Month: September 2012

Love, Dad

—–Original Message—–
From: Lyleret8 Lyleret8@aol.com
To: Lheyd59 Lheyd59@aol.com
Sent: Sat, Sep 1, 2012 8:41 pm
Subject: book

Hi Lori, We worked on the fence today as I told you. The real hard part is done. Ron forgets I am 84. We did bending over all day, I can not do that….I came home and took a shower and relaxed in bed for awhile. I went out on the back deck in the cool breeze and took Merton;s book and you Prayer Closet book to read. I ended up reading your book for an hour and a half. You know I read good books but I was mesmerized by your writing, you write like Thoreau or Kathleen Norris. about nature and life. I can’t tell you how absolutely blown away by your talent. I Love you, Dad.

This email was sent to me by my Dad. And surely he could not have been talking about me, but about someone else…….I teared up when I got it, because I realized again how incredibly blessed I am to be surrounded by people who have sent me things like that my entire life. Not because I am so great, but because they are…..I don’t mind telling you, it made my night.

There is no price we can ever put on the value of good words. And because it was done for me, now I make a habit of doing it too. I never leave my Mom and Dad’s without leaving something under their pillow to find after I leave. And I leave notes around the house where I know Elaine will find them too. She had many words thrown at her growing up, but many were not good. Most were negative.

Edifying words have the power to convince someone they can really do anything they set their mind to do. But negative words have the power to demoralize and destroy. Sometimes those words make someone set out to try even harder to succeed, but all too often they leave a wake of destruction.

Some people spend all their lives recovering from the sting those words leave behind.

God loves it when we give out good words…….He knows their incredible ability to heal, to mend, to uplift.

And that person who has been on your mind? It’s time to write them a note or email . It may come just in time.

And then leave one for God too, even though He already knows what you are going to say…….

And if you have ever thought about setting your blog to print, I would encourage you to do so. It makes a wonderful gift for someone you love. Sure, they can get on the computer and read it, but there is something about being able to hold your words in their hands. Like having a bit of you with them.

Gracious words are like a honeycomb, sweetness to the soul and health to the body. Proverbs 16:24

A doll story, but not just for women

For those women who still have dolls, and the men who love them…….. Not the dolls, the women.

I was late to like dolls. When I was around 4 or 5 I wanted to be like my brother…..I had a name picked out and everything. I wouldn’t wear anything but cowboy boots, jeans and flannel shirts and insisted on wearing boys tennis shoes. Black high tops to be exact. It is to their credit that my parents actually bought me a pair and let me wear them.

Every now and then we fish them out of the cedar chest and laugh……

My parents figured it was a phase, and they were right. They held their breath and played it cool. They didn’t freak out and drag me to the child psychologist and I really respect them for that. 

Anyway, I wanted a horse, I prayed for a horse. I had a plastic collection of no less than 10. Some had broken legs and we had to scotch tape them back on. My Dad got creative with spray painting some of them if that particular month I just had to have one like little Joe’s black and white pinto on Bonanza. We lined them all up and played for hours, the neighbor girl and I.

When I was around 6 or 7 I decided I liked to wear dresses and cute clothes. Though I held onto my passion for horses, one Christmas I got a little rag doll who played a lullaby. I promptly fell in love with her…….she had a blue dress and yellow yarn hair. She was my “special” present that year.

I had a succession of dolls after that, and I loved them all. We had an emotional connection my dolls and I.

I had barbie dolls, wanna be barbie dolls, troll dolls, little kittle dolls and paper dolls. Some of my cousins had collector Shirley Temple dolls. My cousin June had a big floppy life-size doll her brothers used to roll down the stairs. They loved how life-like she looked as she fell to her death. They also attached explosives to her. They were sick.

My friend had an African American doll when she was growing up in Texas. She loved that doll and her Dad threw it out because it was the wrong color. I don’t think she ever forgave him for it. All these years later, she has looked for one like it in antique shops, even EBay. She’s never found one.

One day I went into my favorite gift shop with my Mom, and there on the bottom shelf was the most adorable doll I had ever seen. I had to have her. She had long brown hair that looked real. She is pictured on the right. I named her Suzanne, after a Judy Collins song I loved.

The other doll belonged to my Sister in law who has been in Heaven now since 1998. My Mom had her for awhile, but ran out of room to display her. She was gathering dust in the same trunk my old shoes were in, so I bundled her up and brought her home.

