Lessons

Happy Valentine's Day

2012-02-13T09:04:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone:

Happy Valentine's Day. I haven't posted a new blog yet this week because I had my blog redone and am waiting for the new site to appear. This should happen very soon and then I will post the blog I wrote to go with the page.

In the meantime, I just wanted to tell all of you that Jesus loves you. He really does love you. Sometimes people don't feel loved on Valentine's Day. We look at our our earthly relationships, especially with that significant other in our life, or lack of significant other, and we don't feel loved. At least not loved the way we hunger to be loved.

But know that you are loved. Jesus loves you, and when I write my blogs with you my friends and readers in mind, I feel a great love for you. I realize this love is from the heart of God. It really is true: God loves us. And if we love His Son Jesus, we will also love the people in our life.

The command: Love your neighbor as yourself, only came in second to Love the Lord God with all your heart.

The question isn't "Does Jesus love me?" The question to ask ourselves today is: "Do we love Jesus?" And if we love Jesus, how does that devotion play itself out in our daily lives?

The real Saint Valentine was a man who died because he loved Jesus. Look him up. Just Google "Saint Valentine" and see what you find.

Try spending this Valentine's Day focusing on Jesus instead of just your earthly loved ones.

With each blog I write, I pray Jesus will touch those who read the words I place on the page. I pray there will be healing and deliverance from trouble and sickness and evil in your lives. That marriages are rescued and children are helped and kept safe. That God will place the lonely in families, and put His peace upon each and every one of you.

Far beyond the words I write, my prayers for you fill this blog. And if you have specific prayers you'd like me to pray, please leave me a comment of what I can pray for you. If you don't want to share your prayer request with our blog family, email me privately at: psbicknell@yahoo.com. And if you do share a prayer request publicly, I pray that each of you will pray for that person who has left the prayer comment.

I love praying for you. And I am so thrilled when you tell me that God has helped you. Healed you. Rescued and redeemed you.

So remember on Valentine's Day that you are loved. And if you want more love in your life, surround yourself with more people who love Jesus. Because if people really love Jesus, they will love you as well.

Prayers for peace and love in your life today.

Warmly,
Paula

The Little Hen

2012-02-06T07:56:00.000-08:00

The little hen waits at the chicken coop door. The other chickens want their food. She wants a tender look. The other chickens are strong and proud. She is meek and sweet. They eat first. She eats last. She watches me come and watches me go, the one who nourishes her. Always watching for me, the little hen with her broken beak.

Last spring she came to us as a chick. Lost in a fluff pile of other chicks from the feed store. Her little, shattered beak a death sentence. We bought her that way. Already broken.

Yet, it was her brokenness that endeared her to us. The boys held her in their grubby little boy hands as she learned to live a different way. Dependent.

The other chicks so self-seeking. Strong. Healthy. Full of themselves.

The little hen needy. Weak. Waiting. Full of hope in a healer. Growing strong because of brokenness.

How well I understand this little hen. Need has taught her love. In brokenness she has become more than the strong. I am her keeper and I keep her first. Watch over her best. Love her most because she loves me. My broken little hen.

Lord watch over us. May we be your broken ones. The ones who watch for you. Hope in you. Love you.

"I love them that love me" Proverbs 8:17.

"Because he loves me," says the LORD,
"I will rescue him;
I will protect him, for he
acknowledges my name.
He will call upon me, and I will
answer him;
I will be with him in trouble,
I will deliver him and honor him.
With long life will I satisfy him
and show him my salvation" Psalm 91:14-16.

MY OWN WAY

2012-01-28T11:03:00.000-08:00

"Are you determined to have your own way in living for God? We will never be free from this trap until we are brought into the experience of the baptism of "the Holy Spirit and fire" (Matthew 3:11). Stubbornness and self-will will always stab Jesus Christ. It may hurt no one else, but it wounds His Spirit. Whenever we are obstinate and self-willed and set on our own ambitions, we are hurting Jesus. Every time we stand on our own rights and insist that this is what we intend to do, we are persecuting Him. Whenever we rely on self-respect, we systematically disturb and grieve His Spirit. And when we finally understand that it is Jesus we have been persecuting all this time, it is the most crushing revelation ever.

Is the Word of God tremendously penetrating and sharp in me as I hand it on to you, or does my life betray the things I profess to teach? I may teach sanctification and yet exhibit the spirit of Satan, the very spirit that persecutes Jesus Christ. The Spirit of Jesus is conscious of only one thing - a perfect oneness with the Father. And He tells us, "Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls" (Matthew 11:29). All I do should be based on a perfect oneness with Him, not on a self-willed determination to be godly. This will mean that others may use me, go around me, or completely ignore me, but if I will submit to it for His sake, I will prevent Jesus Christ from being persecuted."

From My Utmost for his Highest by Oswald Chambers.

I had a dream last night that Scott brought home five babies wanting me to raise them along with our seven kids. When I balked at this, he placed one in my lap, a little dark-haired girl with big brown eyes. "Okay, just this one," he said before walking away, leaving the baby with me. I still didn't like the idea, but my spirit began to yield to this, my dream thinking spinning out: well Cruz is hard, but maybe this little girl will be easy and I'll survive.

Then Scott returned with another baby. This one didn't have a child's head, it had a rabbit head. I said, "Scott, it doesn't even have a baby's head, it's a rabbit head."

He said, "Oh, the baby's head is under there somewhere." And he began to try to pull off the rabbit head, which alarmed me. Unsuccessful in this attempt, Scott then walked away leaving the little brown-eyed girl and rabbit baby with me, and then the dream turned into a frightening nightmare with evil men pursuing me, trying to kill me. I fought back like a three-legged coyote, chewing-my-own-limb-off-determined to get away from the killers. Finally, I woke up sweaty and shaken and a little miffed with God that I struggle with nightmares from time to time.

Then in my devotions this morning, I read the above Oswald Chambers. Conviction fell upon me that there is still a lot of self-will in my life. I tend to think I'm surrendered because I have seven children. But the truth is, I'm a hard nut to crack. I haven't lain all the way down yet. I'm doing the limbo, leaning farther and farther back in my walk with Christ with each child He places in my womb, but in no way have I lain down yet resting fully in Christ.

This makes me sad because I want to joyfully surrender everything to my Savior. He gave his all for me on the cross, I want to give my all for Him on this earth. Perhaps the rabbit baby dream came about because the boys went to the dentist this week. Three of them came out cavity free so we went to the pet store to pick out their treats. Fish for our aquarium. But of course when we got there, two of the boys didn't want fish. They wanted furry critters. "No way," I said holding on tightly to my high horse. In the past, we've done hamsters, rats, and dwarf hamsters (tiny devil hamsters).

Who takes care of these varmints?

Me.

Presently I feed fish, dogs, cats, chickens, and often the horses, along with boys coming out my ears and a baby that lives to nurse. I was not about to take on one more feeding and poop chore. We left with three new fish, only to return to a dead aquarium motor so I had to go back to the store to replace it. No motors sold separately fit our tank so purchasing a new aquarium was required. I then swapped out the motors last night.

Should have dreamed of fish head baby. But the crazy dream did one profound thing. Followed with the Oswald Chambers, this morning I see self-will as the root cause of my lack of resting in Christ these days.

So I come to the Savior this morning confessing self-will. Pleading to be healed of this sin so I can rest in Him.

Trust in Him.

Live for Him.

I'm Getting Happy

2012-01-18T19:31:00.000-08:00

Last week G2 got in trouble. Dad sent him to his room where he pouted in a chair. Feeling bad for him, I grabbed a children's prayer book and sat down beside him. One prayer, then two, three, four... on we read and prayed. About halfway through the book, G2 looked up at me. "I'm getting happy," he said with wonder on his precious little face.

I was getting happy, too.

A few days after G2's trouble, our eighteen-year-old daughter got in a car accident. She's all right, but her car is now in the shop. Just days earlier, she bought this car. The night of the accident, she woke me up to pray with her. Kneeling down beside my bed, she buried her face in my hair right on top of my ear. Half asleep, I whispered a prayer for her as she cried into my hair. After she left, I rolled back over to face the baby sleeping by my side and found that I could not hear out of my ear. It was filled with my daughter's tears.

The next morning I asked her how she was doing.

"Much better," she said.

"Are you getting happy?" I asked her.

"Thanks for praying for me last night. It really helped," she answered.

G2 is known for his profound statements. "I'm getting happy" is a new term we've added to our family sayings courtesy of our four-year-old prophet.

A day or two after Lacy's accident, Cami came home for a visit. Because she had college friends with her and wanted to take her brothers along to visit Oma and Opa's ranch, she and I traded cars for the afternoon. When Cruz and I pulled into the driveway in Cami's little Kia that I'd filled with groceries, I was already planning my attack on the house. First I'd shelf the canned goods, stuff the cold things in the fridge, then start another load of laundry and dinner. But when I stepped up to the door carrying the baby in one arm and groceries in the other, the key on Cami's chain did not fit our lock.

Back to the car I went for my cell phone. "Cami," I said when she answered my call a few rings later. "Your key won't open the door."

"Oh no," she responded. "That's my apartment key. My house key is in my purse."

I groaned. With a baby and groceries and a ton of things to do in the house, I was locked out. Scott wouldn't be home for two more hours. Checking all the windows with Cruz in my arms, I found them soundly locked.

Heading for the garage, I pulled out an ice chest and stashed the cold groceries there. Then Cruz and I walked down the driveway, fed and watered the horses in their pastures, then saw to the chickens. That took all of 15 minutes. Still an hour and forty-five minutes to kill and I was not happy. I considered mowing the lawn with Cruz on my lap, but decided I'd be in trouble with my husband if I did that. Scott would think that was too dangerous, putting Cruz on the mower with me. The thought of not getting any more chores done until hubby got home left me even more unhappy. I absolutely hate getting behind on chores because they pile up quick at our place. My unhappiness was growing until I realized I needed to pray.

Of course! I loaded the rest of the groceries on the bench beside the front door, then nursed Cruz in the car. While feeding the baby, I prayed. By the time Cruz finished his late lunch, I'd begun to feel better about my predicament.

After nourishment in the car, we headed for the trampoline. I removed my shoes, left Cruz in his leather booties, and we bounced around for a little while. As we bounced, I prayed some more, thanking God for all the good things that had happened during the week. It was Friday. Then I thanked Him for the bad things, like the flu bug our family was still battling and Lacy's car accident and getting locked out of the house.

After bouncing around a bit more with a smiling Cruz, I laid down on the trampoline and stared up at the blue sky. Cruz crawled circles around me babbling his sweet baby language.

And then it hit me, I was happy. Not kind of happy. Really, really happy. Staring up at heaven on a rare January day that felt more like June, I discovered that peace was pouring through me. Joy was pouring through me. God's love was pouring through me.

I could hardly believe it. "Cruz, I'm getting happy!" I said to the baby.

He babbled something back at me, his face one big smile. I couldn't remember the last time I'd laid around just staring at the sky. "This is amazing," I told Cruz. "We need to get locked out of the house more often. I'm having a great time out here doing nothing."

But I wasn't doing nothing. I was praying.

That's the thing about praying. People say stuff like, "Well, all we can do is pray... Or we might as well pray... Or there is nothing left to do but pray...

