You Better Watch Out

You know that Christmas song, "I'm getting nuttin' for Christmas?" My son had one of those days today. It's like the part of his brain that is designed to say "This is kind of a dumb idea" got unplugged so the part of his brain that is designed to say "I wonder what will happen if..." ran on high speed.

And all I wanted to do all day was threaten to return his Christmas presents. It's been on the tip of my tongue, "You better watch out or there won't be anything under that Christmas tree."

I could set up a YouTube channel of the songs that warn kids to behave themselves or they won't receive any presents on Christmas day. "You better watch out, you better not cry, you better not pout I'm telling you why, Santa Claus is coming to town... he sees you when you're sleeping, he knows when you're awake, he knows if you've been bad or good so be good for goodness sake!"

I'm all for good behavior. I want my kids to be kind and respectful, to think through their actions before they do them instead of after, to love each other and share their toys and be patient and eat their meals in a timely fashion. I want all of these things. I will threaten to take away electronics time, to send them to time-out, to take away Legos, to separate them until the conflict simmers down, but I will not threaten to take away Christmas.

Here's why. The God I believe in loved me before I loved him. He gave me life and grace and freedom and forgiveness and redemption long before I ever blinked in his direction. The peace and joy and hope that are promised this time of year and all year round through Jesus Christ, God the Father and the Holy Spirit are unearned. They are gifts given whether I deserve them or not. They are gifts given because God loves us.

I give my kids presents at Christmas because I love them, because God loves me, because that gift of love that is remembered at this time of year through Jesus Christ's birth is not intended to shape up the sorry sinner into a better behaved little boy; no, the gift of love we remember is the one that rests solely on grace, solely on the goodness and holiness and unconditional love of Christ that is given to make us holy.

I want to deny my son those presents. It would be a very effective threat... an empty threat, but effective nonetheless. Earned gifts make so much more sense than unearned gifts. The god with the scales weighing good deeds and bad makes way more rational sense than the Christ child. My God is baffling in his extension of grace and mercy, humbling in his constant reaching out to the lost and needy, overwhelmingly compassionate to the broken and world worn. If I am to be like Christ, then that's the love and forgiveness I must strive for.

It's impossible on my own. Oh, how I want to just snatch away that hope, threaten an empty Christmas tree to see him wriggle and worry over his behavior.

Really? Did I just say that out loud? He is seven (today it is Elvis, tomorrow it'll be Henry, don't worry, they take turns being jerks to each other); I am certain that he does not seek out to be bad. I am certain that part of his brain just doesn't engage until he's already in the midst of some impulsive "I wonder what would happen if..." moment.

We have to teach them everything. Everything. I have had to learn these things, too. Consequences to actions. Reward for hard work and good behavior. How to love well. How to receive love. Forgiveness. How to rely on someone else's strength. How to believe. Permission to doubt.

And grace, outrageous, extravagant, mysterious, beautiful, amazing, unbelievable Christmas morning grace.


Why will my children receive presents on Christmas morning? Not because they were good or moderately good or kind of good or amazingly good. Only because we love them. Only because of Love. Oh, and also, we have a bad spending habit.

Why do we need spiritual leaders?

In a team building exercise at work today, we were given fifteen people and a life raft that only holds nine. The Titanic is sinking, basically, so who gets in and who stays behind? My team kept Obama but dumped Jay-Z, we kept the carpenter but dumped the line cook at Denny’s, we kept the pregnant lady but dumped Meryl Streep, we kept the stay-at-home mom but dumped John Boehner. At the end of the discussion, we had a priest and a rabbi in the boat with us and Oprah Winfrey in the ocean. My teammates wondered, why are we keeping the priest and the rabbi? “I suppose maybe someone might take comfort in a spiritual leader,” someone said. “I’m agnostic, so…” someone else said. “If we dump the priest, I’ll feel guilty about it,” someone else said, crossing herself simultaneously, “and have to go to church.”

I didn’t know how to answer. Why should the priest and the rabbi get a spot in our hypothetical life raft? What do they have to offer?

I had just brought up my come-to-faith college experience during the earlier ice breaker, so one colleague asked, “Are you still religious?”

