Wandering, Lent Day 2

“But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.” Matthew 4:4

I have a feeling Satan didn’t waste any time trying to tear Jesus down on His way out into the desert. I can imagine him doing just what he does to us. Using our own humanity against us. Reminding Jesus of all that He lost, all that He left behind, all that He still had to suffer.

Can’t you just hear him?

I can’t believe you actually went for this crazy plan……..these people aren’t worth dying for…….God wouldn’t care you know, if you turned just one of these tiny little stones into bread.

He tries to defeat us in our minds first. Then he goes for our physical needs. Our humanity. What’s your weakness today? Right now. Mine was insomnia and worry last night. I stared at the ceiling fan going around and around and looked at the clock which taunted me. I was feeling fearful about the future and sorrow crept in. Tears came in the dark.

I started with the 23rd Psalm which is the one thing I always fall back on when I can’t sleep:

“The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want”……and then I stopped. Do I really believe that? Do I actually believe that God is all that I need in every single circumstance, no matter what? It’s easy to believe that when everything is going smooth. When everyone I care about is okay. But is my faith real enough to believe that even though I can’t fix people and situations I can still feel peaceful because God is in control and loves them even more than I do?

The gentle purr of the cat resting on my shoulder lulled me. I thought of Jesus in the desert. I believe that He was thinking of us during those 40 days and for us, He didn’t give in.

And right now today, He is interceding for us still. He has been through His desert so we wouldn’t have to. But so many times we put ourselves there anyway don’t we?

Jesus focused not on what He didn’t have during those 40 days, but what He did have. And I can see HIm stopping to rest in the shade, tired and weary and seeing these little flowers and thanking God for His perfect plan.

Because all He could see was the victory at the other end. All He could see was me.

At every moment you have to decide to trust the voice that says, “I love you. I knot you together in your Mother’s womb.” (Ps. 139:13); “Stop wandering around. Instead, come home and trust that God will bring you what you need,” “For as long as you can remember, you have been a pleaser, depending on others to give you an identity. But now you are being asked to let go of all these self-made props and trust that God is enough for you;” “The root choice is to trust at all times that God is with you and will give you what you most need.” Henry Nouwen

Open your eyes……

I don’t know about you, but the news lately has left me feeling fatigued, stressed, disturbed.

Sometimes I wonder why I even feel the need first thing in the morning to go look at what happened overnight.

It’s always more of the same. The truth is: The world will never change because the world never did understand the love Jesus came to give it.

But more of the same is never a bad thing when you have the Hope of Jesus.

These times, I pray, will cause us to reflect on what truly matters.

I pray our faith will get real.

I pray we will become closer to our Heavenly Father than ever before.

And I pray that when it all gets to be too much.

That we will remember to go outside……

and remember again that God is behind and around and through it all.

He’s never stopped speaking.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men. The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. John 1:1-5

Finding our place in the Son

New Year’s weekend was spent at the beach. It was 4 glorious days of chilly evenings and mornings and brilliant sunshine during the day. We didn’t want to leave so four days turned into five. It was walking for miles looking for sea glass and eating seafood fresh off the boat. It was breathing sea air facing the surf and letting go of 2014. It was putting off stress and anxiety for another day.

Before that, we had all gathered around a table and celebrated my folks 63rd wedding Anniversary. It was a week of celebrations.

2015 hit me full force on the morning of January 4th. The night before we had pulled into Bakersfield RV park where we have always had a wonderful stay. It was dark. I chose the backside of the park thinking it would be quieter, but it was a bad spot and the hookups were situated in an awkward place. We were both irritable and hungry. We had dinner and missed the season premiere of Downton Abbey because of bad cable in the park.

I tossed and turned all night and awoke with a feeling of dread such as I hadn’t had in a long time. It surrounded me like a cloak. Happy New Year.

For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.

That feeling stayed with me off and on for the entire week. I prayed, I did battle. I also kept thanking God for each new day, which is always a gift we don’t deserve, no matter how we may be feeling. I also spent some sleepless nights trying to map out the coming year. I solved unsolvable puzzles in my mind at 2:00 AM awaiting the alarm at 4:00 AM. Finally, the last part of my week ended. I felt like Jacob after he wrestled with the angel of God all night.

