the purpose, the climate of the places I found myself in.

So joy became a small antidote to captured through little things -- pretty napkins,colored jewelry, a great dress, a cup of Starbucks. Joy became "choosing to see" the Lord in tiny collections, like Hansen and Gretel, filing my cup with good along the way.

But now, I find myself peering out of this wall of protection built around my heart. The wall purposefully created to hold back dreams, tie down balloons, and section off sunsets. It was a barrier between wanting to much, a barrier set up between me and hope, to take away the pain of the present.

But now as I peer around the wall and want to hope for more, want to choose to see the greater of good in the broader perspective, I find myself cumbersomed with fear. Fear that I'll get caught up in the hope, and it will be squashed. That I'll find my way to fullness, and it will be squandered. That I'll allow myself to care, to dream, to believe in his promise for "good things" and they will be stolen, taken, or different than I dream.

About six months ago, the Lord impressed upon me the term "allow joy," trying to teach me to allow and see these good things he's providing as the good that they are. To not take them hesitantly, in fear of what could be behind, as if God were tricking me or setting me up for disappointment too, but to allow my heart and self to embrace them fully, completely, as whole.

The whole world changed. Everything in my perspective seemed to loosen and relax, and create this beautiful life that I felt the Lord was giving me, and I was receiving. It was a time of such glory, such goodness, such relief. I felt the restoration of what was taken, and in tune, learned to embrace.

I'm in another season of looking, peering. Wanting to wish and hope and dream. To create images and imagine a good life, granted to me. Yet tangled in that, is the fear, that it will be taken. That I'll hope and dream, and find the balloons once again, pierced.

That hope will lead instead to hardship, that fulfillment will find failure, and that my heart will once again learn trial instead of grace.

I want to dream big dreams. To allow flourish. To reap harvest. To find myself surrounded in a life where the richness of God touches every piece.

To crack the wall of protection.

I want to live a life that allows joy. That accepts joy, fully and without hesitation. Without fear. Without being cautiously jaded, looking around the corner for the hurt or anger or squashing of dreams to come.

I want to life a life that captures goodness in the little things, the small graces along the way. Yet also receives the richness of God's good gifts in their vast potential. Unhindered. Accepting them as they were meant to be given.

~~

A question to follow: How does one [you] allow joy and dream big dreams, while still keeping yourself pined down to the reality of living today? While staying focused on the present and not trying to run ahead and make or plan a future?

Honor Our Limitations.

"If we are to live our lives fully and well, we must learn to embrace the opposites, to live in a creative tension between our limits and our potentials. We must honor our limitations in ways that do not distort our nature, and we must trust and use our gifts in ways that fulfill the potentials God gave us."

~Let Your Life Speak, Parker Palmer, p55

Thanks, Heidi, for the quote above.

I Need Time.

I need more days off than one. I need time to recover from the energy put out in the week. Time to breathe, time to think, time to pray. Time to scratch out my to-do list, or even to create it. Time to unpack from the clothing mess scattered still from the weekend. Time to buy the Christmas gift, to order the book, to wash the sink, to bag the groceries. I need time to write the email, to post the pics, to launder the sheets.

How do women do it? I feel like such a failure... I can't do it all. I need time...

The Sheep I Keep.

His chin quivered. He sat on the edge of the desk, his cowboy boots dangling and his black Stetson set aside. He had come for me, early in the morning, and I wasn't to be found. Now, he was granted permission to stay and be havened in my room.

His eyes fought back tears. Red glistened behind lashes, voice low and solemn. Letter from his girlfriend he unfolded for me, picture of his truck, stories of his heart.

But his words couldn't contain his brokeness. His defeat. His heartbreak. Moving. Kicked out. Boxes packed. Shipped off to dad, hours away because of a fight with mom. Homeless, unwanted, lost. His form held defeat and I watched him crumble.

My students come in every day with stories. The girl sleeping on a gym floor because her family walked out. The child mourning the loss that broke her family three years before. The two juniors scared yesterday, after feeling deep, spiritual conviction about their seance with a Ouija board. Their scripts remind me of the human behind the faces.

The football player stands at my desk, fighting back fear as liquid wells in his eyes, the fear of the grade going home to mom. The tall man in gray raises his hands, his immigrant story of Russia, English still not spoken at home. The darling in the middle row, notes handing in, regarding her cancer years before. A child out with mono, the brother dead of disease, the question regarding heaven, these are the least of these.

Their humanness beckons me. Their brokeness seeking my strength. These are the souls of those in my classroom. These are the sheep I keep.

Morning Minutes.

Sunday morning stretch. 8:20am. My limbs gathered under a light, white blanket, a single bed in the corner. Another still neatly tucked, quarantined on the other side of the room. There were single bookshelves behind each, with a bright bay window bringing morning in between. Books spread across the desk at the base of the window, with my laptop and materials and lesson books spread about. My frame faced the closet, opposite the window and shelves, holding my barest of materials, just what I could pack for three months in the Philippines. A few dresses, a couple of shorts, bathing suit, and teaching shoes squished into that green bag.