I process my thoughts so much better with a keyboard and a backspace button, so when these kinds of conversations happen, I get a little nervous. I always work up in my head this big deal about how I love Jesus but I’m not that kind of Christian, you know, that kind, and I’m not that other kind either, I’m serious but not legalistic, saved but not a six-day Creationist, deeply interested and educated in the history of religion and a lover of the word of God that I really believe is the word of God but also believe that all truth is God’s truth so I also like science and math and philosophy and the advancement of new ideas and the realization of wonder and awe in nature and the power of mystery and miracle and relationship and love, love, love, so you see I’ve really thought a lot about all of this so please don’t think I’m crazy. That’s what happens in my head.

“Uhh, yeah… well… yes, but not in a ritualistic way…” I stuttered, “I care very much about faith, still.”

“Oh, okay,” she said.

She really doesn’t care about all of that. All she really wants to know is if I’m going to be offended because we are thinking about saving Oprah and ditching either the rabbi or the priest.

So I offered the priest up to the sharks. After all, I said, he’s a man of God. He’d do that kind of thing to save someone else. Plus, if he’s Catholic, he doesn’t have a family waiting for him at home, and he’s on good terms with God, soooo… pull Oprah back into the boat.

The question bothered me all day long—why should we keep the priest and rabbi in the boat—all through the afternoon trust equation discussion, through happy hour, on my drive home, and even through our Friday night house church meeting.

We studied the first part of James 3 tonight, which is all about the power of the tongue. How does bad language and our speech affect our behavior and attitude? How do words impact our children, our neighbors? How should we speak? What should we expose our kids to?

And in the midst of all of this I thought—all of the people I work with, all of the people I’ve interacted with year after year, they are all trying to be good people. They generally know the difference between right and wrong. They have their own moral codes, adopted from their parents or from their culture or reshaped and redefined along the way, and they are all not perfect. They try to watch their language and speak kindly to other people and encourage their children and spouses. They are all trying to be better. My office and school and higher education is filled with people who are generally good human beings trying to be better at something, trying to succeed.

The conversation tonight wasn’t just morality, but isn’t that what you hear most days from spiritual leaders? Do this. Don’t do that. Be kind. Follow the golden rule. Do better. Be better. Even corporate America and business educators are suggesting that businesses flourish by becoming agents of world benefit. World benefit – isn’t that what Christians aspire to? Do good? Serve the poor? Care for the earth? Treat each other with kindness (it was, after all, World Kindness Day yesterday)?

Which brings me back to an even bigger question than why spiritual leaders… why God? Who needs him, anyway, now that world leaders and business educators and philosophers have reasoned out the best ways to live? They are preaching the same gospel, aren’t they?

As we hashed out the ways our words affect other people tonight at house church I imagined the same conversation taking place in my secular work environment. It was nearly the same, minus a few Bible verse references.

Except for this one thing: Grace.

Grace—an undeserved gift that releases us from slavery to “do good things” and delivers us into “I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with unfailing kindness.” This love frees the spirit from the burden to perform, the burden of guilt, the burden of fear. It is rooted in relationship. It filters the muddy waters. It strengthens and encourages and emboldens because we know there is a force that is stronger than our imperfections who is working in and through us for wholeness, for completeness. It is compassion in a hurricane of brokenness and disease. It is freedom from the hells we have been given and the hells we’ve made for ourselves, in addictions, in poverty, in selfishness, in greed. It illuminates so we can see how we have been fearfully and wonderfully made. It resides in us through the Holy Spirit as compass. It clarifies, purifies, mends, heals, hones, hammers, and polishes. Because it is unearned by definition it does not consider your qualifications or your past failures; grace loves and loves and loves, all day long, whether I take it or not, whether I recognize it or not, whether I call it “Jesus” or “God” or not, it shows up in truth, it shows up in beauty, it shows up as forgiveness, it shows up all over the place.