The truth is, all of us are walking around with our hips out of joint. All of us are in a battle of some kind or another.

Sunday January 10th, I decided to put dread and fear on hold. It was a wonderful day. E had rigged up an ingenious antenna so that we could get all four PBS stations and I watched them off and on all day just because I could. We had a wonderful dinner and I made scones for dessert which we ate with lemon curd and blackcurrant jam. We lifted our glasses as we watched two episodes of Downton, the one we missed and the new one.

This morning the dread threatened to come back, I was awake at 2 again and prayed for merciless sleep. I envisioned the still pond, the diamonds on the water, I recalled the sounds of the waves, and the foghorn in the night. I asked Jesus to send me some sleep and after about an hour He did.

This morning I beat back the darkness by opening the Word. For God has given us a promise, that if we open His word with expectation of receiving what it has the power to give; He will provide us with light on our path, if only just for the few steps we must walk today.

I remembered Lady Galadriel’s parting gift to Frodo in Lord of the Rings, the glass vial filled with the light from the star of Earendil. She tells him, ” I give you the light of Eärendil, our most beloved star. May it be a light for you in dark places, when all other lights go out.”

Jesus said: “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” There will be days in this life when we wake filled with fear, dread, even despair, but we can always take hope and take heart, if we are believers.

Do you see it? It’s right there just off the trail. A sunny spot with a log perfect for sitting so that we can turn our faces to the Son and the sun, so we can warm enough to go on again.

This morning I have already laughed and cried reading Anne Lamott’s new book “Small Victories.” She is one of my little patches of sun today. In her book I read these lines by Wendell Berry:

“it may be that when we no longer know what to do, we have come to our real work, and that when we no longer know which way to go, we have begun our real journey.”

Take heart and take hope today with me friends. I have never done this before on my blog, though other bloggers do it each year. My word for this year which the Holy Spirit dropped into my heart this morning is “Stand.” Because before you walk or run, you need to stand. And stand strongly.

A very Present help……..

God is our refuge and strength,
A very present help in trouble.
Therefore we will not fear, though the earth should change
And though the mountains slip into the heart of the sea;
Though its waters roar and foam,
Though the mountains quake at its swelling pride. Psalm 46:1-3

The Holy Spirit loves us with a love that is so fierce, so deep we can scarcely imagine it. How else can you explain His willingness to come and take up residence inside us? Voluntarily. It’s beyond humbling.

He lives quietly and sorrowfully day after day as He sees how I fritter away time and opportunity and douse my hours with endless fear and worry. And still, He’s there to celebrate my little joys as well. What a gentleman God is. Big enough to keep the universe in motion with less than a thought, and yet small enough to fill up the hollowed out places inside me.

He watches and waits as I churn myself up inside with everything that doesn’t matter and some things that do but that I can’t fix anyway and then He takes the leftover space in my heart, my mind. It’s this backwards kind of living that gets us every time. Some things have seeped in though.

I know that starting the day seeking Him first always works. And I know that He will never leave me, that’s a promise He will never break. And that’s good to know in the wee hours of the morning when I can’t sleep.

Thank you Lord, for being there as you always are at 2 AM. I am not sure why You selected that time, but I have come to think of it as Ours. All this time I have been blaming the cat and it’s been You. Maybe that’s the only time you can really get my full attention. And thank you for letting me fall back asleep afterwards.

I think maybe you spend our whole lives trying to get us to get just this one lesson:

He says, “Be still, and know that I am God;

Amen. I think it may be starting to sink in………

Deep calls to deep

Some people think nature calls in a soft voice. I think it shouts quietly. There’s a difference.

What’s it shouting you say?

Things aren’t always what they seem…….like this bloom from a lowly thistle we know as the artichoke plant.

Do you see the bee? I almost missed it, and I took the picture a year ago.

There is a whole universe wrapped up in your back yard.

Just step out the door and open your eyes.

And you will see God.

He is waiting to fill us……so that we may never thirst for anything else. He calls us to the deep end.

It’s easy to tread water when you know you can touch bottom.

He’s calling us to swim further out.

Better yet, just jump.

He has never once failed to catch me.