But thanks to G2, I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that praying promotes happiness.

I hope you're getting happy today ;)

The Jesus Hole

2012-01-06T09:47:00.000-08:00

For Christmas nine month old Cruz (my nickname for little man) got one of those toddler toys where pieces fit into the holes. The shapes are all different: square, star, round, heart, etc. Cruz likes to crawl around carrying a piece in his hand. The toy that holds the pieces is often abandoned on the rug, but one little shape is packed all over the house. Cruz thinks he can stick it anywhere, even the dog's ear. He's a determined boy and the dog does her best to avoid him because that piece does not fit a dog's ear.

I've been told that I often come on too strong speaking about Jesus. "You need to find common ground with people before you start talking about God," they say.

This reminded me of Cruz trying to stick his piece in the dog's ear. There are people out there who want to talk about football. Want to talk about politics. Want to talk about China. Their holes are different than my piece. And that's okay. The shape in my hand doesn't fit everybody. People with a different fit move on. I move on. God has given me a job to do: look for the Jesus hole.

Cruz is a child. He operates like a child. The piece in his hand becomes part of him. He crawls with it. Eats with it. Sleeps with it. Tries sticking that piece in impossible places. The dog keeps her eye on him. Cruz comes on too strong.

I want to be like young Cruz with his key to the universe. The Jesus piece in my hand.

Yesterday, I went to a drug store to buy face wash. The woman at the counter struck up a conversation with me. She was a little thing. Fragile. Dark circles under her vulnerable eyes. She talked about her New Years Eve. Stayed up late, but didn't drink, she tells me. She looks tired.

Where is this conversation going? I wonder, pressing the Jesus piece in my hand.

"I was in the hospital the week before that. Almost died," the woman says.

"What happened?" I ask.

"I got an infection. A super bug."

I'm squeezing my Jesus piece now. Pulling it out, ready to see if it fits her hole.

"I have medical bills I can't pay, but I'm alive. Most people die from this bug."

"I will pray for you," I say, looking into her hurting eyes there in line at the cash register. This promise doesn't seem enough. Prayers for later aren't enough. "Can I pray for you now?" I'm placing the Jesus piece, looking for the fit. And I see it in her eyes. She has the hole. The Jesus hole...

Closing my eyes, I bow my head and pray for her there in the drug store. Loud enough for her to hear. Loud enough for everyone to hear. The key to the universe seeking... This woman with the bug and the bills and the Jesus hole seeking...

After the prayer, she grasps my hand. She is grateful. I am grateful. We have Jesus.

When life is too strong, it's good to come on strong.

Jesus: "My strength and my song," Exodus 15:2. Sing on.

The Scooter

2011-12-30T09:05:00.000-08:00

G2 got a scooter for Christmas. All the boys got scooters. They roar around the house now with their hair on fire. Except for G2. He's too small to make his scooter fly. The scooter is more than he can handle and he trails after his older brothers yelling in frustration. I feel his pain. G2 is living a life that's too big for him. So am I.

It's all about expectation.

Each vacation I expect some relaxation. At least a little book reading. A moment on the couch. Aren't vacations supposed to be this way? Restful? I always buy a novel. Something fun and fictional.

Scott is out of school with the kids. We have no schedule. People ask what plans we have for the holiday. "Nothing," I say with great hope. "We plan to do nothing."

I'm living in expectation. So is G2. He thinks he can ride that scooter. He watches his brothers. Sees how it's done. And develops a plan that works in his head. His heart wants to fly on that scooter, but the way it plays out is nothing like he planned.

I never read the books. Buy one every vacation and never read it. With everyone home there's more laundry. More dishes. More mud on the floors. And this is where the expectations run me over. I want to have fun with my family. Read and relax a little too. And still keep a clean house. It's like the scooter. I know it can fly, but in my smallness, I can't make it happen. And the couch is there. And the novel is there. And between the couch and the novel is a mess a mile high. How can a mom relax with her boys hanging from the rafters and toys and half-eaten snacks stacked to the ceiling?

"We've had a Christmas explosion," I tell my sister-in-law to explain the bomb that went off in our living room. The boys scooter around the mess and scream down the driveway. I follow them to feed the cats. And chickens. And horses. And then it happens. G2 learns how to fly...

Luke is fourteen and strong. Fast and agile and athletic as can be. He takes pity on G2. Steps onto the scooter behind his little brother. The two become one, and beauty abounds.

Down the long dirt driveway three scooters dash... G2 far in the rear now whistles like the wind with Luke on his wing. Past the first brother. Past the second brother. G2 and Luke going so fast I bite my tongue. The mother in me wants to scream for Luke to slow down. G2 has no helmet like the other brothers. Luke is without a helmet too. And they are flying. Flying. I didn't know a scooter could go so fast on a dirt road.

And I look at G2's shining face and my heart sings. It sings. Because I want to fly like that on my mommy scooter that cooks and cleans and wipes up the mud and plays with my family and feeds cats and chickens and horses and my soul. My soul...

Because my soul gets hungry on vacation. My feeding schedule is off. There is always a boy in my ear. In my room. In my bed. In the middle of my Bible. A boy wanting breakfast. Wanting a bath. Wanting a band-aid.

Wanting. Wanting. Wanting...

my soul wanting...

to fly.

"Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me" John 15:4. My Jesus Calling devotion this morning...

My big brother Jesus taking pity on me. He has climbed on my scooter. By His grace I will fly.

More Christmas Memories

2011-12-24T19:40:00.000-08:00

I'm in the seventh grade draped in ruffles and lace by the designer Jessica McClintock this Christmas. It is the year I stop growing. I have a woman's body and a young girl's heart. Some days I love my new curves. Other days I want to die of embarrassment. The body bleeds monthly. Daily bleeds the junior high heart. Girls can be mean. Boys stupid. Life is confusing. I fight with my mom over profound things... mascara, heels, skirts that hug my hips.

All dolled up in McClintock, I go to Grandma's. The pony grandma. She and my carpenter grandpa raised four boys; one my dad. Only two of those boys married and bore children. I am the only girl out of four grand kids. We do pony Grandma's Christmas at my uncle's house that seventh grade year. A stunning ranch home with a swimming pool. Uncle has money. And naked statues in his yard. He is single, but not alone. I love the man by his side. It's like I have two uncles. But this man and my uncle have a monkey that freaks me out. I've been told Monkey bites menstruating women.

This year I am extra terrified of this twenty pound mini baboon with a raw, rosy butt. Monkey is jealous of everything female. For some reason all Uncle's animals seem to be female. Monkey torments the cats, launching herself off the roof onto their backs. The dogs hate Monkey, too. They also get kamokazed by her. Twice Monkey has eaten my grandpa's hearing aid when he left it beside the pool while swimming. Grandpa cusses at Monkey. Monkey doesn't care. She is the ugly "lady lord" of Uncle's eccentric estate.

When I walk in wearing Jessica McClintock everyone quiets. Uncle looks me over. Smiles wolfishly. "Look," he says. "Little Paula grew chi chi's this year!" The room erupts in laughter. A handful of family members and a whole lot of Uncle's friends delighted by my horrified face.

And that ends Christmas for me. I hide not just from Monkey, but from all those laughing heads. Jessica McClintock will never be the same for me. I breathe a sigh of relief when we get in the car to go to my other grandma's house. Religious grandma. We always do Christmas back to back. Eat double turkey dinners. Start at pony grandma's and end at religious grandma's.

Now days we eat only one Christmas dinner. Both grandmas are gone and Uncle passed last autumn. Monkey died decades ago.

I don't miss Monkey, but I miss Uncle.

In Uncle's final years, he joined us at church on Christmas. And then sporadic Sundays. And then almost every Sunday. He asked me questions about Jesus. We stood in my yard one Christmas Eve a few years ago talking about the Lord.

"I'm a sinner, Paula," he said, politely blowing cigarette smoke away from me.

"I'm a sinner, too, Uncle."

Uncle smiles. His smile so different now. Softer than the afternoon all those years ago when he announced to the world I'd grown chi chi's. A heaven-seeking smile. "I'm a real sinner, Paula.," he says sadly. More smoke blown to the side. He doesn't want the smoke to touch me.

I touch him. Put my hand on his shoulder. "Uncle, I'm a real sinner, too. Jesus died for me for the same reason He died for you. We need his blood to cleanse us. Under the blood we are the same. Washed clean from sin big and small. I love you, Uncle. I want to be in heaven with you someday," I tell him on Christmas Eve.

I think he made it to heaven. My uncle with all his sin. Jesus pouring out all his blood for Uncle. For me. For you. All His blood for big and small.

Tomorrow is Christmas. Most of us will spend the day with family. Many of us have uncles. I doubt they keep a monkey, but I bet a lot of them need Jesus. Don't be afraid to tell your family about the Savior. Love speaks. Love seeks. Love saves.

Have yourself a merry little Christmas. Hopefully without a monkey.

Christmas Memories for Monday...

2011-12-19T10:59:00.000-08:00

I'd hoped to do some Christmas baking today, to make goodies for the people I love, but the flu is in our house and I don't think the people I love want the flu for Christmas. So I've decided to blog today instead of baking. And all I can think about is Christmas... the tree is lit in our living room. The fire is burning. The kids are crazy with Christmas excitement. Each day the boys check the tree searching for new gifts with their names on them. It's so cute. And so annoying. Our presents have shaken present syndrome.
"If your toys are broken, it's all your fault," I tell the boys. I stand there in my apron with my hands on my hips. "You kids be good," I say. "Leave the presents alone."
I've become my grandmother.
And I miss that woman.
Miss her apron. Not the apron itself, but the cooking that went with the apron. I miss Grandma telling me not to touch the gifts. Even the one with my name on it. The gifts under her tinsel draped tree, gifts wrapped so perfectly. Grandma has gone in her bedroom. Closed the door. And wrapped for hours. Just a few gifts wrapped for hours. Wrapped perfectly. Her house so clean. Smelling so good. The dining room table set for the adults. The card table in the laundry room arranged for us kids. We get Tupperware. They get china and crystal. We get to play quietly out of sight. They get to talk and talk and talk. After dinner, my grandma pours the rest of her wine into her coffee. A little wine. A little coffee. A little piece of pumpkin pie. A life of moderation. The rosary before bed. Never, ever miss church.
I miss that woman.
I am a little girl. Small enough to hold Grandma's hand as we walk to the front of the church to look at the Nativity scene. Baby Jesus in the manger. That's my favorite. I like the animals too. The sheep curled up beside the shepherd boy. The donkey in the stable. Is the donkey sweaty from carrying the pregnant Mary all the way to Bethlehem? I ride ponies. And I make them sweat. On a pony, I am a wild little girl. Ride like the Indians... hold the reins in my teeth... Red hair slapping my freckled face. Racing the wind.
My poor grandma trying to civilize me. To church we go. To the altar. To the Nativity scene. "Look at Jesus," Grandma says to me as we stand there holding hands at the altar.
And I see peace... A baby sleeping...
And now after seven babies of my own, I understand this: A baby sleeping = peace.
Her life of moderation: Grandma cooks. Grandma cleans. Grandma wraps perfect presents and puts them under her tinsel tree. I am instructed to only use one tiny piece of tinsel at a time to decorate the tree. This I don't understand. A fistful of tinsel seems right to me. I am young and passionate. Grandma is old and restrained. But most of all, this grandma keeps her eyes on Jesus. She is my church-going grandma.
My other grandma does ponies. This grandma does religion.
Yet, Jesus in a manger is not religious to me. Ponies eat out of mangers. I think Mary rode the donkey till it was sweaty...
I am told to be quiet in church. No talking. No playing. No burping or passing gas or kicking rocks. Okay, my dad says this to us kids when hunting, "No burping, no passing gas (he uses the other term for gas), no kicking rocks. Childhood memories are this way, fluid, like snow softly falling, each flake unique, each memory personal, yet it all seems like snow.
Shake the snow globe. I am a little girl at Grandma's and I love shaking the snow globe. And here again is snow softly falling... I can't remember which grandma showed me the snow globe. Let me hold and shake the globe to make the snow fall. Both grandmas have been gone for years. All this snow softly falling today. Tears falling. Baking would have been easier. My heart wouldn't ache from baking. My heart aches this morning with Christmas memories. Sixteen years ago today Grandma met her Savior face to face. Dying at Christmas time isn't so bad. Not if you see Jesus.
If your heart is aching, too, right now, take your snow softly falling to Jesus.
Prayers of peace sweet friends.