Morning was welcome. I yawned, smiled, and pulled the phone in my room over. Resting, waiting.

Ringing.

My smile broaded, my delight full and sleepyness faded.

"Good morning!"

"Good evening!"

My mom and I exchanged our twelve hour differences, marking our phone date and finding ourselves being loved on the Sabbath. Her voice was familiar, home, my mom.

We talked for a bit, chatting about this and that... My weekend adventures, excursions to places like Pajasan Falls or Mt. Tall or the markets flowing down the streets. Or dental missions under tents and percieving squatter villages and talking with my students. We chatted easily, aimlessly. She updated me on fall, the colors and sites and sounds of Michigan harvested under the aumtumn leaves. To family gathered by the fire and roasting dinner and sharing love at the hearth. We exchanged our stories, hours and airplane rides apart, as if Sunday morning and evening were instead met as one.

She ended with a steady voice, and I could hear her love pouring through, her ways of thinking dotting the words. "Christina, I love you and you are worth every penny. But I got my phone bill this month and our calls this month [two calls, about 20 minutes each] were five hundred one Sunday and six hundred dollars the other. You're worth every penny, and I'll call you again, but maybe we'll have consider keeping our calls a little bit shorter."

I gasped, but quietly and perceptively, hearing her words and heart and knowing, she really wasn't concerned about the eleven hundred dollars she had just spent. There was so much love in that motion.

We ended in conclusion, me recommending her to calling about the minutes and lighten the load [which worked, and minimized the bills], but me also feeling and knowing the tenderness of our love, the importance of our connection, the relationship beyond price.

This was my mother. This was her love. This was our miles. This was my morning minutes.

Stitches Sewn Into Scar.

It's writers club tonight. And I am out of writing. I am learning things about myself, and about myself as a writer. If I am not in the Word, or reading a book, I am lacking. I have nothing to write about. There are no thoughts, little movement of what the Spirit is teaching me.

So instead, I sit here in my own self-perception... trying to find or dig up something to think about, something to write about...

There was a book on grief, on art; tonight I recall it, a warning against dwelling in the dark, the night, to write, to art. Its words trickled back to me, a reminder as I read back tonight through old things I had written, but never "published." Stored away in private safe keeping, locked underneath the "Documents" file, subtly forgotten.

And what I found there, was pain. Agony. Cursing anger. Deep, the darkest of wounds, bleeding reds so rich and scarlet that stains seemed to reveal against the ink of paper. I found so much hurt, gnarled grief, bitter anger... I stopped. Closed the files and stored them again with quick closer. Those first two years, especially that middle year of the two drew more memory than I would ever desire to recover. Even 1% of it. I am surprised, but ever-so-thankful, at how much I have removed, the Lord has removed, from my mind and heart... like a suture...

Like time restored.

And I remember, am reminded, of how much I am thankful. Thankful that the Lord created Charlotte as my cacoon. That the Lord has created in me a new heart. That the Lord has freed me of the wounds the memories, running so deep, now stitches sewn into scar.

And so I am thankful, for the reminder of the words of the book, remarking that digging up dark places for writing for the art is tender, is to avoid.

So instead, I sit here and write, thankful. Thankful that that tenderness is there, yet so is claim over time and heart and mind and memory. That scar remains, yet scab and scarlet soothed away. Thankful that time works like restoration, like love in the remains.

Like Woven Shawls.

Charles Martin in the book The Dead Don’t Dance wrote about a journal being the places where one is most vulnerable. The deepest place of the being, of the soul. He writes about it being the only ear that will listen and hear.

My writing is very much like that. The deepest places in me, of my soul. It is the darkest and most vulnerable. It is the places that shed the most light into the greatest of me. It is the beautiful imagery of words that God produces in my spirit and weaves in to sentences like a loom. It is the beginning of a sentence that he gives me, the initial lines that starts out my prose. It is the nakedest place I can become. All clothes hidden and the skin revealed. Sometimes soft and smooth like woven shawls around myself; sometimes coarse and cutting like the hurt pained within. My writing is most delicate place I know. It is the places I am most profound and most proud of. The ones I wish everyone could read and know. And the ones I am most embarrassed of and most hidden from. Where I wish and hope the lines are never known or discovered.

~ Written December 6, 2008

A Praying Life.

The Power of a Praying Wife. A Praying Friend. A Praying Parent. A Praying Church. A Praying Life.

There are books in a series, or written by another hand, that correspond with the same lingo, the same emotion, the same distinction: The Power of Praying.