Spiritual leaders, then, shouldn’t be morality instructors. Even though the internet loves the “ten ways” lists, and people love to know how to become better people, the priests and rabbis might do better to stop telling people how to be better. Spiritual leaders should be more like scientists who observe and announce, “Look! Look what I found!” or maybe like poets who ponder and write, “I saw this small thing in the world and look how full of meaning it is,” or maybe they should be like stargazers who point to the heavens and declare, “There, isn’t that marvelous?” Spiritual leaders should say, “Let me show you grace. Here it is. Here it is. Here it is again. This is grace. This is love. This is Christ. This is God. Here is the Father. Here is the Son. Here is the Holy Spirit. Here they are again, ever-present, everlasting, loving you forever and ever and ever, loving you even after you screwed up, even after you’ve been ‘saved,’ even in your attempts to earn it, loving you, beautiful you, stunning you, masterpiece you, God loves you. That’s it. That’s all.”

Maybe I’ll grant the spiritual leader this one final benediction, “Now act justly. Love mercy. Walk humbly with your God.” We don’t need the priest who preaches morality. We need the priest who points to the heavens and says, “God. Have you seen this? Have you seen this grace? Have you seen this love?”

I Don't Read Postcards from Hell

I got a soul that I won't sell, 

And I don't read postcards from hell. 

- The Wood Brothers

It's been about a year and a half since I wrote this post, "Crazy Jesus Parables and Dead Pigs." In hindsight, it's a rather cryptic post. I don't give any context to why driving out demons and the house of the impure spirits meant something to me right then, that fall; I don't let on that I felt like I was constantly pushing off the temptation to engage another man who was interested in me, I don't let on that I did not want anything to do with him but I also didn't mind hearing that someone found me attractive, I don't share how conflicted I felt, how guilty I felt, how weak and needy and lonely I felt, even though my husband was around, yes, around, but I missed him. I was distracted and tense, trying desperately to stay pure, to resist temptation, to keep it together.

I wrote about what was happening in my life but I didn't really write what was happening in my life. My world was under threat, and I was the first guard at the gate. What better weapon to wield than the Word of God? 

I am not sure what would have become of me and my marriage if it wasn't for the Bible. 

This sounds crazy. 

Crazy Jesus Parables and Dead Pigs sustained me. Letters from the epistles reminded me what to do when my emotions reeled, when my immediate heart's desire was to be filled, to be filled with something, anything, when the easiest access was this other man who so readily handed out compliments, who readily flirted, who assumed I wanted to hear these things... and I did.

Except I wanted to hear them from my husband, the man I had committed to love, til death do us part, not him.

As fall crept into winter and winter sloshed into spring, resistance built on resistance, brick by brick. Gradually, it passed. It passed, and I survived. Our marriage survived. The notes and emails from him didn't stop, entirely, and some of the things he said ran on a random loop in my brain, but I knew what was right. I knew what was good. I knew what was true.

Lately, my guilt and shame about being tempted at all has dissolved away into rage. How dare he? I find myself thinking, from the safe distance of a healed marriage, from behind the wall of love and security my husband has built around me. This is one truth: I did not ask for those things. The realization that what I put up with for almost a full year could have been, should have been, called sexual harassment, this realization obliterates everything else.

Almost.

Because this is another truth: I was still vulnerable. There is something inside me that longed to be filled, to be openly adored and desired, and, let's face it, after nine years of marriage, isn't everyone a little tired of trying so hard all of the time? The temptation was strong. It would be a lie to push the burden of responsibility entirely onto the other person. But it would also be a lie to take the full weight of that responsibility.

From this side of mercy, Brandon and I tell each other all things. Everything has been laid bare here; every temptation, every hurt, every longing. He has seen it all, and he still loves me. He loves me, he loves me, he loves me.

From this side of mercy, I see the Word of God a bit differently. As a new believer, I viewed the Bible and its rules as guidelines to earn God's love and acceptance. The B-I-B-L-E: Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth. How clever. The laws of God were given to keep me in line; if I followed them, then God would bless me. If I broke them, God would turn his back on me.

Over and over again, the psalmists praise God's laws and precepts. "Oh, how I love your law! I meditate on it all day long," the psalmist says in Psalm 119. What?! How could someone sing about rules? How could someone love the law, those restrictions, those barriers, how could someone praise God for the law?