Merry Christmas from the Bicknell family 2011

2011-12-15T19:19:00.000-08:00

There’s a new ruler at the Bicknell house this year: Christian the Conqueror has a mouthful of teeth and he’s not afraid to use them. Nor is he afraid to crawl into a pile of wrestling boys. We think Christian’s strength is in his hair. His natural faux hawk is the envy of the Bicknell brotherhood. Not since Prince Luke the Rotten arrived on the scene has our life been so upended by a baby.

John, Joseph, and Garry are the three musketeers in the middle. God knew what He was doing when He made Luke fast. Those “little middles” love going after their big brother. They are in their glory when Luke lets them catch him. Then all the boys roll around yelling, “Tap out!” to each other. Luke has taken up weight training with Scott at school. He knows it will take muscle to stay on top of the Bicknell man clan. Again this year hunting with Opa, Luke shot a large buck to feed the family. And thanks to Oma, everyone is learning how to farm. The kids and Scott spent the summer planting a walnut orchard with Oma, Opa, and Uncle Patrick. Our fruit trees are also producing and the chickens Oma and the boys raised from chicks this past spring are now laying eggs. God has given us a land of plenty and hands to do the work.

Lacy is in her last year of high school and spends evenings and weekends working at the church nursery. It’s been a big adjustment for Lacy having her own room for the first time in her life. We all miss Cami terribly. Recently, Cami came home for a weekend visit. We were sitting around happy together in the front yard when Garry James gazed at Cami, then at the rest of us and solemnly said, “Looks like a family again,” which brought tears to our eyes. Even a three-year-old understands how our world has shifted with Cami off at college now. Lacy is trying to decide if she should join her sister at Sacramento State University next year or head down to San Diego for school.

Luke continues to enjoy soccer and is gearing up for another mission trip this summer. Last year he experienced Brazil. Thanks to all who helped him go. Someone on the mission team snapped a picture in Rio de Janeiro that said it all: Luke kicking a ratty ball in a slum with a stray dog in the background. Wherever Luke goes he finds a soccer field. And he loved the people there.

Scott and I are doing our best to civilize our sons. Raising boys sure is different than rearing girls. The girls were easy. The boys are crazy. A man once told me that when you have one boy, you have a boy’s help. When you have two boys, you have half a boy’s help. When you have three boys, you have no help at all. He didn’t say what you have when you have five boys. I’ve decided when a mother has five boys she needs a straight jacket or Jesus. I am thankful for Jesus.

Christmas blessings,

Scott, Paula, Cami, Lacy, Luke, John, Joseph, Garry and Christian.

Under the Fig Tree

2011-12-08T14:23:00.000-08:00

Three of our sons (I call them my "little middles") spent yesterday afternoon digging under a tree. Who knows why the boys were digging; like the dogs they just seem to dig for the joy of digging. So after all the digging, I asked the "middles" to wash their grubby, little hands because dirt packed under my kids' fingernails makes me feel like a bad mom.

To help the boys out, I clipped their fingernails first, then one by one, sent them to the bathroom to scrub. In record time six-year-old JoJo had clean fingers. But the other two couldn't seem to get the dirt out from under their nails. G2 I can understand. He's not even four yet. But eight-year-old Red Bull (I call him Red Bull because he's a redhead with the strength of a bull, and everything I read on the net these days says not to use your kids real names when you blog so now I'm trying nicknames.

Three times I sent Red Bull back to the bathroom to wash harder. Finally in exasperation, I told him to go ask JoJo how he'd gotten his nails so clean. Red Bull came back holding G2's new toothbrush. "He scrubbed his nails with this."

"JoJo!" I called. "Get in here right now!"

"What?" said JoJo all innocently when he appeared before me.

"Did you scrub your nails with your brother's new toothbrush?"

He nodded cautiously, waiting for his comeuppance.

"Well, that's thinking outside the box," I said in appreciation. "You could become a Special Forces soldier thinking like that." The U.S. Army looks for guys who get the mission done one way or the other. To be a Special Forces soldier, you have to think wide and deep to solve problems normal folks can't think wide and deep enough to quickly solve. Maybe it's because Scott was once a soldier and our family is still surrounded by daddy's big, strong, soldier buddies that makes all our boys long to be warriors.

"So can I use G2's toothbrush on my nails, too?" Red Bull asked.

"Let's get an old toothbrush and we'll put it in the other bathroom for you boys to use on your nails," I suggested. "We don't want to leave it lying around the sink in your bathroom because you boys will be scrubbing your nails and your teeth with the same brush and that disturbs Mommy." I'm also concerned now about my toothbrush. Where it's been and what it's done...

I tell this story about toothbrushes because it makes me laugh, and as a mother of five boys, if I lose my sense of humor, I will end up in a straight jacket before they're grown. But the real point of this blog is what happens under a tree. A fig tree. The story is found in the Gospel of John, chapter one. Jesus is calling his first disciples, and after he calls Philip, Philip finds Nathanael and says to Nathanael, "We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law, and about whom the prophets also wrote - Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph."

Nathanael replies, "Nazareth! Can anything good come come from there?"

Jesus' response to Nathanael's honesty is this, "Here is a true Israelite, in whom there is nothing false."

"How do you know me?" Nathanael asked.

Jesus answered, "I saw you while you were still under the fig tree before Philip called you."

Then Nathanael declared, "Rabbi, you are the Son of God; you are the king of Israel."

Right away here Nathanael realizes he is in the presence of God because Jesus knows him. Deeply and completely knows all about him before they actually meet.

Is there anyone who deeply and completely knows you?

My husband comes close to knowing me. My parents know me pretty well, too. So does my brother. But the only one who knows me all the way to the bottom of who I really am, all the good, the bad, and the ugly, is God.

And He still loves me.

And He still loves you.

Whether you are a person like Nathanael who lives transparently, or you have a closet full of secrets that are about to sink your ship, God knows and loves you. I don't tell you this lightly. God's love is not a light thing. God's love for you cost Jesus every earthly thing. Jesus suffered and died for you on a cross because God loves you.

My point is that God already knows you. He already loves you. He sees you before you see Him just as he saw Nathanael under the fig tree before Nathanael saw Jesus. You are known. You are loved. And you are forgiven...

if...

If you have reconciled with God. If you have confessed your sins and asked for forgiveness, then there is no need to hide.

Not from others.

Not from yourself.

And not from God.

You are free to live your life openly and honestly. Learning as you go. Saying sorry when you blow it. Seeking help from the Lord every step of the way.

Just as Nathanael was seen and known under the fig tree, you are seen and known under a mighty tree of God's grace. I pray this helps you today. I pray this helps you tomorrow. And I pray this helps you all the days of your life, dear friend.

TAP OUT

2011-12-01T10:05:00.000-08:00

In the middle of doing laundry this morning, I decided I was hot. Not 'hot' as the kids say 'hot'. The old peoples' hot. Sweaty not sexy. Before going to work, Scott had made me a roaring fire. Now my sweater felt too warm. I yanked it off and threw on one of Luke's shirts in the clean clothes pile on top of the dryer, then hit the kitchen dishes like a prize-fighter.

The baby began to wail in his walker and three-year-old G2 yelled for a sandwich. My throat ached from the flu bug I hadn't been able to completely shake for weeks, and I scooped up another article on the counter I didn't recognize and tossed it into the pile of lost and found by our front door.

The lost and found pile is from the wedding we hosted in our front pasture this past Friday, the day after Thanksgiving. I'd about worn out my knees praying over this wedding: an outdoor affair at the end of November in northern California: usually a land of fog, rain, and wind this time of year. In the end, the Lord in his goodness provided sunshine and joy for the big day. His instruction for the occasion: "Be still and know that I am God" Psalm 46:10.

After the wedding, I spent the next several days stumbling around overwhelmed by other things in my life that have sapped my strength and left me feeling small and vulnerable. The baby has fussed since his birth - nearly nine months of fussing - and even the dogs and chickens are too much for me right now. The dogs have been on my naughty list since they tore a bag of garbage to bits and strung it across the freshly groomed lawn the day before the wedding. The new nesting straw I placed in the chicken house yesterday is now flung all over the muddy ground and once again the nests are down to the wood so the hens crack the eggs after laying them.

As weariness overwhelmed me, I left the dishes and scooped up the crying baby, heading for my prayer chair to rock little Christian and hopefully read my Bible if I could get baby asleep on my lap. After taking a seat, I looked down and noticed Luke's shirt which I wore, said, "Tapout" in big, bold letters across the chest. In that instant in my heart, I cried to the Lord, "I'm tapping out!" For those of you who haven't heard of tap out, it means "I surrender! Stop beating me up!" It comes from a mixed martial arts reality show titled: Tapout, that I have never seen. But I hear the term "tap out" every day because my sons who are always wrestling yell "tap out" at each other all the time as they tussle on the living room rug.

In that moment after telling the Lord I was tapping out, a heavenly hush fell over the room. The baby stopped crying and I settled him down to nurse. I closed my eyes and drank in the Lord's strength and sweetness. It tasted so good because I was so thirsty. Sensing the Lord's instruction, I picked up my Jesus Calling devotion and read this:

Let Me infuse My peace into your innermost being. As you sit quietly in the Light of My Presence, you can sense Peace growing within you. This is not something that you accomplish through self-discipline and willpower; it is opening yourself to receive My blessing. In this age of independence, people find it hard to acknowledge their neediness. However, I have taken you along a path that has highlighted your need for Me: placing you in situations where your strengths where irrelevant and your weaknesses were glaringly evident. Through the aridity of those desert marches, I have drawn you closer and closer to Myself. You have discovered flowers of Peace blossoming in the most desolate places. You have learned to thank Me for hard times and difficult journeys, trusting that through them I accomplish My best work. You have realized that needing Me is the key to knowing Me intimately, which is the gift above all gifts."

This passage in Jesus Calling was followed by two of my favorite scriptures: Isaiah 58:11 and Isaiah 40:11. I'm not going to write them out for you here because I want you to go look them up and read them for yourself. Isaiah 40:11 is particularly meaningful to me because the Lord promises that He gently leads those that have young.