This past summer, Trish and I read A Praying Life, by Paul E. Miller. More than all the thoughts, quotes, stories, and scriptures, the book was a reminder to me of the power of prayer. The purpose of prayer. The necessity of prayer.

And then with the words, the Truth, the conviction, came the simple ability to have eyes to see... prayer. To peel away the layers of self-dependence and independence and coincidence and futility of myself, and see prayer be present.

To see God hold back a Saturday storm while our boat rocked and our skin tanned. To see God issue parking spaces by Belk while Mark drove in circles. To see God provide a Prayer Chair with money banked to me that very week. To have December weekends filled, a Handyman in my front yard, nights of sleep fulfilled, and Inklings in the corner.

I have seen the Power of Prayer. In small ways, in big ways, in miracle ways. I have seen my prayer muscles strengthened and built, muscles flexed like the Stockbridge Boiler Room, or daily divine like Son-Life Camp, or intimate like Mexico missions. But I have also seen them loose and lackadaisical, like the last week or two.

This morning as I sit here and am reminded to pray. Am reminded of the purpose and presence and power of... a praying life.

Simply Thankful.

I am simply thankful, for mornings like these where I snuggle beneath blankets and tea and sit with the Lord and rest and be.

I am simply thankful, for nights like the last, where our friends come and collect with pizza or coffee or dressed for Halloween. Where Marks house fills with their laughter, and our talk, and the sport on TV. Where we fellowship and mingle and I simply can't help but look around, and be simply thankful.

I am simply thankful, for cell phones and friends. For calls from Mark and texts from Trish and pictures from Kelsey. For that connection to community that crosses miles or context.

I am simply thankful, for students who make me laugh, who bring me McDonalds, who tell stories, who are Country.

I am simply thankful, for the accessibility to The Word. To it on my iphone, or in my prayer chair, or cupped in my hand. For its easy application, its strength, its encouragement, its ability to deliver hope and light and peace and Truth.

I am simply thankful, for childish moments at the circus and movies like Footloose.

I am simply thankful, for Mark's mom who studies the Truth. And his family that loves Jesus and the fact that mine does too.

I am simply thankful, for my mantle softly spoken. Poked with flowers up from vases and the ceramics of Aunt Ruth.

I am simply thankful, for Trish and Linds and bread baskets too. For their thoughts on Wednesday, and the reminder to be: Simply Thankful.

Weekends Are For...

Weekends are for...

Giddiness.

And Girlyness

And Dangling Curls

And Dresses.

For wine.

Toasted to salmon

And partnered with veal.

And small corner booths

And lighting kept low.

For beignets.

Doused cinnamon

Dapped in glaze

And cripsed into coffee ice cream.

For dessert melting

And Mark melting

And me melting.

And us.

Weekends are for

Quiet mornings

And fences

And neighbors.

For smiles with Tate

And sarcasm with Sam and Wes.

For watching my backyard

Gather neighbors

And gift home.

Weekends are for Gardens

And hoping

And roaming

And dreaming.

For peaceful, delight, love;

That intimate place.

Weekends are for

Mornings that linger with coffee

Kitchens that sparkle with clean

Services that fill with worship

And the man that holds my hand.

Make Plans.

"I don't want to 'not make plans with you' -- I want to make plans with you."

~ Declan, in Leap Year.

I posted this quote May 15, 2011 on my original blog; rarely allowing rom-com quotes. But, it fit. And for some reason it has resolved to stay in my mind... So alas, I cave and let it be shared and posted again.

Boots and Bras: I Dig Holes.

One of my dad's favorite things about my mom was that she would work in the yard or put on waiters for the dock or drive trucks during the day, but at night put on a long black fur coat or yellow silk skirt or diamond flower ring and dine in the most expensive restaurants. She was a woman, in all senses of the word - tough and strong and courageous and sensitive and nurturing and genteel.

I was raised that way. I was raised to cut six acres of grass, two ways so it was checkered in the end; to scrub algae off boat lifts; to drive quads and stick shifts and snowmobiles and Sea Doos.

I don't blink at eye at grabbing the shovel, I own my own tool kit (its pink!) and level, and have an assortment of tasks I am able and willing to do around the house. (Though admittidly, I won't touch worns or fish, won't even aim at skeet, and have no idea how to change a tire.)

I'm tough and rough and dirty and proud of it. I planted my flowers, used a powerwasher, stood on a ladder, pounded my nails, and worked at my place. It's love, working the hours and heart at home.

I dug holes today, two feet deep in red clay. Went to Home Depot Saturday twice and once today, and Lowes four times over the weekend too. I walked around with a tape measure in my purse, bought supplies, and screwed hinges. I can tell you the difference between vinyl and wood and lattice and bushes and blinds and every other type of concoction one could come up with for privacy in my backyard.