From this side of mercy, however, I find myself singing along with the psalmist, "Oh, how I love your law! I meditate on it all day long." It was the law, the Word of God, that showed me the way and said, now walk in it. The heart only wanted to be filled, immediately. I used to think the Law was given to earn God's love, but now I see that the Law was given as a gift of love from God. The Law was a grace bearer. The Law, fulfilled in Christ, delivered me. 

Here, child. I love you. I don't want to see you in pain. Here, let me tell you what to do, even though you think this is the hardest thing you could do, here, let me show you the way so that you might walk in it, so that you might walk into the valley, through the desert, and enter the promised land. You will persevere; perseverance will produce character, and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint. You will do more than survive, my child, you will thrive.

Daily I sing, from this side of mercy, from this side of grace, from the broken but healed side of redemption, "Oh, how I love your law! I meditate on it all day long."

Most Memorable Moment: Ten Years Later

Last night, we went to Bull and Bones Brewhaus and Grill in Blackburg, Virginia (look at that nice alliteration... it's even a poetic location) for karaoke and drinks.  Brandon asked me what moment is most memorable for me from the last ten years together, not counting our wedding day and the births of our children, and I was stumped.  Most memorable?  God.

Maybe singing "Love Shack" with Brandon on the stage of our honeymoon cruise, or the long walk back from nearly drowning my new husband off a Key West beach, sandy flippers and snorkles in hand.

Maybe the day we came home to the house on Leland to find that our dog, Tex, had eaten everything in the kitchen.  The loaf of bread.  The plastic around the loaf of bread.  A candle.  A coffeepot.  A chocolate Easter bunny.  We were stunned.  We were certain he would die, but he didn't!

Maybe the night I brought both pregnancy tests downstairs grinning to Brandon sitting on the couch watching the Indians with Tex stretched out next to him, and he said, "Wow.  Wow."  And I said, "I know!"

Maybe driving all over Akron and Hartville looking at houses under $50,000 feeling downtrodden, rolling over the tip of a hill and seeing a for sale sign on a burned down house, or walking through the house that was sinking at such an angle into the earth that we could barrel roll down the living room floor, until finally we found the house on Ardella, olive green siding and a fenced-in backyard for Tex, enough bedrooms for a bunch of babies.

Maybe the day we expected to find out that we were twelve weeks along only to find out that we had miscarried our first baby, and we stood alone in the parking lot, summer sun bright and hot above us.  "I guess I should go back to work," I sniffled, head low and tears a slow leak, and Brandon put his hands on my face and whispered, "Be strong and courageous, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go," and we held each other, facing the first intimate grief of marriage together.

Maybe six months later, standing in a restaurant after the boys basketball team won a tournament game in East Liverpool (right? was that where we were?), getting the call that our nephew was born but that he was struggling in the NICU and feeling so helpless there, states away from our brother and sister-in-law, how the parents and basketball team all bowed their heads and prayed for Braden, for Ben and Kelly, for health and miracles and life.

Maybe when we brought Lydia home to that house on Ardella, our two crazy redbone coonhounds ready to meet the new addition.

Maybe "I see a firetruck, a bright red SHINY firetruck!" for Thanksgiving, celebrating Braden's second birthday (was it his second? do you remember? time goes so quickly and it all runs together, and now I don't know, was Lydia there for the firetruck or was that the next year?).

Maybe our trip to Butler, PA, when we felt the push to start looking at seminary, the need to move on to the next big thing.

Maybe the day we realized if I took the job at Ashland, he could quit his job, and we'd still be fine, actually better than fine, and maybe even start seminary.

Maybe walking on the towpath in the valley with Lydia right after Elvis came home from the NICU himself, and Brandon wore our strong, fragile, healthy but so sick before little boy in the Baby Bjorn, and the light danced through the leaves, and we prepared to go house hunting again, and then how every house was like something from Flip This House - the Bacon House, the Flea House, the Power Line House, the Putt Putt House - until we found the house on Morgan, a clean slate of white with so many walls to paint, so many ways to make it ours.

Maybe the day we decided to step out on faith and start to tithe regularly.  Maybe the call later that afternoon asking Brandon to work for ESPN.

Maybe every trip we've taken tagged on to work where we've eaten good meals and drank good drinks and slept in large beds, work as the brackets around relaxation.