The strange thing about that doll? Shortly before I got married my maid of honor got sick with the chicken pox and couldn’t do the ceremony so my Sister in law graciously stepped in and fulfilled her wedding duties, perfectly I might add…….including wearing the beautiful peach colored dress I had picked out for my friend. The very same color this doll wears today.

She’s almost as beautiful as my Sister in law was. It is safe to say that I am emotionally attached to both of these dolls. It’s what they represent that I hold close, all those good times, safe times. For a few moments I am a little girl again, lost in the wonder and magic of long ago. When dolls were more than just dolls.

I remember every one of them like old familiar friends.

And when I watch my little niece with hers now, I smile and my heart glows warm.

I remember when all over again.

The most important thing I may never tell you

To everyone I care about and even those I don’t know or love:

I want you to go. To Heaven that is. And no matter what you may have been taught or believe. It exists……..and believe me, you will very much want to go there. You will not come back here again as something else, this is your one chance.

Behind every moment eternity rests. Eternity awaits…….

I am telling you this because I care. And as I was praying this morning, and thanking God for the assurance that I am going there, as will most of the people I love, I thought of you. And I knew that right now if something happened, you wouldn’t.

And more than anything else? I want you to understand that it is not for anything I have done that I go to that wonderful place, that place of unapproachable light, but only for what Jesus did.

For me…..For you.

And that other place? You really don’t want to go there. No comfort from friends waits for you there. There is only the absence of everything good, everything you ever loved. And forever is a very long time to gamble on. I hate writing this……hate to think that people are dying right now and will miss out on something eternally good, because no one told them.

Because they ignored the voice that spoke in the quiet.

Day after day.

Because they never got a letter like this.

Please know, that it doesn’t have to be. You have an incredible opportunity to be with the God who created you for all eternity. He wants you with Him…….

And no, we won’t be floating around on clouds playing harps. It will be as real a place as you can possible imagine. In fact, the Bible says we don’t even have the capacity to know just how good it will be, only that it will exceed our wildest imaginations.

That light that you see every morning and every evening? Those planets? Those were set there just so. As reminders of where we come from and where we are going back to someday.

And it may be very soon. The tragedy is that you will never see this letter. It will most likely remain right here, because you see, I don’t want to offend you. The truth is, I would rather see you go to hell than offend you, because I really like you……

I just don’t love you enough.

 
Lord, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
You have set your glory
in the heavens.

Through the praise of children and infants
you have established a stronghold against your enemies,
to silence the foe and the avenger.
 
When I consider your heavens,
the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars,
which you have set in place,
what is mankind that you are mindful of them,
human beings that you care for them?
You have made them a little lower than the angels
and crowned them with glory and honor.
You made them rulers over the works of your hands;
you put everything under their feet:
all flocks and herds,
and the animals of the wild,
the birds in the sky,
and the fish in the sea,
all that swim the paths of the seas.
Lord, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
 
Psalm 8, proof that He loves you.
 
Still counting the gifts, every day, every Monday too……
 
I called my Mom because I wanted to speak with this special girl, but she said they had just left for the pool.
I had been thinking about hearing her voice all day….And I thought of her swimming and how she loves it, and I could just see them in my mind at the pool. And my eyes swam tears…….”She’s ten, she’s ten, she’s ten,” was the refrain that wouldn’t let go. How did she get to be ten?
She is not actually, but she will be in a couple of months. This must be how parents feel. How do they do it? Their hearts must ache with an overflow of love continually. Well, good parents anyway. How do they let go? Maybe it is a really good thing I never had kids. I would have been one of those obsessive parents who follow their kids to school and on the bus. And I can imagine me, standing in the driveway crying buckets…….waving a hankie when they pull out of the driveway and leave for college.
I have a hard time leaving my cats with strangers.
But there she is. And all at once we turned around and she was so tall. Wearing size 10 dresses and impossibly big shoes. When did it happen, and how many moments did I miss in all these years? Silly me, thinking she was still 6 or 7, I tried to pick her up when her feet were burning on the hot cement and almost dropped her. She laughed. Bless her, she has my sick sense of humor.
Is this how God feels about us? After all, every life is sacred, every life is eternal. I know He grieves and misses us when we are away. I know that at the end of a life spent without Him, He aches for what could have been. I know it.
Watch out for her God. I know she has Mommy and Daddy and Grandma and Grandpa, but sometimes they might miss something.
But you never do. Thank you.