I worked in hiking capris and brown hiking boots, with flowers decorating my top. A ponytail of curls, with pearls, and leather gardener gloves with a red shovel in my hand. I like it -- the feeling of adventure; the grinding of the dirt, the knowing it's mine, the risk in figuring it out.

Today, I wear boots and bras. Today, I dig holes.

Life at Porter Ridge.

A few pics of life at school...

My first block class -- US History Honors. Love them!

One girl brings me an egg mcmuffin at least twice a week! :)

Every year, J.D. Lawson brings his Vietnam helicopter.

Presentations on the Reform movements.

Encouraging college applications (go USC!) as well as friendships. :)

Friday night lights.

ROTC.

Interact kids at Walter Bickett Elementary school delivering Christmas gifts.

Special Olympics. Interact kids run the county-wide event at our school.

Band performances.

And yes, teaching....

Surrender Your Reputation.

The greatest advice I ever received as a teacher was: "When you surrender your life to Christ, you also surrender your reputation." It was from my supervising teacher at Eastbrook Public High School, Roberta Kroll. We were talking about our jobs and the professional and the pressure to be the "cool" teacher and the implications that has on ones relationship with ones students as well as the work one does in the classroom. And her words struck me, freed me, and desperately stuck with me.

I forgot about them the last couple of weeks, but was reminded tonight when I was thinking over the day. I stepped down from several of my leadership responsibilities with Interact today. And in doing so, I surrendered some of the perceptions of me. I allowed others to see my breaking point, to label my failure, to mark my limits. But I also allowed myself to be finite. To stop and rest. To reconfigure what is important. To do less, well. And mark my purpose in the classroom.

My job is to educate. To love on kids. To be available to them. To listen to their stories and share in their exclamations and hold their tears. To hear the girl yesterday crying about the death of her mom, three years ago this weekend. To listen to the boy who dreams of the girl a year his senior. To congratulate the sixteen year old on her birthday. To cheer with the coaches at the football game. My job is to open their minds, to ask them to go farther, to push them, teach them, to think.

This is why I'm there. This is why I am called.

So today, I fell back on wisdom from a sage teacher. I surrendered my life to Christ again, by surrendering my reputation. I backed away from Interact, from the craziness of meetings and questions and emails and receipts and purchase orders and politics. To step aside from the pressures, the complications, the craziness. And to instead, be finite, but infinitely called. Called to Christ. To my classroom.

~

Just an additional note: Yesterday, after the day wound down and students were dispersed among homes and friends and families, I felt at rest in my classroom for the first time this year. This my friends, is a blessing, a relief, an affirmation. Thank you Lord, for giving me a place there and redeeming its purposes with you in this day.

Real Mail.

Trish would say, "Did you pray for that?"

And again, I would answer "Yes."

To anyone who knows me, this post does not come as unusual. You know I am obsessed with mail. Yes: mail, mail, mail. Snail mail. The kind that comes with frabic paper, or imprinted symbols, or textured letters. The envelopes with return addresses or Halmark seals or out-of-state postmarks. The scrawlings of real penmanship, friendship words, heart in script. Mail. Real mail.

I got home today, and walked to the pile of mail on the counter. It was 9:50pm and I left the house at 6:41am. And the mail gleaned at me. I literally prayed, "Please Lord, let there be some encouragement in this."

And surely, a card from my friend Amy brought such relief and love to the day. The cover portrays a young girl pursing for lipstick, dressed like the 195s0s Hollywood star; captivating. But inside, all the more, were her words of encouragement and giftings over me. I want to hug it and sleep with it held to my chest.