Maybe every time I've worshiped next to Brandon in church, our fingers intertwined, or the time at Hudson during the sermon when we watched the bump of Lydia's elbow or knee move across my abdomen, or every time we have held a baby during a praise song, or every time we've walked with Lydia and Elvis to the communion table, the kids eager for bread to fill the empty spaces.

Maybe every time Brandon and the kids have walked over to my office on campus just to stop by.

Maybe every time we have sung, "Jackson" by Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash.

Maybe every time we've quoted Dumb and Dumber or When Harry Met Sally or The Anchorman or Forget Paris.

Maybe every time we have walked nine holes in the fading fall light.

Maybe every time Henry says, "Juice, Dad, Mom?"

Maybe every family picnic or backyard barbecue with friends.  Maybe every fourth of July picnic.  Every Christmas morning.

Maybe every time we have danced slow or fast, in our kitchen, in our living room, after a Christmas party with Lisa and Zack, at the Boot, at the Dusty Armadillo, at Thirsty Cowboy, at weddings, singing "and we'll remember them!", singing "He stopped loving her today..." and always, always laughing, always smiling, always his rough cheek against mine.

Maybe every time we have forgiven each other.  Maybe every time I have been forgiven.

These, yes, these, and so many, so many other memorable moments that have comprised ten years of laughter, ten years of learning, ten years of growth, ten years of grace, ten years of choosing each other, and yes of course ten years of love, ten years, ten years, ten years.

Favorite memorable moment?  If a moment can stretch across a decade, then, this last one.  This last decade, with my husband.  Every happy second, every difficult season, every grief, every mercy.  Everything.

Just Call Me Sarah "All Heart" Wells

Oh no.

That's what I thought to myself as the clock ticked closer to the cut-off point of a clip from Jerry Maguire, this morning's edition of the At The Movies series at our church, seconds closer to when I had set the video up to automatically shut off, right before Cuba Gooding, Jr. announces, "I'm all heart..." and then drops a giant M-Fer.  Oh no, I thought to myself, what if the DVD doesn't stop at that 40-second mark?  What if, even though I tested this--twice--to make sure it would shut off at just the right moment, what if it keeps playing?!  Oh no.

There were five clips from Jerry Maguire this morning, and our pastor had jotted down, to the second, when the clips should stop and start.  We rehearsed together the importance of the DVD times for each clip before service started.  ProPresenter makes it easy to do this.  All you do is set the time it is supposed to begin, and set the time that it is supposed to end.  Done.  No problem.

But.  What if this time the DVD keeps playing? That would be horrible!  The college students were back for the first Sunday since May.  The audience below was filled with regulars and lots of new visitors, "It's so great to see so many new faces today!" said one of the associate pastors during announcements, "Welcome to 5 Stones!"  What if the DVD keeps playing, and the whole church watches the end of this scene?  

And so I positioned the mouse arrow over the play/pause button and prepared myself to stop the DVD just in case we hit the 40-second mark and it kept playing.  We hit the 40-second mark.  I panicked.  I clicked the play/pause button.  It kept playing.  "No heart?!" Cuba Gooding, Jr. said. OH NO.

"No heart?!" Cuba Gooding, Jr., said, "I'm ALL HEART m*f*!"

EEEEEEEEEEEKK!  I shrieked, frantically clicking the play/pause button, the stop button, any button to make it stop, make it stop, JUST MAKE IT STOP!  And then it was over, the church collectively gasping and laughing, the pastor laughing and apologizing and asking for forgiveness and the congregation granting it, like they do because we have a rockin' merciful grace-filled congregation. From the balcony behind my computer screen I yelled down, I am so sorry. 

There are only a couple of times I can recall being utterly and completely mortified.  There was the time in middle school when I tripped over my own feet going up the stairs with two cheerleader/uber-popular girls behind me and let out a GEEZ! as if they had caused me to stumble, and they laughed and said, "What?! We didn't do anything!"  And at a high school dance camp, after rehearsing all week our team's routine and lecturing, as an officer, the whole group about the timing of the last sequence, I was the only one who shot out with a toe touch while everyone else stayed crouched down, and then I swore on the way off the stage--possibly costing us our showmanship trophy, or team spirit trophy, or some other acknowledgement of positive behavior.  