After this, I looked down at the baby now sleeping at my breast. Three-year-old G2 still needed his sandwich, but the movie he was watching had captured his attention and he was quiet.

When I finally put Christian in his crib and made the peanut butter and jelly for G2, he said, "This is my favorite movie, Mom." The scene in Narnia was playing where the children come out of the battle victorious in the end.

Filled with peace and renewed strength, I handed G2 his sandwich and returned to my sink full of dishes.

Gotta Get My Crazy Out

2011-11-18T10:05:00.000-08:00

Several Sundays ago Scott retrieved our boys from Bible class. Racing out onto the church lawn, six- year-old Joey headed straight for our Suburban in the parking lot at the edge of the grass and leaped onto the back bumper. He jumped up and down for a moment, shaking the car, then ran to the front of the vehicle and climbed onto the hood. Joey was in the process of scaling the front windshield when Scott yelled, "Joey you're freaking out. Get off the car!"

"I gotta get my crazy out!" Joey hollered back.

"Get off the car, Joey. Now."

"Dad, I've been in church for over an hour. I gotta get my crazy out!"

Fortunately, I was not there to witness this wildness. Scott just told me about it later that evening while I was bemoaning the fact that nice Christian people often act up at sporting events.

"It's like Joey," My husband explained during our conversation. "Christians hold it together most of the time, but then something triggers them, and their crazy comes out."

This got me thinking... what makes me crazy? Recently, while studying the book of James in the Bible, I realized my crazy happens when my buttons are pushed.

You know those buttons: someone who knows you far too well says or does something that immediately gets a rise out of you. My mom can do this to me quite well. Scott can too. So can my kids.

Lately, I've been praying that God would break those buttons inside me. That my hot spots just wouldn't respond anymore to people or events that upset me. In mulling this whole thing over, I realized the buttons are not the real problem. The true issue is "the crazy" inside me. Somehow I must allow God to get in there and cut that crazy out.

Seeking answers on how to do this, I picked up my Bible. I believe every truth I will ever need lies in the Bible. Asking the Holy Spirit to guide me, I popped opened my Bible and let the pages fall where they may. When I first became a Christian, this is how I read my Bible. "Lord speak to me," I would say, then I would just open the Bible and begin reading wherever I landed.

Now that I've walked with the Lord a number of years, I'm more intent about how I study the word, making sure I stick to a daily reading plan and also follow devotionals. But still when I really, really want to hear God, I say a desperate prayer, and then more desperately open my Bible.

Today, in addressing "the crazy" question, I landed on the book of Job. Here is what 31:7 of Job said, "if my heart has been led by my eyes." The Lord has brought this scripture to my attention before. Years ago I was struggling with a shopping problem, and Jesus said to me the problem is because "your heart is led by your eyes."

And that was true back then. I'd walk through a store, see something pretty, and then want it. Had I been blind going through that store, I'd only get the things on my list because my eyes wouldn't be in charge. The list would be in charge.

So now there is a "crazy" inside of me because my heart is led by my eyes. This brings me to another prayer I've been repeating lately in my life. "Lord, please let me be compelled by nothing but the love of Christ." Recently, I realized I'm compelled by a lot of things that are not born out of the love of Christ. Fear sometimes compels me. Pride compels me too. So does approval. And comfort. And security. And then there are those earthly desires...

All these are buttons that push me in ways I don't want to go. And the buttons are wired to a "crazy" because my heart is often led by my eyes not by the Holy Spirit.

Example: I see my surroundings, the people there, the situations in play, and I respond by sight and not by the faith that pleases God. If I was operating in faith, I would hold my peace because "the peace of God which transcends all understanding would guard my heart and mind through my Lord Jesus Christ" Philippians 4:7.

So this puts me at a place I've been many times before... helpless to change myself. There is something broken in me that I can't fix. Like numerous other Christians, I hold it together most of the time, but then because of some person or circumstance that tweaks me, my crazy comes out. I don't run across the church lawn and jump on a car like Joey, since I've learned enough self-control not to act like a wild boy, but still I hate how I feel when a situation gets the better of me.

As I write this, my eight-month-old son is sitting in his basket at my feet chewing on the baby Jesus. It's a little Fisher Price toy from a kid's Nativity scene. Right now I wish I could just swallow a Jesus pill and be done with this crazy inside me. Like taking antibiotics to cure an infection. Yet, according to the Bible, there is a way to heal my heart. It's found in Psalm 51:10. "Create in me a pure heart, O God and renew a steadfast spirit within me."

I pray Psalm 51 today for myself, and also for you as you read this blog and long for God to cut your crazy out, too. May the Lord forgive our sins and set us free to walk by faith and not by sight.

"So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal" 2 Corinthians 4:18.

Amazing Grace

2011-11-10T08:52:00.000-08:00

May 1989: our honeymoon. Driving through San Francisco we decide to walk the wharf. The day is bright and sunny, warm for the city by the bay. "Let's get you a wedding present," says Scott, knowing picking out a gift together will delight me.
At Pier 39, we pop into a music box store. There it is. The perfect wedding gift from a husband to his bride: a white, wooden, laminated music box made in Italy. "Select your song for the box," says the man behind the counter.
"Do you have The Rose I ask. Our wedding song.
"Nope, don't have that one." The man's European accent is strong.
"I smile at Scott. "Okay, how about Stand by Me?" The first dance at our reception.
"Don't have that one, either," the man replies.
Now I'm disappointed. Still, I grin at my husband who so wants to make me happy on our honeymoon. "All right, Amazing Grace?" It's quaint and old-fashioned, but this song never fails to tug at my heartstrings.
"Done!" The man's exuberant response startles me. He grabs the white box and disappears behind a wall beyond the counter. The sound of seagulls blows into the store as two German tourists slip in the front door. Soon the man returns, placing the delicate box before me. In a sweeping gesture he opens the lid and the intricate workings whirl into play. Amazing Grace fills the store. The Germans pause in their browsing. Stand there reverently the way Scott and I do until the music ends.
Ten years later on an island in Maine a gray-bearded man in a kilt plays Amazing Grace on the bagpipes. The tune strings hot tears down my cheeks. Sitting beside Scott at his grandparents' church on vacation, we've grown miles apart in our marriage. Hearing Amazing Grace, I recall the day we picked out the music box full of hope and each other. Now the lean years of love are upon us and the wolf of "what if " is at the door. Thoughts of divorce plague me. An army pilot now, Scott is rarely home. I am a lonely wife wearily raising three small children. Stepping over the church threshold in Maine, sun reflecting off the sea blinds me. God is near.
A year after Maine, Christ becomes my Savior. In a few more years Scott is saved, too. Our marriage flourishes and four more sons fill our home. After more than two decades of marriage, I review God's goodness to us: such Amazing Grace.

For it is grace that draws the sinner
to a place called Calvary
The blooded-stained cross
that calls the lost
and bids the blind to see.
May you find the Savior waiting
when you weary of this world
may his voice you hear
as he draws you near
beckoning, "Come to me."
In his hands you will know healing
at his touch you will find strength
your life will be new
He's steady and true
this God of Amazing Grace.

A Toddler on the Highway

2011-11-03T19:26:00.000-07:00

Five years ago driving up Highway 20 while towing a horse trailer, we came upon a toddler standing along the interstate. The child was all alone watching the traffic roar along. A steady line of vehicles zoomed so close to the tot that his hair and clothes blew in the wind of their passing.

"Was that a little boy by the road?" Scott stepped on the breaks to slow down. When you have a trailer full of horses, the last thing you want to do is stop on a dime.

Whipping my head around to look in the rearview mirror, I gasped. "He's about two-years-old. You have to turn around so we can save him." Immediately I began to pray, please Lord take care of that child. Don't let him move. Don't let a car hit him. Please Lord. Please...

It seemed to take forever to find a place to pull off the highway and turn the truck and trailer around. Vehicles zoomed past going well over the 55 mile an hour speed limit. What is wrong with these people? Don't they see the child? Why hasn't anyone stopped in a car to rescue that little boy? Lord, keep him safe until we get back there!

When we finally returned to the spot, there stood the child only three feet away from speeding traffic. My heart was in my throat.

"This is crazy," said Scott. "He's a baby!"

"I'll get him," I cried, jumping from the truck. Running down the highway, I reached the tiny boy and grabbed his hand. "Hi!" I said breathlessly. "What's your name?"

"Daniel," answered the wide-eyed child. His voice was tiny, too.

"Where's your mommy?"

The toddler turned toward a house at the end of a long driveway. There was a fence around the place but the gate to the drive stood open.

"Is that your house?" Now that I held his hand, relief made me light-headed.

The little boy wouldn't say anything else. I suspected he was just too young to tell me where he lived. Homes clustered along the interstate in this area. I guessed that the little boy lived at the house he'd turned toward when I asked him about his mother.

"Let's take you to your mommy." I smiled reassuringly at him, waved to Scott and our children waiting in the truck, then trekked down the driveway through a well-kept yard with a swing set near the front porch.

When I knocked on the door, a petite woman answered. Her brown eyes went wide when she saw the child at my side. "Daniel!" she cried, looking at him, then back inside the house to where apparently she thought he should be. She called out to other children, then turned back to me.

"I found him beside the highway," I gently told her.

She appeared about to faint.

"He's okay," I reassured her.

I let go of the little boy's hand, and the horrified mother herded him into the house. "Thank you," she said softly.

"You're welcome." I smiled into her distressed eyes hoping she could see that I didn't think she was a bad mother. I had a handful of children, too. I understood how easy it was to lose an adventuresome little boy.

The woman closed the door, and as I returned to our truck, I prayed for her. And I prayed for little Daniel. Thank you Lord for letting me rescue that child. Please Lord comfort his mother. And Lord, please let that little boy grow up to love and serve You, Jesus.

I didn't forget Daniel as the years passed. Each time I drove by his house on Highway 20, I prayed for him.

Then, this past summer, my mom began showering me with food from a lady named Monica that Mom met at Bible study. In the midst of these home-cooked goodies showing up, our oldest daughter was heading off to college, while our 13 year old son was being exposed to a whole new world of temptation via facebook and an iPhone from Grandpa.

Our other children had their stuff, too. The baby was colicky. Our younger boys suffered bumps and bruises from all their little boy play. I'd come to the conclusion that I could not keep all our children safe. There were too many of them and only one of me. I felt anxious and overwhelmed trying to protect seven kids.

Around this time, my mom handed me that first bag of homemade rolls from Monica. "Monica has twelve children. After I told her that my daughter had seven children she asked me to bless you with this food."

As the summer rolled along more homemade meals arrived from this amazing Monica lady. Then one day my mom said, "Monica really wants to meet you." So mom and I and my two youngest children drove to Monica's house nearly an hour away.

I was taken aback when we pulled into Daniel's driveway.

"This is Monica's house?" I asked in amazement. "Daniel lived here." I couldn't believe it. "How long has Monica lived in this home?" I asked.

"I don't know," said my mom. "You can ask Monica that when you meet her. Who is Daniel?"

In a nutshell, I explained little Daniel beside the highway as Mom and I walked to Monica's door. But Monica wasn't home that day.