Tired of treading water in the cesspool of worry?

Stop treading and float, my friends.

I took my troubles to the LORD; I cried out to him, and he answered my prayer. Psalm 120:1

When its still waters you seek………..

“The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside quiet waters. He restores my soul……”

The other day I awoke with a feeling of disquiet, of unrest. I felt like a rubix’s cube that someone had tried to fit back together wrong. Or that maybe there was a piece missing. I carried the feeling around that whole day. I was craving peace and still waters but I wasn’t sure how to go about getting it, I just knew I wanted it…..needed it.

Living the Christian life, we know those days will come. The best part however, is that we know they won’t last. We carry a living hope that refuses to let us despair, for we carry Christ wherever we go. The Holy Spirit rests deep within our soul. He is the still water we seek, and though at times the turbulence of this world rocks us, sends uneasy ripples in any number of ways, we need not worry.

Yesterday in prayer as I opened the Word, I felt those ripples begin to quiet as I read the words, fingered through those pages in the early hours. After awhile, I felt their calm assurance slowly begin to fit the pieces back together. I sensed a hope as I closed my eyes and once again meditated on those quiet waters. I felt Him start to restore my soul.

Because we need that, each day, don’t we?

The world rips us at the seams. People do it too, with hurtful words or actions tossed carelessly in our direction. The world is full of unrest, but here in this calm, in the eye of the storm, He restores us. He lets us know that no matter what happens outside.

He will be here with us on the inside. Where the still waters lie.

He guides me in the paths of righteousness for His name’s sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil, for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; You have anointed my head with oil; My cup overflows. Surely goodness and loving-kindness will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. Psalm 23

Photos: Gilbert Riparian Preserve, Gilbert Arizona, and The Bloedel Reserve, Bainbridge Island, Washington

What Matters Most

How blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the path of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers! But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in His law he meditates day and night. He will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in its season and its leaf does not wither; and in whatever he does, he prospers.

The wicked are not so, but they are like chaff which the wind drives away; therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, Nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous. For the Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish. Psalm 1:1-6

I was grieved by the news today. We’ve become a nation that now thinks it’s okay to openly negotiate with murders and cold-blooded killers. (I am speaking of the Taliban) Our government traded five notorious radicals that would think nothing of beheading your children, your elderly parents, your wife, your husband, your best friend, for a U.S. soldier who went missing as a deserter of his platoon. His own father uttered an Islamic greeting, referring to allah, during the press conference at the White House and he has also said he wants every detainee released from Guantanamo.

Meanwhile, Saeed Abedini, an Iranian-American Pastor who converted to Christianity, is serving the first year of an 8 year prison term for working with the underground church in Iran and protecting Iranian Christians from persecution. He was also working to open orphanages in Iran. He has endured long stints in solitary confinement, according to his supporters, beatings and torture at the hands of his jailers and fellow inmates. For months, he has been “denied proper medical attention for his injuries, according to his family and attorneys.”

His wife has repeated appealed to congress and the President for his release with no response.

All this to say, that while events of this world and the news distress us, we shouldn’t be surprised by any of it. Jesus Himself said as such. Instead we need to be focused on keeping our eyes on the One who keeps us in His peace and holds us in His grace. While there is always much to worry and stress about in this life, there is more beauty still.

Lately, my prayer has been that I will wake up before it’s too late. I don’t want to live from weekend to weekend just getting by. Sometimes, those of us with particularly stressful jobs (and really, who doesn’t?) put ourselves on autopilot. When we do that, we fail to really see the people and situations around us.

There is so much to be thankful for every day. Time is flying by at warped speed and I don’t want to miss what God has for me. No matter what we might think about the current political climate, with eternity’s values in view, it really doesn’t matter. What does matter is our relationship to our Father and to each other.

And love, love always matters most of all.

Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things. Philippians 4:8

Blooming thanks today

So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness. Colossians 2:6-7

I had made a potato salad for Easter the night before. Then I got up the next morning sick. Bad sick. Sicker than I have been in about 6 years. E had gotten it before me and she was still down too. Easter came and went, and so did the day after. By the third day I felt a little bit like I had been in a tomb right along with Jesus. Well, not really but I felt like it.