Today, I prayed for encouragement. Today I prayed for it in mail. Today, the Postman heard my cry.

~~~

P.S. Thanks to everyone who sends me mail. You make my day! :)

Stories Worn Like Songs.

I dressed tonight for my Women's Ministry meeting, carefully eyeing over my thoughts of pink and pastel and feeling beautiful and feminine. From my closet I pulled a precious sweater, ivory buttons sewed into soft cloth, a fabric bouquet of pink floral at the chest. But then I swirled over to my jewelry orchestra, a display of stories worn like songs. And tonight I wore:

~ Pearls. Because I'm a Southern women, a feminine aristocrat at times. Donning dresses and and pearls and breathing in air like a women of the South, a longing to feel the belle of the antebellum.

~ Cuffed wristlet engraved with "Put On Love," given to me after my story was shared to through the women's ministry a few weeks ago. It already has a special place in my heart.

~ Silver watch. Bought with Mark's mom our first shopping day. A day of special memories laughter, and Charming Charlies. Being girly, giggling, and loved.

~ Pink ring. I only wear it on days that matter. On moments I want to remember, need to capture, or desire to embrace. Its the first thing I bought after my mom died. From my sister. Its presence reminds me of that time, of those days, of her. It feels like such a special gift, precious treasure.

I love that the adornment is an art, sharing stories worn like songs.

Inklings in the Corner.

Laughing in the corner booth, rounded granite centered by leathered green chairs. Wine resting beside me, blog in front of me, and low-lit lamp hovering over me.

Trish sips peppermint tea while lingering over her sketching journal, colour pencils resting at her reach and thoughts pouring like intricate work from her hand. She is pensive, quiet, but rested and real. Her true self.

Deb sits across from me, stirring her lemoned water with a straw, then swirling Merlot and enscripting words and thoughts onto her peacock journal, the pages like fabric, textured thick. Her words come in pulse, a mixed of rushed squiggles broken like breathes by the sipping of water or wine.

We are The Inklings.

C.S. Lewis, JRR Tolkien, and other Oxford Associates coined the phrase. A group of writers, philosophers, thinkers, critiquers, kindred spirits, they met Thursday evenings in Lewis' dorm, and Tuesdays midday for decades to follow at The Eagle and the Child in a corner dulled by pub light and puffed with circles of tobacco, embracing the minds of the analytical and imaginative genius'. They drunk beer and discussed ideas and knit camaraderie and penned prose in that little pub corner, creating works such as Lord of the Rings and Out of the Silent Planet, criticism and encouragement given alike.

I feel a little bit like this, cornered at Nova's Bakery or Amelies or Smelly Cat or Crisp. My coffee or wine sipped slowly and my eyes slitted with thought, my hands plucking at keys. Trish and Deb lean forward and backward, an exchange of scrawling across papers. We smile, relax, write. Then we converse, commune, care. For we are philosophers, kindred spirits, careful writers, crafters at work. We are The Inklings.

~~~~

I found an old blog post, and wanted to hear Trish say in reflection to it: Did You Pray For That? Because, yes, my Inkling friends, I did.... And he heard:

TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 2009

Inklings.

I've been reading and drinking in Sheldon VanAuken's book, A Severe Mercy, and this afternoon, and craving the beauty of his pen pal relationship with C.S. Lewis, writing each other letters of deep self and thought, though they had never met, and keeping each other then, persistent in prayer. The character of C.S. Lewis comes through and is astounding to me, as it was to VanAuken, as he is a busy professor and acclaimed writer already at that point, mirrored and quoted by numerous theologians as the most influential contemporary of the time. But yet, Lewis writes these incredible, almost in a romantic sense, poetic narratives to VanAuken, offering open discourse regarding the Christian faith, or furthermore, the essence of belief. It is beautiful, the display of discovery woven through an intellectual literaturistic style in these letters.

As the book sat coddled on my chest, myself wrapped in blankets and nuzzled in this cold, wet afternoon with tea, admiration and desire wells with in me for friendships as such. To sit with Lewis' companions, the Inklings, and discuss theology and terms amongst a stirring glass of wine or simmering tea. Or to read such personal,provocative, and honest letters regarding the search for belief and faith from another.

There are some where I have this now, this stirring shared through in qualms by email or blog space, but a returned desire for the essence of this intellectual, bookish, theological community is awakened and drawn. It begins with Lewis and VanAuken and a realism in pen pals, and comes to fruition in what clever antidotes I can conjure up in my daily communities.

Let God Use Me.

He's teaching me. Breaking me. Bending me. Molding me. He's teaching me, to surrender.

He's teaching me, to let God use me.

I lay in bed, the ten o'clock hour well-past, and my mind settled and nested like the form underneath the covers in the quiet of night. She had asked, twice. They had asked, twice...

Yet I was... seeing my schedule, marking my time, watching my energy, protecting my heart, concerned for others.

Yet, He was speaking to me.

They had asked me to share. To share of my life-blood, my soul, my heart. To allow others to view-in, perceive my experience, my heartbreak, my vulnerability, from afar.

I wasn't ready. I wasn't perfect. I wasn't rehearsed. I wasn't over it.

But they were asking.

I said "No." But God said "Yes."

I lay there, in my darkened room, wrestling with His desire from me. Working through heartache, data, story.

I wasn't able. But He was. And he was asking my heart, to be willing. Willing to let God use me.

So I surrendered. Heart, soul, experience, life. The personal, the intimate, the loss, the hurt. As much, in bits and pieces, that was required, or asked, or pursued, or needed, or desired.

I surrendered. Video-taped the story, released the emotions, gave of myself. And let 250 women in. To me.

Because I desired, to Let God Use Me.

Neat of Tornado.

My day:

Splattered papers, students staring, mind scrambled.

Its ironic that coffee spilled all over my desk...

Just to add metaphor to the distress in my head...

At least I'm ending it,

Trying to make neat of tornado

At Crisp.

Life Is Wrinkled.

If everything stayed packaged from the dry cleaners, or ironed crisp from Grandma, it would be perfect. But, instead, it gets wrinkled. It gets life.