This is particularly amusing to me now because I am bad at swearing.  Meaning, I don't do it naturally.  I am not a good swearer.  I am funny when I even try, too formal, too stilted, awkward.  They just don't roll off my tongue the way they do for other people.  

So.  You can imagine my horror as a church with pews filled with people listened to Cuba Gooding, Jr., deliver a pronounced and passionate F-bomb.  The mother of all F-bombs, even.

Humiliation burned on my cheeks.  I really, really hate screwing up, privately or publicly, consciously or unconsciously.  My entire body hates it, and as our pastor graciously proceeded through the rest of the sermon (a really great one, mind you), my hands shook, adrenaline pumping, head shaking, tear ducts leaking impulsively.  omg.  That just happened.  omg.  Somehow I managed to queue up the other movie clips and slides for the sermon and shake it off.  Somehow.  And after it was over, thank God, over, our laid back church embraced me with laughter and grace.

It was and continues to be hard for me to receive grace.  I want the A, I want more than good, more than good enough, more than great; I want perfect.  I expect perfect from myself.  Not from others, no, I totally get that we're not perfect and everyone messes up and blah blah blah, yes, other people, but not me.  And so in high school when confronted with the concept of grace and forgiveness through Christ for the murderer and minor-vice-committer both, I said, No. I spat, No way.  I wanted condemnation for the sinner and crowns for me.  I've earned it.

And then I started to pay attention to my daily behavior.  Every time I tried not to fall short, it happened.  Oh no.  I was not perfect.  And it happened every single day!  Oh NO.  I fell short all of the time.  This was really disturbing to me.  How could I be good enough for God?  I failed again and again, I would always fail, now that I've failed there's no HOPE of ever being perfect.  And then, in my freshman year of college, I thought I might be pregnant.  I might have been pregnant, for all I know, and maybe miscarried, given my record of miscarriages now.  I don't know.  

Laughter and grace.  Christ is all about grace, and I suspect he also laughs. The opposite of grace and laughter is condemnation.  Frowny face.  When I felt like I was surely condemned, life ruined, career trajectory altered forever because of what I had done as a freshman in college, what I received instead was love. Mercy. Grace.

But still.  "No heart?! I'm all heart!"  God, help me.  In some churches, you might expect lightning bolts.  In mine, laughter and grace.  I serve a great, big, amused Lord of the universe, and my church is his joyful, caring, graceful and sometimes embarrassing bride, but wow, she's just beautiful, isn't she?

Grace Notes by Brian Doyle

I JUST finished Grace Notes by Brian Doyle, literally just finished the last page and set it down on my desk and sat back in my chair and sighed that long, contented, choked up sigh of YES.  This!  

"...after fifty years, I am absolutely sure what I am supposed to do: sense stories, catch some by their brilliant tails as they rocket by, carve and sculpt them into arrows, and fire them into the hearts of as many people as I can reach on this bruised and blessed planet. That's all. That's enough."

Yes.

I've also read Leaping by Doyle, which was also SO GOOD.  These are the sorts of books and Doyle is the sort of author that makes you want to return to page one as soon as you've finished page 148.  The prose is lively and unexpected.  Conversational and intimate.  And most importantly, these short essays fire arrows into the hearts of readers.

That's all.  That's enough.

Corrective Lenses and Parenting

I have been cranky all night and the peanut butter and banana plus chocolate dessert is not helping. It is a shame, too, because it’s just about as perfect of a night as there could be in mid-June. It is still light at 8:30 and the neighborhood is milking every last second of daylight. The night air is active with dogs and motorcycles, laughing children up later than mine, the hum of the air-conditioner kicking on, several different birds chirping. There’s nothing quiet about sitting outside right now. It’s downright noisy.

I don’t know why I’m such a grump tonight. When Elvis ran his front wheel up the back of Lydia’s Big Wheel and fell over onto the sidewalk crying, I checked his knee for blood and told him to stop running into her and that won’t happen. Oh, and are you okay? Want me to kiss it? You’re alright, get back on your bike.