I can’t say I was grateful to be sick, but I do remember thinking that I was grateful that it fell on my weekend and that I had three days to just lay down and be sick. Many people get sick and have young children to take care of, or their elderly parents. Or a job that they just can’t leave. And I remember being grateful for the fact that I had a nice soft bed to be sick in.

There was one night, however, where I didn’t feel very grateful. At…..all. I couldn’t sleep and the devil was really stoking up my fire in the ‘ol hot flash furnace, as well as chills from the flu and to top it off a headache right behind my eyes. I was whining, complaining to God. I….just….wanted…..sleep.

I recited the Lord’s Prayer and the 23rd Psalm repeatedly, in between trips to the freezer for frozen water bottles. I tried visualization of still waters and green pastures dotted with sheep peacefully grazing. They blinked at me and went back to grazing.

As the hours ticked by I got mad. My prayers turned to whining as I lay there thinking about the coming summer heat and wondered how in the world I will ever get through five months of it. Sometime around 4:30 I fell asleep.

When I awoke I felt human again and filled with the kind of joy that feels almost impossible after feeling so bad just a few short hours before. Despite all my nighttime grumbling, God put His stamp of blessing on me for no good reason other than that fact that He loves me.

And now I am staring back down the week reflecting joyfully that I have reached my weekend once again. This weekend will be Easter for me, and really, isn’t every new day? As I stepped out to the car in the early dark the birds were already starting to sing, and as I drove down the freeway I was singing too.

I strolled through the big glass double doors with a spring in my step this morning because it’s the last day of my work week and once again, He has brought me through every challenge.

So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness.

I’ve never thought much about the word “continue” in the verse above, but in the final analysis, continuing is what matters most of all. Especially when you are continuing with Jesus, not just as friend but Lord and God.

Depending on what you are going through, continuing can be a really hefty word. Sometimes just continuing feels nothing short of impossible. But when we take one step forward with hope in His strength. All things are truly possible.

Continue……in peace. With your hope firmly rooted in Him. In due time, He will reward you with joy.

On Alzheimer’s and feeling lost

We had plans to go to dinner with our neighbors from Canada who were leaving the next morning. She called me on the way to her Moms Carehome after work and asked if I would please go over and give them her apologies, that she wouldn’t be able to make it.

She was driving her route when she got the first two calls and couldn’t return them. After work, she returned the third call. One of the aides picked up. “Your Mom is not doing well, she is crying and asking why no one has been to see her and asking where her husband is?” He has been gone for almost a year and she hasn’t asked about him in just about that many months.

Her Mom has been in the facility over a year and she has settled reasonably well. But now, this.

The panic, the caregiver’s stress, in a moment it all came flooding back. Of course it never really left. Her days continue to be divided by work, home and going to see her Mom to do those tasks that seem to fall through the cracks continually.

I needed to go there, I heard the desperation in her voice and I thought maybe seeing another familiar person would help jog her Mom back into the present. I had to try.

When I got there they were seated at the dining table. E. was relieved to see me and her Mom perked up and said, “There’s Lori, Curtis must have come with her.” I groaned inwardly, and E. scurried around helping her Mom and assisting others at the table. I sat by Bethany and Joyce as they were passing out Dixie cups of ice-cream and had one myself.

Finally we got her to go back to her room, where we found she had been squirreling away socks and two bottles of water in her purse, ready to hit the road. Then the round of questions started all over again.

Where is Curtis?……When are we going home?……How long have I been here?……..What happened to the car?….. How much does all this cost?…..What do I have to do at the house?

It was like she was reliving the events of the past year all over again, back to square one.

E. looked over at me helplessly when Joyce asked where Curtis was for the 10th time. I shrugged helplessly back and mouthed the words…..”I don’t know.”

It was a day later that I had a kind of small personal epiphany. Sometimes, honestly, I feel just as lost as she does. I think we all do. We like to think we have an element of control, but as I sat in that room I wanted to ask the same questions Joyce was asking.

What happened to the last year? Where am I? Why do I feel so ill-equipped at handling day-to-day living sometimes? What happened to the person I was 5, 10, 15 years ago?

Sometimes life just beats the tar out of you.