It gets hot sunny days with my niece on my lap. It gets cold autumn nights with Mark pressed beside. It gets Thursdays downtown Holland, boating days at Barlow, quads on the Ponderosa. It gets long walks amongst Pikes Place, trekking in Colorado, tea days in Indy. It gets movie nights at home, craziness in the classroom, community at church. It gets parties with friends and dancing galore. It gets Saturdays sunny, with USC scoring. It gets vacations in Spain and caring in Kenya. It gets morning at my table.

Nothing worth wearing stays packaged from the dry cleaners, or ironed crisp from Grandma. No life worth living stays pressed and crisp and lined and perfect.

A life worth living is wrinkled. It's full of the joy and and exasperation of every day living: It's full of squishy hugs from friends and curling up on couches. It's full of conversations that explode and hearts that implode. It's full of lingering and laughter, pensive and pursuing. It's full of spots and stains, jarring and jaded. It's full of release and rest, bliss and being. It's full of adventure and awe, compassion and character. It's full of all the moments motioned against the fabric that makes it... life.

Life is wrinkled. Wear it well.

Now They Know.

I strolled through the slender passageway, overgrown with trees and shrubs, a galley of greenery connecting the park to church. My head and heart felt it: the last Sunday I could hide. The last Sunday I could walk around the people, duck through the grounds, or peer like a peaking child amongst people. It was the last Sunday I would be, could be, anonymous.

Because after this, I would be known.

After tonight (Tuesday), they would know my story.

They would see me across the atrium and think: That's her: that's the girl who lost her mom. And forever I will be labeled that way. From here on, those who faces I don't know, will know mine. And they will know a slice of my story.

There is a great act of vulnerability that comes in that. A great surrender. A great giving of the private, inward self that allows the tenderist of moments to be exposed, the weakest of emotions to be revealed, the rawest memories to be disclosed.

I watched the large screen show my face as tears welled and poured over from my eyes, emotions seeping through. His words of surrender to me, "[Be willing to] Let God use you," were placed as a seal on my heart.

I could hear their weeping, some louder than mine. Feel Trish's hand clasping my fingers and Kara's warmth on my back. And I knew the weight of their emotions, the cognitive pairing of the woman on the screen and me.

And I thought, "Now they know."

Now they know a piece of my story. Now they know the deepest of worlds. Now they know...

Me.

And though feeling embarrassingly exposed,

I also felt freed.

Loved and known and hugged and accepted,

But now a with a more fuller love

Because now they know

Me.

On Holy Ground.

"We're standing on holy ground..." The chorus reminisced through my mind all night, hearing the slow beat of an old piano and voices gathering within ancient doors. "We're standing on hoy ground..." The sound of the old hymn bringing me to ages past.

And present. As I looked around, I saw the toppings of a female meal: daisies basketed and sunflowers sprouting. Mason and ball jars overflowing with feathering flowers and peanuts alike. Checkered table clothes and denim fabric. Bandanas tied and sweet tea poured. Candles enchanting and music playing. The Women's Event: Fall Kick Off.

Surrounded by all the necessary "frills" of the event, the entire gathering space was mesmerizing. But it was more than that. I stood next to a woman who seemed lost, looking for a table to belong, and asked her how I could assist. She simply said, "I'm okay. I don't know where to go, but this is a safe place." A safe place. Could a woman's event ask for more of a compliment than that? A safe place.

And yet, I still say yes. Because I still hear the hymn. Because beyond the places set with bows tied and devotionals placed, I heard voices. I heard women worshipping. I saw hands raised. I watched hugs exchanged, tears cried, hearts opened, testimonies given. I stood, on Holy Ground.

A woman's event is so much more than a woman's event; it's holy ground.

And tonight, I stood on Holy Ground.

Weekends Are For...

Rest.

Faith.

World Vision,

Embraced family friend.

Coming Home.

Mark.

Bon Fires.

Smoky stares.

Laughing; Mick.

Bed.

Friends.

Morning Mist.

Amelies.

Permission from friend.

Being alone.

Winsome Uptown.

Streets.

Strolling.

Quiet.

Me.

Rain.

Running.

Running in Rain.

Laughing.

Laughing while

Running in Rain.

Rest.

Sleep.

Afternoon TV.

Dinner.

Dates.

Dresses.

Mark.

Merlot.

Salmon.

Sleeping.

Doe-eyed.

Morning.

Making Bread.

Sipping

Solitude.

Rest.

Me.

Tea With My Mom.

I need to have tea with my mom. To sit with her, hear wisdom, perspective, and linger. To feel that sense of love and belonging that is only felt within the safety of her space.

I remember a day in March, two and a half years ago. It was the only day, the only time, I can remember doing this. I was so exhausted from teaching, so worn out from life, that I drove after school straight to her Victorian farmhouse home. She walked around the counter, saw me at the door, wiped her hands on her apron, and hugged me. Surprised to see me, it being four in the afternoon, she knew my heart and head were full, tousled.