Still, on that day in Monica's driveway, God taught me a memorable lesson as this scripture imprinted on my heart: "Do not be afraid... because I have many people in this city" (Acts 18:9-10). Jesus said this to reassure the apostle Paul in Corinth that God was watching over him. And at Monica's house, Jesus said something equivalent to me: "Do not be afraid. I have many people to guard your children. Just as you protected my servant Monica's son Daniel on the highway, my people will watch over your children as well."

I still have not been introduced to Monica. But Mom recently met Daniel, a boy of eight-years-old now. When Mom told Monica that I was the person who whisked Daniel off the highway, Monica was embarrassed. She explained to my mom that older siblings were supposed to have been watching him that day and how terrible it was that we found him on the highway.

Someday soon I hope to tell Monica how the Lord used her and Daniel to increase my faith. Because while we live in a dangerous world, God has many people watching out for our children along their way.

A Little Sin Goes A Long Way

2011-10-27T09:42:00.000-07:00

The seventeen-year-old boy throws a water bottle across the parking lot into the bushes. A teacher sees him do it and now there are consequences. The boy is told to retrieve the bottle from the shrubs as tall as he is. On his first attempt he finds a dead bird.

"It's nasty in there. I'll be right back," he tells his teacher. Soon he returns with his little brother and the little brother's two friends. "Get that water bottle for me," he commands the younger boys.
The teacher allows this. There is a lesson to be learned here: your sin affects others.

All of these boys lose much of their lunch recess. The teacher doesn't get to finish his lunch, either. The water bottle is hard to find. The teacher picks up more student garbage as he waits for the boys to accomplish their task. So now four more people are impacted by the seventeen-year-old's decision. All because the boy felt like throwing a water bottle at recess.

The girl is nineteen with a string of abusive boyfriends. She's been arrested for drunk in public and drunk driving. Her tongue is pierced and so is her eyebrow. Her heart is pierced as well. The heart is an old wound acquired as a child. Divorce is often harder on kids than their parents. This particular divorce began with a father's adultery. He didn't want his wife to leave him. He just wanted to have a good time on a night out with his buddies. Ten years later his daughter is a disaster. And she's angry. Her parents destroyed her home so now she is destroying herself. She has made them pay. And pay. And pay to love her.

This is the woman's third miscarriage. She knows that abortion at eighteen has done this. Her mother put her on birth control pills, but as a teen, she forgot to take them. At twenty-eight, her cervix is weak and so is her marriage. She and her husband long for a family. Yet the legacy of once living loosely has left her broken in places she can't fix. And it's breaking the man she loves too.

It all started with a wine cooler from her parents' frig. Then two or three or four coolers come college on her own. Good times. Now twenty years later she lives on wine at night. And sometimes in the afternoon. And sometimes mid-morning when she should be at work. And now she's lost her job and her children and her husband, too.

When does it end? Sin that multiplies like a virus in the body. In the population. Like the Holocaust. Hitler was once a boy. Who grew up to be a man. Who ravished a country. Then a continent. And then a generation of Jews. And Christians. And the handicapped. He hated and murdered them too while the whole world looked the other way. Why?

Because it started small.

Hitler was a boy.

Who grew up to be a man.

Who killed millions.

I posted a video titled: 180 on my facebook wall. It's well worth watching.

How many times have you looked away from sin? Your own sin and that of others? That little sin you just ignore. In yourself. In your children. In other people's children.

Hitler's mother must have had friends. Did they talk to her boy? Pray for him? Love him?

Not long ago

Hitler was just a boy

with a little sin

that went a long way.

Dust Devils

2011-10-19T14:22:00.000-07:00

An Autumn day, crisp blue sky, painted leaves adorning the trees. I ride the mare confidently now. We've gotten to know each other. Her ears turn with a longing to obey my commands. I've learned her nuances. The easy grace of her stride when relaxed. The way she tenses up nervous. A rustle through grass sharpens her. The dog darting from behind produces caution in her step.

Overhead a red-tailed hawk swirls on this slow-moving Sunday afternoon. I am eager to see my brother on the farm across the way and push the mare faster to get to him. All is well until the mare's ears prick. In the saddle I sense the change in her. Reaching down, I stroke her neck. "Steady, girl. What is it?"

For the life of me, I don't see the threat.

Above the sky is unbroken. Our yellow lab continues her sweeping passes in search of rabbits. A crow squawks in the distance. And then it happens. A hush settles over the field. Even the birds fall silent. The mare's nostrils flare. Her body tenses in earnest.

Still, I don't see it. Where is the danger the animals perceive?

My ears pick it up first. The rush of breeze. The swirl of leaves. I turn in search of this strengthening sound. Tighten the reins. "Steady, girl," I say again. "It's only the wind." On a windless day...

The mare would bolt if I let her. I make her stand still and both of us brace ourselves for the impact.
It hits in a vortex of dust and debris. Eyes shut tight, skin stinging from the fallout. The dust devil lingers, punishing us for taking a stand.

The devil has asked to sift you... pops out in my Bible months earlier when I earnestly seek direction for all the things going wrong; Murphy's law maddening the days. Like this moment with the mare, I go still. Pray for the strength to pass this testing of my faith.

Later on the Autumn day, a dust devil hits our son as he exits a friend's car in the driveway of my parents' home. Fourteen-years-old and fast on his feet, the boy dives back in the sedan as dust envelops him. What are the odds of this? I don't believe in coincidences. This is a serial attack on our family. Dust devils and sifting continues.

Nightmares stalk my sleep. Scott has them too, demonic dreams. We both cry out for Christ. Asleep and awake, we call to our Savior. On my horse or in our house, even in my dreams, I take my stand in prayer. In peace.

Peace like a river running red with the blood of Christ.

Satan must pay his respects to the throne room of God to get to us. Jesus at the right hand of the Father, eyes burning with love. We are His redeemed.

"Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you," instructs the Bible in 1 Peter 5:7. "Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings. And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast. To him be the power forever and ever, Amen" 1 Peter 5:8-11.

Halloween

2011-10-14T20:25:00.000-07:00

I walk through stores awash in skulls, evil masks, and horror films. Apparently, people adore Halloween. Parties are planned. Costumes created. The public lines up in droves to visit haunted houses. And I understand why this holiday spins out as all fun and games. I didn't grow up born again. I grew up trick-or-treating.

As a kid, I enjoyed Halloween. In college, I loved it all the more. At nineteen-years-old, I helped run a haunted house. Dressed as the devil, I escorted people through "hell."

When I confess this to our church-raised kids they stare at me like hoot owls. Mouths open, eyes wide in disbelief. A conversation ensues about celebrating a holiday that honors evil. "Why do people sin?" asks one of our sweet, little sons.

"Because sin can seem fun," I answer honestly.

I remember a Halloween before Scott and I married. Actually, we were broken up at the time. Scott was attending the University of Nevada-Reno. On the other side of the state line, I drank way too much while in school at Chico. That Halloween weekend in 1980- something Scott called and said he was coming to visit me. We'd been split up for nine months. He arrived in Chico on Halloween evening.

Donning costumes (I dressed as an Irish leprechaun, Scott painted his face in army camo), we partied with a group of mutual friends for two days straight. On the tail end of this crazy binge, we ate laced brownies and couldn't find our way back to my apartment. For several hours in the middle of the night we laid in someone's lawn stoned out of our minds. I thought we'd freeze to death. I'll never forget how relieved I felt when we finally sobered up as dawn washed the horizon. "I want to go home," I told Scott.

"Sounds good to me," he said.

"Home," I clarified. "Not to my apartment. The ranch."

"I'm going where you're going," said Scott. "I didn't come to Chico to party with our friends. I came to be with you."

"You could have told me that two days ago," I said, hating my monstrous hangover. That weekend we had narrowly avoided a riot downtown, and to this day I'm leery of public brownies. Later that Sunday afternoon at my parents' ranch in the buttes, Scott asked me to marry him. I thanked God that day for two things: I'd survived Halloween, and I was back with the boy I loved.

Never again did Halloween have a hold on me. And actually as the years rolled on (even before I became a real Christian), I began to dread the wicked day. Too much candy. Too many freaks acting freaky in October. An overload of scary shows on television. Even the news gets twisted. About nine years ago I started my own frightful tradition. I break out Christmas music on Halloween morning and play it all day long.

Now every year it never fails, Scott says to me, "Isn't it too early for Christmas music?"
And I say, "Nope. I'm playing Christ's music because I don't want the devil enjoying his holiday at our house."

Halloween isn't discussed in the Bible, but in John chapter 8 verse 42, Jesus talks about The Children of the Devil. Before Jesus gets to this startling accusation, he says to the people in verse 31, "If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."

The people, who were Jewish, answer, "We are Abraham's descendants and have never been slaves of anyone. How can you say that we shall be set free?"

Jesus replies, "I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin."

After this, the exchange amps up. The people claim, "The only Father we have is God himself." And Jesus says, "If God were your Father, you would love me, for I came from God and now am here. I have not come on my own; but he sent me. Why is my language not clear to you? Because you are unable to hear what I say. You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father's desire." Jesus lets the people have it for a few more verses and ends the conversation this way, "He who belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God."

I really think Jesus' words in chapter 8 of John unveils Halloween for us all. Whose desires are you fulfilling on this day?

The Mare

2011-10-06T16:35:00.000-07:00

The plow ripped deep, tearing to the heart of the soil, creating the impassable. I ride the edge of this destruction, my horse with her nose to the ground, nostrils wide. She senses the danger of land turned inside out. She is an animal of legs. To run is her protection. And her peace. Instinctively, my mare avoids the four-feet deep crevices, the waves of clods rolling into sunset. This is not the normal plow. Deep ripping has happened here. And my delicate mare is not built for this. She knows it and I know it.

Most of the day my little mare waits in the protection of her corral. With the baby on my hip, I feed her peaches. Apples. Hay. The ride must wait until the daddy comes home.

After handing off baby and the boys to Daddy, I throw on my boots and lug her saddle to the arena. She approaches me as eagerly as I approach her.

Outside the gate, we hit the trail that skirts the furiously plowed land. The way is narrow. Ribboned between the furrowed field and a steep ravine. The ride is the same every day. Change is coming, but will take time. The field is in transition. Soon to be smoothed out, scraped clean, and planted in walnuts come winter. Ten years from now, the orchard will be a beautiful ride for the mare. Even next spring will be nice. But today the land is impossible for her.

Kept on the trail, my mare is safe. She trusts me to guide her, and though sometimes she looks longingly at the far horizon, she understands we won't go there. Not now. Not with the churned up field so opposed to the kind of creature she is.

Just as I know my mare, the Master knows me. The Master is also the Farmer who has plowed the fields up to the edges of my life. I am left with a narrow path. A corral of protection.

I pray for patience. For peace. For the grace to embrace the Lord's gentle way for me. Others will forge hard steps through the plowing. They are not the mare. God has different plans for them. Some of these will even smooth the ravaged field, break up the clods, fill in the crevices. Heal the land and plant the new crop.

And when the land is cultivated once more, the mare can run there. Until then, the mare with the delicate legs waits.

She and I wait.