And Lydia is talking back. But I don’t want to eat my sweet potato. But I want to go to the Seminary Park. But I don’t want to read that book. But but but but I don’t freaking care what you want I want ice cream and silence and you all to do what I want you to do right this instant. Now!

Sigh. This is a bad parenting night for me. I’ll own it, especially now that everyone is in bed and I’m trying to enjoy the cool night with all of its chatter and buzzing. I think I can even hear the highway, and it is miles away. Go away, cars! Go away, people! Go away, stupid happy chirping birds!

Maybe it is because the day started off with a baby poop explosion that made me late for my vision exam.  I found out that my near-sightedness got worse and that my prescription is such that I am ineligible for laser eye surgery.  Usually I can roll with these things, though, so I don't know what it is about this particular day that's got me all twisted in knots.  Plenty of good things happened, too, but I've been too busy scrunching up my nose and grumbling to pay much attention to those.

The kids are in Vacation Bible School this week, and of course they are learning about God things, so today after work in the midst of my crankiness, Lydia asked me if I had a “God sighting” today.

I chuckled—joke’s on me, eh God?—and looked about for some kind of a God sighting because I sure hadn’t put on any sort of spiritual lenses today. I said something about how the flowers growing made me think of God, which was a total cop-out response given that our backyard is in full bloom while I’m feeling like six feet of snow.

If I had any eyes to see today, though, I am sure I would have seen God shaking his head at my need to control my kids, to manipulate their eating habits, to force them to behave exactly how I’d have them behave when I’d like them to behave. I turned parenting into a performance in which I am the director and my kids are the cast. Play your part, children, or the director will cut you and call up the understudy.

Tonight I boxed in my kids, more than usual, forced them to acquiesce to what I wanted, and when they didn’t care for that plan, I was quick to bark orders and cancel rewards. On better parenting days, my hope is that I teach them about the right decisions and then let them choose into those, and if they choose into something else, then depending on the outcome I’ll respond accordingly, with mercy and grace instead of fast justice and snappy discipline.

Maybe then my God sighting will be acknowledging the beauty in the chaos of the night.  Or thanking God that I live in an age that has developed corrective lenses, since during any other time in history, I'd be considered legally blind.  Me and Milton, you know.  Or that it was warm and sunny and I ate a delicious salad on our patio with my family at lunch and then walked around the block after dinner. 

Now, after I've carried my laptop back into the house, I am sure that God is in the silence and the churning of my thoughts, listening to the hum and click of the computer, waiting for me to quit my belly-aching and acknowledge the stillness, sit in it and wait and know.

Last Words Series - Part Two, "Breath"

This poem wiggles around on the page and has funky spacing, but I thought I'd give it a shot here, because I don't think you need to have the visual effect in order to read the poem. In fact, I've changed some of the line breaks for this post, just because. :)

Breath

You are wondering why I am
up here with you, why
our blood is mixing together
in the dirt, why our lungs
heave out as if we have
the same spirit
in us
begging to be set free,
why we keep
breathing.

Each inhalation,
a gasp.
All I want to do
is breathe out
a final time. You, a criminal, exhale.
I inhale
your air.

Do you feel the weight of it
rising
off your chest even now,
before your final sigh?
You wonder why
suffering
must last
so long.
For this breathing—
guilt
and grace,
guilt and
grace, guilt
and grace—and yet

I assure you,
today,
you will be with me
in Paradise.

-----------------------------------------

This poem relies on what Jesus says to one of the criminals next to him on the cross ("I assure you, today, you will be with me in Paradise"). When writing this poem, I wanted to evoke the physical strain of breathing when suffering, and I also wanted the process of breathing to be that exchange between guilt and grace - salvation at work. I was also thinking of the "breath of life," breathed into Adam by God back in Genesis, and how Jesus's breathing on the cross could serve as a second wind, so to speak.

It is phenomenal that Jesus can look over at this confessed criminal and declare that he will join Jesus in paradise that very day. In the face of suffering and grief, the last place I tend to look is at other people's suffering-- my focus is on my own pain and troubles-- but Jesus extends mercy, even with his hands and feet nailed through to the cross, even with the weight of the earth pulling at him. Take a deep breath - inhale that mercy. It's awesome, isn't it?