So she stopped her baking and cooking. Set aside her recipes, her plans, her day, and stood still with me. We stayed in the kitchen for a few minutes. Me, trying to act like everything was fine. But her, knowing to read between the lines of my face and words. And then, she suggested we have tea.

So two cups were stirred, rich tea steaming out the pot, strings like dainty delicacy down the side. And she looked at me, led me to the porch, and I knew she felt my heart, and that I just needed to sit.

The porch was yellow. Sunshine yellow. With big floral patterns in spaces, brown wicker with overstuffed cushions, bright colored settings, and the Front Porches coffee table book I had bought for her a year before. Tea pots hung like lanterns from the walls, birdhouses to be exact, and the new, yet worn cabinet chested cups and saucers and petals and papers.

She settled in across from me, and sighed in her listening, contented, mother-like sound. And waited.

I wanted to act like everything was fine. I wanted to keep it all pulled together. To look and appear perfect and whole. But she knew more. She knew I wouldn't have come here if I wasn't in need of her. If I didn't desire for that mother-heart of hers. That love, that nurture. That holding of me.

And so I started, "I just can't do it all... I'm just so tired inside..." I began to cry, feeling the weight of my heart, and then in guilt began again, "I know people have harder lives than me... I know people are dying today, starving, or raising children on their own..."

I don't remember the rest of this conversation. I just remember her loving me and knowing me and caring about me. But I do I remember one thing she said, one thing that I have held on to. "It's okay. It's okay to feel sad today. Yes, people are dying of disease in Africa. Yes, people are getting divorced and hurting. But that doesn't change that today, you just feel sad and you just feel bad. It's okay."

It was the first time I had ever heard her say that, ever felt her let me be okay with hurting. Ever let me crumble without being strong. But I remember it, I remember the gift of that.

And I remember this day, this tea with mom. This place of rest and safety and love. This place where she walks around corners and smiles, and wipes her apron and sighs, and hugs and bakes and lets me be. This place where I am me, and I am loved, and I am having tea with my mom.

The Chase.