Road Maps

2011-09-29T10:33:00.000-07:00

He held his little girl on his lap by the campfire. A big, strong cowboy raised by a hard daddy. "I don't believe in scaring kids," he said. "My daughter won't be playing that "Scare" game."
I'd grown up with the Scare game, and terror filled me each time Scare happened. The game occurred every summer at our cabin. Dark would fall and fathers fueled by alcohol would hide in the meadow and surrounding woods waiting for us kids to find them. Huddled together, we kids would tiptoe along, out of our heads with fear, looking for the wild-eyed daddies and the bears. To my great relief, we never crossed paths with a bear, but the daddies scared the dickens out of me on countless occasions.
I'll never forget what I felt when that daddy by the campfire said his little girl would not be playing Scare. The same kind of feeling came over me when I lived in Germany and got on the wrong bus one day. I did not speak German and couldn't communicate how lost I was until I finally found someone who spoke English and pointed the way home for me in a language I understood.
The day I realized that not everybody played Scare was like that for me. Some lucky little girls lived their whole lives protected from that exciting, but awful game. Right then I made the decision that when I had children, they would not play Scare. The man with the little girl on his lap at the campfire was a road map of sorts, a way to a place I'd never been before. I began watching this man's family at a distance. He was the only daddy I knew who went to church with his wife. I never heard him cuss and I never saw a beer in his hand. I'm sure he wasn't perfect, but his three little daughters looked so secure in his quiet wake.
When I first began noticing road map people like this man, I didn't understand them, but they were lights on the trail that kept me headed in the direction I wanted to go. The more I followed these lights, the brighter the path became. One day I finally realized that it wasn't these road map people I was after, it was the God they served.
Joshua from the Bible knew the value of road maps: he followed Moses wherever he went. Elisha pursued Elijah. Timothy trailed Paul. John the Baptist had his followers and then there was Jesus... "In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it" John 1:4-5.
There's a whole lot of darkness in the world. We all need road maps to find our way. Today, I have a handful of people in my life that I watch and follow: my prayer partners, godly older women, empty-nest parents who raised their kids the right way. I go to these people seeking advice and encouragement and above all, prayer.
And to my great relief, my children have never played Scare. This summer at our cabin (the cabin built the year I was born), while sitting at the campfire as the shadows grew long after sunset, a huge bear stepped into the meadow. Because I'd followed a road map years earlier, our children sat safely beside the fire as the bear passed by.

Mom and Eggs

2011-09-18T12:26:00.000-07:00

I tuck the chicken eggs, warm from under the hen, in the turned up hem of my T-shirt. Carry them against my belly to the house. Spill them onto the counter as gently as possible. Some go into the fridge. Several I crack onto a frying pan. These delicate eggs will somehow nourish my sons today.
How does something so fragile bring health to children?
I wonder this about myself: the mother I am. Often I feel small and tired in the tumble of my home. Most nights I fall into bed bone weary. Perhaps five boys does this to a person. These budding little men are a handful.
Yet, eggs encourage me. So breakable, but life-giving. When it comes to what we eat, eggs are known as a perfect food. Eggs for breakfast keeps a person satisfied longer than those who eat bagels or some other breakfast meal because eggs pack that protein punch.
I remind myself that God knew what he was doing when he made the egg and he knows me. The secret of the egg is that its strength is born when the egg is consumed.
Yesterday, I watched a news special about a mother of eleven children. Cameras shadowed a routine day in her life. Up early, this mother attended daily mass before doing anything else. Six-thirty a.m. at church and by seven back home to wake her children, having already begun a load of laundry. Such a humble woman. A few of her secrets: rely on God. Stay on track. Dole out chores. Keep after the laundry. Organize. Organize. Organize. Don't forget to hug the husband, too.
Great advice for any mom. What struck me most about this woman was her selflessness. She was being consumed by her family. And she kept smiling. True, she looked tired, but her family was obviously a happy bunch.
I realize many women flinch at the thought of being consumed in rearing their family, yet those same women happily pour themselves into other things like jobs, the gym, shopping, church work, scrap-booking and the like. Raising children comes with very little praise. Three-year-olds rarely say, "Great job, Mom!" Teenagers praise even less. But God sees, and God rewards.
Just as God made the egg, God also makes the mom.
Ask Him for everything you need to raise your children no matter how many kids you have: strength, patience, wisdom, love. Then trust the Lord to fill you. God wants you to be an amazing mom. He created the heavens and the earth and God created you. He will supply all your needs in Christ Jesus, just as the Bible promises.

People of Need

2011-09-08T13:23:00.000-07:00

At church on Sunday a young woman stands at a booth seeking financial support to continue in her missionary work. We strike up a conversation and I find myself really wanting to support this girl. Our budget is thin so I don't know how I can convince Scott to agree to sponsoring the girl each month until it hits me: give up 7-11. The idea rocks my heart. Sad, I know, that a 7-11 store matters that much. But it's not the store that lightens my step, it's the fountain Pepsi.

After leaving the girl who works for God with a promise to speak to my husband about supporting her, I slip into church and fall into singing along with the worship band. While singing, I wonder why on earth 7-11 is so important to me. I stand in line there with the lottery players and 12 noon beer drinkers. Those addicted to tobacco, and of course there's the teenagers and their energy drinks. This thirsty crowd is here for the same reason I am, to get their fix. I know the woman who works the cash register by name. This is a posse I've ridden with a long time: these people of need at 7-11.

In church this morning, I feel God nudging me to give up my need to meet the need of someone else. Sponsor this girl. Sacrifice hurts. I'm embarrassed to admit that cutting out 7-11 is difficult for me. Pepsi and I go way back. I sit with this for awhile. When did I have my first Pepsi?

Perhaps with Grandma Helen. This memory captures me. Wraps around me tight like a straight jacket protecting me from harming myself. We are in Grandma Helen's kitchen. She is pulling a Pepsi wrapped in tinfoil from the freezer. Grandma tucks it into a leather saddle bag along with two sour dough bread and cheese sandwiches. Butter and mayonnaise coat the bread. We walk to the barn together, maybe I'm toddling. I'm not very old. In fact, I'm so young that I ride on a pillow on the front of Grandma's saddle. Her horse's name is Reno. A high-stepping Tennessee Walker. He walks so smooth I fall asleep. My grandmother is large busted, a comfy back rest for a sleepy little girl. The day grows warm. It must be summer. Up into the Sierra Nevada foothills we go, stopping to irrigate my uncle's cattle pastures. Finally we come to a creek, such pretty music, the tumbling crystal water makes.

"It's hot, honey," says Grandma. "You can wade in the creek if you want. Go in your underwear so you don't get your clothes soaked. It's a long ride home and I don't want you all wet."

Happily, I do what grandma suggests. The creek feels like heaven. When Grandma hands me the cold Pepsi after unwrapping it from the tinfoil, it tastes like heaven, too. We eat lunch in the shade, my bare feet still in the creek.

To this day I love butter and mayonnaise cheese sandwiches on sour dough bread. And Pepsi, well, it has become legendary in my life.

In college, I lived on Pepsi, Diet Pepsi then. I was young and vain. Watching my weight. Eating red rope licorice for breakfast, along with Diet Pepsi on my way to class. Years later, I switch back to regular Pepsi to avoid artificial sweeteners. And 7-11 has become my favorite stop.

Addictions are a funny thing. Often connected to heart strings. We are a people of need. Our greatest need a savior, but many of us don't see this. We all have holes we try in vain to fill. Lonely holes and hungry holes. Holes of want and holes of waste. Years ago I worked as a cocktail waitress at a big Nevada casino. The holes there were astounding.

Today I write my initial check to the girl who works for God. My first week without 7-11 and I make it through. Drink a few Pepsis from the can at home. It's not the same and I contemplate switching to iced tea. Another adjustment, not as hard as seeing our oldest daughter off to college last month, but still a trying turn of heart.

Seeking the grace to change, I go to my Savior. Again and again I find myself in this place. A begger before a King.

King of the Jews and my King, too. Jesus, please fill this hole of need in me.

Ten Things Money Can't Buy

2011-08-31T08:28:00.000-07:00

It's been an eye-opening summer. A number of power surges blasted our house, killing appliances like flies come rain. Four different repairmen put their hands in our pockets on account of the surges. These repairmen would have found only lent and perhaps a pacifier if my parents hadn't loaned us the means to fix the essentials.

Our clothes dryer was not deemed essential. A rope now runs the length of our backyard. The longest clothesline in California.

Trouble has also plagued our vehicles. The transmission crashed in our old Suburban last week. It's taken about four thousand dollars in the past three months to keep this decade-old Chevy on the road. Scott's truck has a broken air conditioner. But like I sweat taking down the laundry in the yard, Scott sweats driving home from work.

Dryers and air-conditioners must wait. Dental and medical bills for the kids also pillaged us.

It's discouraging, these worries of the world. Yet the Lord assures me this lesson about the deceitfulness of wealth will pass. For now, I must learn to be content in lack. True joy comes from the Lord, not things like clothes dryers and dependable cars.

The Bible says that "...the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things come in and choke the word, making it unfruitful" Mark 4:19.

I get this truth now. Way down in my heart's pocket where money will never be found because Jesus is there, I understand the deceitfulness of wealth.

Here are a few reasons why wealth is deceitful:

* We think wealth can keep us safe. It can't. For example: A sturdy home protects against storms, but not always. Note the destruction of Hurricane Irene.

* We think wealth will make us happy. It won't. Vacations pass quickly. Moths destroy fine clothes. Luxurious meals spread the waistline. Some of the most miserable people in the world are the most wealthy.

* We think wealth can buy us health. It can't. The best doctors often can't cure cancer. Or a host of other diseases that destroy the body. Rich and poor die side by side in hospitals.

When I talk about wealth, I'm referring to income on a world scale. America is a land of milk and honey. There are all kinds of things I can't afford right now, but we have milk in our fridge and honey in the pantry. Most people in this world do not.

Sometimes I stroll through celebrity mansions on the Internet. Many of these are for sale. Most due to divorce. See how money can't buy happiness? And it sure as sunshine can't buy love.

I just want to leave you with my list of ten things money can't buy:

1. The softness of my baby's cheek when I kiss it.

2. An unexpected hug from my eighth grade son.

3. My three-year-old's prayers at the dinner table that go on and on.

4. Touring our oldest daughter's first apartment and seeing a cross I gave her hung on the wall.

5. Watching my little boys play on their slip-n-slide at sunset as dragon flies swoop the yard.

6. Sharing a warm peach I picked off the tree with our younger daughter, a senior in high school who will soon leave the nest, too.

7. Feeling loved and protected in my husband's arms.

8. Sunday dinner at my parents' house.

9. Rubbing my horse's warm, sweaty neck after I've rode him all day.

10. When I feel the Lord's presence.

I challenge you to make your "Ten things money can't buy list." Then say a prayer of thanks that the best things in life are gifts from a God who loves you enough to die on a cross for you.

A Clothesline, Slip-N-Slide, and Carolina peaches

2011-08-19T12:13:00.000-07:00

A soft, warm wind pulses through the laundry on our clothesline. Beach towels flap slow in the breeze. Summer fading.

Three little boys with suds in their hair squeal down a long, yellow slide. Sun beats down. The thumping tail of August. Grandma worried about her lawn when my cousins and I would slip-n-slide. I try not to. Let the boys play themselves out. The slip-n-slide I'll drag off the grass when the sun takes its turn and slides behind the house.