By the time we left, Elaine was wiped out. She felt like she had propelled her Mom safely back to shore, but it took everything she had.

If dealing with Alzheimer’s has taught me anything, it’s taught me empathy. In watching Joyce, I see a bit of my own desperation and the desperation of the human condition in general. In the mirror of her lostness, I see my own.

It has also taught me the necessity of living one day at a time and doing the best I can with what God has given me. There are days that are hard, when you feel a little bit crazy, but then the next day is better.

And as long as God is the One rowing me safely back to shore, I will be okay.

How to remain soft (when the world gets too hard)

In any given day we are exposed to hundreds of bits and pieces of information at rapid fire pace. Some of them are totally useless. This is why I listen to the news only enough to know what is going on in the world and no more.

We live in a world of sensationalism; of endless noise, where the biggest, saddest story gets the headlines. It’s the stories that hold the most tragedy, the most grief that are waived endlessly in front of our eyes all day long. I wonder what all this does to our psyches?

For the most part, there is little we can do about any of the events we hear about every day. Added on top of that, we have family, friends, jobs and responsibilities. Things and people who can’t wait.

We tend to filter it all out in order of importance, but some of the other stuff leaks in anyway. We have to let some things slide. In fact, it gets easier and easier to let more things slide. How do we deal with all these things we can do nothing about? It’s a question I have been asking myself.

While I was back home, there were two obituaries in the paper. A young girl and a young man who should have had everything to live for committed suicide. One of them jumped in front of a train and the other shot herself. And then hungry displaced Ukrainian children and the missing Malaysian flight with 239 people…..gone.

I wonder if we are all much more desensitized than we realize. I wonder if it’s all making me more desensitized to events in my own world than I realize? It scares me to think that.

In the world of long ago, many of us lived in small communities. We knew each other and each others families. When Sally fell into a well, or when Billy fell off the tractor, we all gathered together to help. When someone died, we all cried together, prayed together.

We dressed in black and went to the funeral, brought food to the family.

And slowly everyone healed. Grew closer together. We had a sense of resolution. It felt like some kind of closure.

But now I wonder. And it makes me think that what I do is even more important than ever. This getting alone with God in the mornings. As of late, I have been thinking that maybe it’s just something I do out of habit like reciting a memorized prayer by rote.

But even memorized prayers have words with meaning, words that God can fan into flame with His power just like He can ignite our hearts to love all over again.

I think of Jesus when He was on this earth. I think of how hard it must have been to see the heartache and know that He could have just waved His hand and taken it all away. But He didn’t. He healed hearts and people one at a time, just like He wants us to do now.

Jesus had the ability to display perfect empathy in every situation. One person at a time. And He had to get away for a while too, even though He was God.

He got alone by the water, alone on the mountain. Who are we to think we don’t need to?

Yesterday the parking lot beckoned like an oasis. On break I went out to my quiet car because my brain just wouldn’t quit. I closed my eyes and remembered the sound of the waves.

I was worried about my Mom who was sick and my Dad whose body is failing him in many ways. And I felt my brother’s wounds and sorrow too. I heard my niece processing her fears of missing me “when Nori goes back to work,” and I heard my Mom’s voice as she wistfully said, “Mom’s and daughters shouldn’t be separated.” I agree Mom. I hear you, you’re right. I felt it all, along with the joy.

As I sat there with the sun warming my shoulders, I threw a line of prayer out every now and then, not feeling it much. With my eyes still closed, I startled when I heard the rustle of wings close, and the unmistakable squeak of a dove as she landed. Right on the lip of my sunroof.

She stood staring down at me, so close we were almost eye to eye. I thought she might just fly into the car, but she just looked at me for a moment and flew off. It was a visitation. One moment of a hundred others in the day that stood out. A God moment.

And heading home, welcome words from a text on my phone.

“I am not going to the gym, I made dinner.” Oh, how I needed those words. A peaceful and restful evening after steak and asparagus. Oh yes, I will go to the gym tomorrow.

But for right now, this is how I heal. This is how we all heal each other.

Because sometimes, even after vacations, you still need a little rest.

Lori's Prayer Closet

"And when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done is secret, will reward you……"Matthew 6:6

Anxiety