From my original blog, June 24, 2011. I need to hear it again... Maybe you do too...

~~~

Phone call to make. Email to return. Text to write. Vacation to plan. Food to prepare. Dress to buy. Weekday dinner. Game night. Worship venue. Coffee date. Football score. Road trip. Book Club. Dance party. Family outing. Tuesday study. World news. Facebook invite. Cute guy. Church women. Breakfast fare.

Running. Chasing.

Torn piece to piece, in pieces. Life scattered. Segmented. Pulled. Lured. Drawn.

We're like threads on a net, the end caught to unravel, slipping away at grasp, maintaining no hold because of its lucrative power to seduce and secure so many directions.

I dial cell phone. I scan Facebook. I scour email. I propose text. I schedule plans.

All to which purpose, to which end?

These things, hoping and aiming to connect me to so many, instead pull me away. Because the directions all yank so severely that I am everywhere and no where, with everyone and no one, all at the same time. I chase.

I run the race, tangle in the vines.

Caught by good things, great parties, glad conversations. Nonethless, still caught.

He has called me to run this race for Him. To keep His heart, my focus. His pleadings, my will. His dictation, my life. His hope, my freedom.

"Throw off everything that hinders" Hebrews 12:1 states, petitioning me to take note and grapple.

Perhaps, what hinders, are good things. Good relationships, good events, good plans. But so much good causes little fulfillment in distraction.

I chase toward Him, yet divert my eyes and awareness as billboards like post-it notes line my path: text back, align time, check calendar, make room, purchase item. My eyes, my schedule, my thoughts distract my heart.

So perhaps there is a place where the chase becomes a pursual of so much good, it returns bad. And then the chase isn't really a chase at all, it's a repetitious swerve, jumping this way and that to end no where at all.

A few months ago, I started a new mantra: "Say no to good things." Because I found myself overbooked and unaware and empty of God as I tried to seek Him and others through so many avenues. So I had to learn, to reteach, to say no. To block time and place and space to simply be. That being, then, instead becomes the greater Chase. The chase towards Him.

Thankful for Perspective.

I am thankful for the perspective gained today from my classroom. From discussions on modern slavery. And gaining, again, the passion against injustice. The eyes for beyond me.

I am thankful for perspective. As I am caught up in planning the perfect day, or composing the most captivating lesson, or being the most intimate of friends....

I am given instead, perspective. That people live in poverty. That people live chained. That people lived lonely. That people live so much different, so much harder, so much more involved, than me.

I am thankful for perspective. To take me out of my box. Out of my emotions. Out of my world. And see more. See His world. His heartbeat. His care. His people. To see more than me. To see Him; We.

Today, I am thankful for perspective.

Agents of Change.

Agents of Change: Perspective in the Battle; Perspective in the Classroom; Perspective in the World.

We sat in a circle. All 34 of us. Closely knit already, woven like friendships and family more than students and teacher. Our desks, touching our papers spread.

I handed out packets, pencils in their hands, the study of history aside, and began: “Slavery exists in the world today.” Their eyes looked up. “In your lifetime, slavery exists. There are 27 million people who are slaves right this moment, in this world. That is more than the time of Abraham Lincoln. More than anytime in history.” And their eyes held mine.

I went on to tell a story, about a friend of mine in India, being offered a man’s daughter, a four year old girl, for a dollar. For sex. I read a paragraph from the packet, accosting them with the price of slaves: $25 dollars today. They were $40,000 in the Antebellum South ($1,000 equivalent to $40,000 today).

They stared. Speechless. I told them about a friend in Southeast Asia, who saw young girls stored underground until nighttime fell and men came to defile them. About fathers in Africa who offer their daughters a better life in the city, only to be betrayed by the lure of the businessmen.

They write their responses. Quiet and pensive, but scrolling on paper: “How could someone do something like this with no sorrow or regrets?” “I am horrified; I feel sad and angry, shocked.”

We read sentences. Stories. Lives. Reality of fingers cut off, wrists hung and torn, skin mangled to smell of rotten flesh. The quotes of those who remain scare our own emotions, as we listen to theirs: “God created me to be a slave, just as he created a camel to be a camel.” “I am no star; I’m just a whore. That’s all.” “For ten years, I had no one to laugh with. For ten years, nobody loved me.”

The room is still. Quiet. Angst and anticipation crowd the corners. The students say nothing, do little except stare at me and their work, unable to respond, to answer. Tears threaten a few. My own heart pounds out beats. They pencil thoughts: “How can people come in and murder people? The kid name the rest – innocent men, women, and children alike?” “To slaves that slaves were hurt is an understatement. People fix cars of bikes better than they fix their slaves…These slaves are tortured, mutilated, punished so severe…”

I linger slowly, punctually over facts: details of capture, torture, selling, holding. I assign the paragraph: “Serious punishment includes the feared ‘insect treatment’ in which tiny ants are stuffed into a slave’s ears, and the ears are then bound tightly by a scarf. The slave is left tied u for several days, after which, Human Rights Watch says, the slave will do what he or she is told.”

I speak about 485 and 77, the junction between two major highways near us, and display the article from the Charlotte Observer about it’s slave passageway; its transfer of human life. She speaks: “Why are we not doing more to stop it?”

We are cold, hardened; now hurting. We are shocked, softened. We are perplexed, purposeful.

I stop. Pause. Breathe.

I armor them. My world changers: my warriors against battles I cannot fight alone. I give them places to be more. To be greater than a student in a desk, an adolescent in their home. Organizations, people, places to join with, to fight with.

So we start today. World changing. Going from content to coin collecting. Gathering a jar of coins to fight modern slavery. Loose Change to Loosen Chains. More than an issue. More than a reading. More than a class period.

We are more. We are students. We are agents. We are agents of change.

Courage.

Courage is the ability to do hard things.

It's the push, the focus, the strength.

It's knowing, and deciding, something is needed

And moving forward into it.

Courage is calling the person

Even when you don't want to hear their voice.

Courage is choosing your motions

Even when your emotions contradict.

Courage is carefully crafting a response

Even when you want to say the other.

Courage is walking into it

Even when you want to walk out.

Courage is standing in the gap

For those who feel helpless.

Courage is walking into injustice

For those who will tell the stories.

Courage is fighting for whats right

For those who are wronged.

Courage is taking the shield

For those who are too battered.

Courage is grabbing a hand

When you lament to admit it.

Courage is allowing help

When you struggle to ask for it.

Courage is conceding

When you fight to submit to it.

Courage is allowing love

When you chasten against it.

Courage is waiting

Listening

Praying

Relying

Finding

Releasing

Living.

Courage is everything about

Those days.

These days.

Those days of yonder.

These days I'm in.

The days to come.

Courage.

~~

One of my life passages is Joshua 1, where the LORD repeatedly attempts to armor his people, and Joshua, with "Be strong and courageous." So many times, this passage has been my shield, my sword, my steadfast. Still today, these days, it brings strength to my bones, surrender to my spirit, and solidness to my soul. For each time the LORD says it to Joshua, it becomes louder, bolder, more prominent. I too have learned these tender, battle words to be the same.

"Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged. For the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go." Joshua 1: 9

Rosemary and Peppers.

Wedges of grilled chicken, tossed with slices of green peppers, halves of juicy cherry tomatoes, and slivers of red onion. Doused with rosemary garlic specialty blend, drops of olive oil, and flames... and you have.... dinner...

Pair with Pino Grigio, blogging, and a roommate-night movie, and you have: a heart at rest.