Telling the story

The most authentic story is the one we are living out right now.
I felt like a kid on the playground who got picked for a game. You remember that feeling, the lineup, the choosing sides? If you are like me, you hated it. I was always short and not very competitive so I never got picked first. Michelle Fromm always got picked first, and you always wanted to be the one she picked first. I was always somewhere in the middle, and that was fine with me, as long as I wasn’t dead last.  
Today, over at Bibledude.net Duane Scott is launching something very special.
I was invited to take part in this wonderful opportunity to share some of my stories, and though I’m still not sure why, it is a great honor. I think maybe God had something to do with it. The reason this means so much is because I believe in it so strongly. We all have a story and no one story is more important than any other, especially to God.
God has written our story on His heart, and more than anything, He wants us to share His story with each other, and with the world. After all, His story is the one that matters most. Like the old hymn says:
Tell me the story of Jesus,
Write on my heart every word;
Tell me the story most precious,
Sweetest that ever was heard.
Tell how the angels in chorus,
Sang as they welcomed His birth,
“Glory to God in the highest!
Peace and good tidings to earth.” 
Well, that is part of it anyway. This song, written by Frances J. Crosby, tells the redemption story. The most important story that will ever be told. And, your story, our stories, matter.
So pull up a chair, sit down beside us on the bench and we will share a story together. Who knows what we may learn from each other…..
Many thanks Duane, again!

Living the beautitudes

I knelt by my bed, seeking the familiar, looking for home.

Lately, easy things have been difficult and I slog through the day, feeling like I am beating a path through a thick jungle with a machete.

I cherish my days away from work, I count them off, savor every hour. Four, three, two, and now I have just tomorrow. Herding cats would be easier than trying to capture my thoughts right now.  I ache for the simple. I ache for things to slow down.

I hunger for nature even more than food. I need to hear the trees speak, hear my own heartbeat and feel it slow to the rhythm of the bigger picture. But trips are like a far off dream, and the motor home sits silent and empty on the storage lot.

Care giving takes its toll, and the rubber is meeting the road again. And I know it is no accident that other circumstances have come into play, all of them conspiring to create the “perfect storm.” My job is stressing me out big time, and I am in the beginning stages of that time in a woman’s life known as “The Change” BIG LETTERS.

It goes by many names, and no one wants to talk about it so I won’t either. Suffice it to say, it feels like a black shade has been pulled down on my life.

And yet, even with all this going against me, I know this season of my life is an opportunity. A divine appointment. A chance to demonstrate love without getting anything in return. A chance to put my faith into action.

Care giving is extremely humbling simply because of the times you fail. Day after day we are tested. Day after day there are opportunities to succeed or fail at loving.

Just the other morning the clouds parted and God allowed me to feel a tremendous sense of peace, even joy about what we have been doing for the last year and a half……I was pumped up, I was ready to deliver a sermon on the Beatitudes to anyone who would listen.

And 10 minutes later her Mom got up and irritated me to the point that I retorted back to the sarcastic thing she said. Most of what she says is sarcastic but I know that. I should have been ready. And of course her timing is always impeccable.

How can a woman who can’t remember anything you said 3 minutes ago, remember you hitting a pole with the car and doesn’t hesitate reminding anyone who will listen? I guess when you have practiced negativity and denial your whole life, it comes easy, that’s how.

I really don’t know how Elaine does it, and yet I do.

We laughed when she got up and I told her how fired up I was, how I wanted to preach a sermon and then Joyce immediately showed me how far I still was from the Kingdom of God.

I am happy to say that through all this, we have kept our gratitude. Our peace. And in spite of it all, there are a hundred little moments a day where I will absurd moments of joy.

At the library……out by the garden…..sharing a laugh……kneading bread dough…..watching the cats antics.

And getting into the Word can always take me home when I don’t feel I can take another moment.

I can honestly answer the question that Paul Chan throws out in his book, “Crazy Love.” What are you doing right now that requires faith?

Everything, simply everything.

“If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you?  Even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners do that. And if you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you?  Even sinners lend to sinners, expecting to be repaid in full. But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked.  Be merciful,  just as your Father is merciful.  Luke 6:32-36