I cut up peaches warm from the tree. Smile as I taste the fruit's golden flesh. Grandpa would be proud. He loved that I loved his Carolina cling peaches. The kind he raised for the cannery.

My maternal grandparents farmed peaches. Our whole family would gather in their orchard come August to help bring in the harvest. Grandpa's birthday fell in August. He'd take everyone to dinner, the bill on him. Tired and hungry from a hard day's work, the meal always tasted extra good. Grandma had her one margarita. "Pops" as we called Grandpa, had his highball. Us kids drank Shirley Temples. After the margarita, Grandma would sometimes giggle. She wasn't a giggler so I loved the softness on her face during dinner.

It's adding a clothesline to my life that has brought back memories of my grandparents. They've been gone nearly two decades. Today, thirty-five years ago seems like yesterday in my mind. Perhaps it's the way this August has played itself out, hard and slow in the heat and sweat of broken appliances. Moisture runs down my back where the baby is strapped in his backpack. He weighs nearly twenty pounds now. I feel small and achy beneath the weight of this seventh child.

Thirty years ago, I swore I'd never be like my grandmother with her clothesline. The endless manual labor: chickens to feed, vegetables to pick, a man to fix three meals a day for out of flour and freshly killed animals. And all her other chores to boot. Yet, here I am standing at a clothesline after feeding the chickens.

Lately, God has been stripping modern conveniences away. Our clothes dryer is dead. The coffee maker, too. Our home's air conditioner no longer works. My car is in the shop. I see how spoiled I've been. I meditate on this as I hang out the clothes with baby on my back. Remember how Grandma never complained...

The boys complain it's hot. So I buy the half price slip-n-slide. Summer on clearance.

Baby soap exaggerates the slip. No need for a bath tonight. The boys run across the grass, dive onto the slide, scream in delight. Delight fills me, too. For a moment I am eight years old again in my bathing suit on my grandparents' lawn with my cousins...

And suddenly I am grateful for what God has stripped away. Without a dryer, our clothes smell like country air. Because of hard work, my arms are strong. Gym-toned without a gym in sight. Instead, I see the chicken house, the garden, the clothesline. Peaches on our trees. And beyond that, my grandparents...

Their life was good. Wholesome. Grandma never missed church. Never forgot who God was. Lawerance Welk was her favorite show. The music of her life inspires me now. Songs of gratefulness for a clothesline, slip-n-slide, and Carolina peaches.

Move slow sweet August... slow dance with me, chores and memories. Life is not about getting things done. It's about who and how we love. The joy this evening of bathing the boys on a slip-n-slide, making a Carolina cling peach cobbler, and watching our laundry pound in the breeze: the heartbeat of God in my life.

Bitter Roots

2011-08-10T07:42:00.000-07:00

This summer our family has spent countless hours picking puncture vine from our pastures. Also known as goat heads, these leafy vines web across the ground, producing pebble-like thorns that flatten tires and terrorize bare feet. They grow like crazy and carpet the soil, crowding out productive plants. To eradicate goat heads, this wicked weed must be pulled out by the root. Any roots left in the ground regrows another mean goat head.

Inside the house is another story. The goat head thorns stick to shoes. They walk into the house with someone. They drop off on the carpet. Half asleep on the way to the kitchen for a cup of coffee, they spear bare feet like poisoned arrows. I'm wide awake now with a bleeding heel. For some reason (maybe because I'm a barefoot girl) it tends to be me who gets stabbed by household goat heads.

Battling these goat heads reminds me of my fight to grow God's grace in my life. Hebrews 12:15 says, "See to it that no one misses the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many."

From time to time, most of us struggle with bitter roots in our faith life. Three bitter roots in particular:

Perfectionism (a lack of grace turned inward).
Judgementalism (a lack of grace turned outward).
Legalism (a lack of grace turned upward).

According to the Bible, what causes these "ism" roots?

It's missing the grace of God. And missing the grace of God is surprisingly easy. Grace comes through relationship and a relationship takes time and attention.

In the midst of missing grace this past year, legalism especially had been creeping into my life. Blindly serving God is easier than having an honest bond with Him. It takes time to nurture bonds. Raising seven children doesn't leave a lot of room for quiet moments with the Lord. I used to get up early to have my time with God, but during my last pregnancy, I found myself too tired to keep this up. Once the baby arrived, I was even more tired. My morning devotions now often take place in the middle of rowdy boys and a fussing baby. A few times a week I try to get up earlier than the baby (who is usually up by 6:00 or 6:30 a.m.) to be alone with God. But this is hard right now. Sometimes I feel too tired to have a relationship with anyone ~ even God.

This past year, I've also struggled with God because He's allowed trials to keep coming when I'm already overloaded. We all have trials so I won't get into mine today, but the truth is, I need more grace in my life. To get more grace, I need more time with God. Time to really listen. Really hear. Really do what He says to do. "Lay down your life. Pick up the cross. Offer your cheek in love to those who spit upon you. To those who treat you badly because of me."

To say, Thank you, Lord for humbling your servant, when I would rather cry and complain over my trials...

Like freeing our land from goat heads, it takes time and effort to pull up the bitter roots of legalism, judgementalism, and perfectionism that can creep into our lives. This is done by the giving and receiving of God's sweet grace.

The Bible says, "For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord" Ephesians 5:8-10.

JESUS CALLING

2011-07-09T16:13:00.000-07:00

I love the devotion Jesus Calling by the missionary Sarah Young. Because I have not found the time to blog this week, I am posting Jesus Calling's July 10th reading:

Relax in My Peaceful Presence. Do not bring performance pressures into our sacred space of communion. When you are with someone you trust completely, you feel free to be yourself. This is one of the joys of true friendship. Though I am Lord of lords and King of kings, I also desire to be your intimate Friend. When you are tense or pretentious in our relationship, I feel hurt. I know the worst about you, but I also see the best in you. I long for you to trust Me enough to be fully yourself with Me. When you are real with Me, I am able to bring out the best in you: the very gifts I have planted in your soul. Relax, and enjoy our friendship.

Based on: Revelation 17:14; John 15:13-15

This devotion hit me hard in the heart. Hope it arrows into your heart, too. I am praying for you... prayers for a great week!

What to do about Facebook..?

2011-06-29T11:46:00.000-07:00

When Scott and I first married, our dog of choice was the pitbull. Our first pitbull, Evie, amazed us. She proved fierce and loving. I adored her and am convinced she would have died for me. After Evie came Scout. A pitbull I couldn't trust. That two-faced dog in the house with our children rattled my nerves. Just like Facebook in our home now.

In '08, I signed up for Facebook because my literary agent highly recommended it. Scott and the girls had already "drank the Kool Aid" as my cousin so quaintly put it about joining Facebook. Remember the cult leader who fed his followers poisoned Kool Aid back in 1978? Nearly a thousand people died in a mass suicide. Whole families perished. Even babies were forced to drink the cyanide-laced stuff.

Just for the record, I don't see Facebook as cyanide. It's a wonderful way to keep in touch with long-distance family and friends. No more bulging letters filled with photos of the kids for the grandparents in Texas and Florida. No more wondering what happened to those old Army friends. Keeping up with writing associates is easy on Facebook. But here's where things have grown mountainous. Our 13 year old son just joined Facebook and I've become a game warden.

I never heard of a girl referred to as a cougar until last month. Now I find myself ready to trap and relocate several fifteen-year-old felines on Facebook. I'm the mother stalking the cougars stalking my son. Pass the Kool Aid because I don't have the time and energy for this. I certainly didn't sign on for this Facebook foolishness.

Keeping things in perspective, we haven't owned a pitbull since Scout. Now our dependable yellow lab lets our babies hang from her ears. I want our home to be a safe place for my kiddos. I realize that when they walk out the door, the world awaits, but in their bedrooms, they don't need seductive animals prowling through their iPhones. By the way, the iPhone wasn't my idea. A grandparent did that, and our son works the fields for it. Fifteen hours a month laboring in the orchard for Opa to pay for that Internet island pass.

My issue is that some girls dress scantily on Internet island. Some go nude. Using song lyrics, they invite my son into sexual sin. Does a 13 year-old-boy really need exposure to these kind of coconuts? Believe me, I don't think my sweet son is completely innocent of the Facebook antics. It takes two to mambo... enough said... Momma bear has been poked.

This morning My Utmost for His Highest devotion read: "And if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell" Matthew 5:30. I know My Utmost for His Highest comes across old-fashionedly, but believe me, God's advice never goes out of style.

And I realize Facebook isn't a right hand, but if it offends, shouldn't the Bible's advice be taken?

The bottom line is this: Scott is the head of our household, so he will make the decision whether or not our family stays on Facebook. My job is to pray for my husband and children. To softly speak words of wisdom, whispering... don't drink the cougar Kool Aid!

P.S. This morning when I went to Facebook to check our son's page, he wasn't there. Last night he gave up Facebook on his own. I'm so proud of our boy and grateful to our Lord for His constant care :)

Psalm 91

2011-06-22T08:41:00.000-07:00

Six years ago, Scott and I experienced a near car crash that probably would have killed us. Speeding down a back country road, we came upon a slow-moving hay truck. Scott whipped around to pass. Without warning the truck began to turn down a long dirt driveway. That turn put us in the path of disaster. It happened so fast.

The hay truck driver never even saw us. Not till the near accident was all but over.
To avoid a high speed collision, Scott whipped the steering wheel, sending us sideways. Our SUV tipped on two wheels, righted itself by an unseen force, then sped down the long dirt driveway a hair's breath away from the hay truck. It still amazes me that we avoided that accident.

When it ended, we sat there shaken in our car in a cloud of dust. I keep a Bible and a daily devotional in our SUV's glove compartment. All I wanted was to hear from God. With trembling hands, I pulled out the devotional first. The day's entry read: "For he will command his angels concerning you, to guard you in all your ways; they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone" Psalm 91:11.

Picking up the Bible, I then read Psalm 91 to Scott as we slowly got back on the road. I believe that day angels protected us from the accident.

When I first became saved, I would sometimes awake in the night sensing evil in the room. A strange prayer would run through my mind, holy words slipping out under my heaving breath almost on their own accord. I knew the prayer originated from my Catholic upbringing. All those readings in church for three decades. My subconscious must have tucked specific words away, and when I was scared, they would rise on their own.

There came a time when the nightmares became so bad that I sought help. I was still practicing Catholicism at the time so I visited several priests. Both men of the collar told me the devil was not real.

I didn't believe them.

A friend of mine had been a serious Christian all her life. So I asked her if the devil could walk into my bedroom in the middle of the night.

"It's probably a demon," she said. "There's only one devil and he can't be in more than one place at a time. But there are lots of demons. You need to see my pastor. He knows all about spiritual warfare."

"What is spiritual warfare?" I asked. I'd never heard of such a thing.

"Angels and demons are real on this earth. There is a battle going on for each and every soul. God's army are the angels. The devil oversees the demons."

So I went to visit her pastor. He didn't look at me like I was crazy when I told him about the devil in my room. While talking with him, I shared that sometimes I'd wake up in the presence of evil saying this unfamiliar prayer that brought great comfort.

"What is it?" he asked.

So I recited some of the words.

"That's Psalm 91. The Psalm of Protection," said the helpful pastor.

After leaving the pastor's office, I went home and flipped open my Bible. Sure enough, there it was: Psalm 91. I was amazed that in my sleep those words would come to me even though I was unfamiliar with the Bible back then. I liked Psalm 91 so much, I memorized it.

Fast forward a number of years. It's easy to get complacent when all is well. I hadn't read or spoken Psalm 91 in quite awhile. Then seemly out of the blue, our family hit a patch of difficulties. I'd grown so comfortable that it didn't occur to me to break out Psalm 91 to fight the battles coming from all directions. While sharing my troubles with a friend in our Bible study, he said, "I have just the book for you." The next day he brought me over Psalm 91: Real-life Stories of God's Shield of Protection by Peggy Joyce Ruth. I read the book in two days and jumped back into a daily reading of Psalm 91.

Then I began to study it. Using Charles H. Spurgeon's The Treasury of David, I've discovered that actually Psalm 91 is attributed to Moses. That information was new to me. I thought King David wrote the psalm. I also learned that Psalm 91 is not a promise to all believers. Only those who continually dwell in God's presence are afforded the blanket of protection Psalm 91 offers.

To continually dwell with God is not an easy thing, but I noticed something that recently inspired me in my walk with the Lord. Down the road from us is river land. Towering oaks. Tall grass. Vines wrapping the river banks. Here is where the sheep graze in summer. And with them, the faithful shepherd. As well as four diligent dogs. This in 2011. There is no modern way to guard sheep. At night the shepherd pens his sheep and sleeps right beside them in a little camp trailer. During the day, he stands with the sheep keeping them safe. As long as the sheep don't wander off, they are protected. The dogs are constantly circling, fending off predators. This is the secret place of the Most High talked about in Psalm 91: never leave the Shepherd's side.

Against the Wind

2011-06-18T07:51:00.000-07:00

Today I watched him on the tractor plowing our field. Our field. Not his own, though there is endless work to be done on his land as well. The dirt and heat swirling around his head. And the wind in his face. His sweat-stained hat wet from the hose. Pushed down tight on hair still dark. Not much gray though he's just months from seventy. Dark like my grandmother's midnight hair. She's been gone for over a decade now. The girl from Montana - a force to be reckoned with. Sold her horse at seventeen and bought a train ticket to California. On her own. Her second son like that, too. A one man show. Sometimes I worry about him. He lives hard. And the years roll along. People don't last forever. But love does.

Love does.

A man in a plain white T-shirt. Worn blue jeans. Not store bought worn. Hard work worn. Battered silver watch on a tan wrist. And cowboy boots with real manure stains. He still never wears anything else but those boots. Even on a trip to the beach with his grandkids: cowboy boots with a hundred barn miles, though the silver watch is gone now.

Long gone like the little freckle-faced girl who adored him. She is forty-three with wrinkles around her eyes, too. Burden heavy upon shoulders. "Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and my burden is light" Matthew 11:28-30.

I long for him to hear these words. Deep in his soul hear these words for the weary. He's a weary man and I sometimes grow weary praying for him. But love hears.

Love hears.

"Ask anything in My name and it will be done for you" John 14:13.

I ask for things this man I adore - my dad - does not yet ask for. He has not gotten to the end of himself. The end of all earthly things. Heaven's door. Far from the tractor. Far from the fields that need mowing and plowing and planting. Fields that will need mowing, plowing, and planting a hundred years from now. Long after he and I are gone.

And still the wind blows. Against our fields. Against new walnut trees. Against my dad's dark hair. All his friends gone gray, but not Dad. The defiant one. Still running against the wind.

Let the cowboys ride. Let the cowboys ride. They'll be ridin' against the wind. Against the wind.

I hear Bob Seger's song Against the Wind and I think of my dad. That 1980 album. Dad finished his dream house on a hill with his own hammer in 1980, my mom hammering too, and then bought my brother and me waterbeds. The rich sleep in waterbeds. He was young and strong, bucking the wind. But love waited.

Love waits.

I heard someone say he's getting religion now. This about Dad going to church after years of going without. I hope not. Not religion. Religion has no Wind. No Spirit. Let the dead do religion. The living trust in the One who died on the cross and rose again. The grave could not hold God's Son. A Redeemer lives. He's real. "He is called Faithful and True. In righteousness He judges and wages war. His eyes are a flame of fire, and on His head are many diadems; and He has a name written on Him which no one knows except himself. He is clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and His name is called The Word of God" Revelation 19:11-13.

I place The Word of God before him, over and over, before my dad. This is not an easy thing. Birth is like that. Difficult. I sigh. Again and again, I sigh. When will he rest in the Light? When will he reach for rescue? From the fields forever mowing? Plowing? Planting? From the devil forever tempting? From himself forever running against the wind?

When will he reach up? To the One called Faithful and True. The Rider of the white horse in Revelation. Wearing a robe dipped in blood. Waging war because of love. For love saves.

Love saves.

Spiritual Sailing

2011-06-01T08:54:00.000-07:00

This past weekend at the ocean I watched a kite surfer wrestling the wind and waves. He appeared to be an amateur, the sea violently sloshing him around. I was seriously concerned for his safety.

"I hope a shark doesn't get him," said Scott, who sat in the truck beside me on a windswept Bodega Bay bluff overlooking the beach where the kiteboarder struggled alone.

"I can't believe he's doing that by himself. He needs major help," I said. A storm was passing through. The wind howled. Waves rolled huge. Nobody was on the beach but him.

After a particularly bad run at trying to surf... I thought he was going to die... he finally trudged out of the waves dragging his long kite behind him. He spent about thirty minutes on the beach messing with his equipment. Scott and I hoped he would call it a day. But pretty soon he headed back out in the water after seriously adjusting his sail.

To our complete surprise, he then kite surfed like a professional.

"That guy knows what he's doing," said Scott.

"He's amazing," I responded. I could not believe he soared across the tumultuous sea after fixing his sail. Pretty soon we could hardly see him out there flying around that great blue ocean.

Driving home, I didn't think much about the kitesurfer. Instead, I was fighting my own battle with the wind... the wind of the Holy Spirit...

We'd ended up at the ocean on Saturday because of our colicky baby. Our original destination was a wedding in Santa Rosa, but Christian had been so fussy we had to leave the ceremony before it hardly began. On our way out of town, we drove by the lovely hotel we'd had reservations at for the weekend of the wedding, which was also our 22nd wedding anniversary, but the power surge that damaged our house last month also drained our finances so we had to cancel the hotel room.

On top of that, one of our cars is in the shop and our other car needs repairs we can't afford to make right now. We've got dental bills and doctor bills. Bug problems and gopher issues. Early morning often finds me in the yard in my pajamas with a shovel and a can of poison chasing the rodents digging up our lawn. This after a night of not much sleep with the baby. Clearly, I'm taking my frustration out on the gophers. The other day I had my brother over here with smoke bombs. We dropped mini sticks of dynamite down the gopher holes. The next morning one of those critters had the nerve to pop his head up outside my bedroom window at six a.m. I think he might have been puffing one of our smoke bombs like a cigar. I nearly went after him with the baby at my breast.

Other things more serious are getting to me. I've stopped reading the news about all the natural disasters and I call my prayer partners more than ever. People I love here are hurting as well. There is so much to pray about these days...

This past Sunday in church we sang a song, "My faith shall be my eyes." This line so resonated with me. The Holy Spirit has been after me lately to speak God's truth instead of voicing defeat. To say things like, "I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength," instead of mindlessly repeating, "I'm so tired."

On Monday during prayer time with one of my prayer partners, as she was praying for me, the Lord brought to mind that kite surfer. The kite surfer's problem wasn't that he didn't know how to surf. He was very good at surfing. The problem was his equipment. He needed to regear himself to the wind that was stronger due to the storm. Once he got his sails in order, the turbulent sea became his dance floor.

The Lord is telling me to set my sails in accordance with His Holy Spirit. I need to speak the Word of God over this life with faith and trust and patience. More than ever, it is faith that will see us through in troubled times.

Safely Home

2011-05-28T08:55:00.000-07:00

A storm cloud loomed on the horizon. I'd never seen a cloud like this in California. It looked like an atomic bomb blast, huge, mushroom shaped, and dark. Sinisterly dark. Lightening veined through it as if arteries of electricity fed the cloud life.

I was in bed when Scott asked me to come outside to look at the cloud this week. "You've got to see this," he said after returning from kenneling the dogs. This was so unlike my husband. Weather never excited him.

We walked upstairs to our balcony for a better look. When I saw it, the cloud took my breath away.

"It's north of the ranch," I said anxiously. "If that thing stays on track, it will hit Mom and Dad's house." Six of our seven children were spending the night at the ranch with their grandparents. "That thing is a monster. It looks like something from the Midwest. I'm calling Mom." With tornadoes tearing the South apart, images of that kind of devastation in California filled my mind.

"It's up there pretty high," said Scott. "The kids will be fine at your folks."

I hurried downstairs anyway to the phone. After warning my mom of the storm headed their way, I jogged back upstairs to Scott's side.

"Isn't God's power amazing?" he said in wonder.

Really, that's what you're thinking...? I thought to myself. All I could see was tornadoes and lightening and hail coming out of the cloud. Killing my family. "That thing scares me." I winced as lightening lit up the night.

"God's in control of that storm, Paula," said Scott. "You need your sleep. Let's get you back to bed."

Since the baby had arrived, Scott was always after me to rest. I was surprised he'd gotten me out of bed in the first place to look at the storm, but then again, that storm was worth losing sleep over.

Ten minutes later my husband lay snoozing at my side. This I found nearly as amazing as the monster cloud outside our window.

Had the storm reached the ranch yet? Were the kids okay? I prayed again for God to keep everyone safe and marveled that Scott was so unconcerned. He and the baby in our bed looked like twins sleeping the world away.

What really weighed on my mind was the fact that God was in control of that storm headed for the ranch. Just as He was in control of the tornadoes that killed hundreds in Alabama and Missouri. God was not bringing peace to this world. He was bringing war. I felt small and helpless. Insignificant. Beggarly.

Above all, weary of this world.

This is battlefield earth, I reminded myself. My peace does not come from my circumstances. My peace comes from my Savior Jesus.

"Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid" John 14:27.

Give me your peace, Lord, I prayed. There is no peace for me on this earth.

"Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me. In my Father's house are many rooms... I am going there to prepare a place for you" John 14:1-2.

My hope was in the Father's house. Heaven... I finally drifted to sleep knowing that down deep I was safe.

Early the next morning I called my mom.

"We only got rain and a little hail last night. Everyone's fine," she said.

After doing my devotions, I pulled up the Internet news. Photos of destruction filled the page. The first funeral in Joplin, Missouri belonged to a devout Christian man. A tornado had carried him to his Father's house. I was sad for his family, but not for the devout man. He was safely home and I was happy for him.

You Can Choose Your Family

2011-05-18T08:15:00.000-07:00

You've probably heard the old saying: You can choose your friends, but you can't choose your family.
Well, according to Jesus, you can choose your family.

In Luke 8:19-20, the Bible says that Jesus' mother and brothers came to see him, but were not able to get near him because of the crowd. When Jesus was told that his birth family was standing outside, wanting to see him, Jesus said, "My mother and brothers are those who hear God's word and put it into practice."

Later, as Jesus hung on the cross, he made a decision that must have upset his birth family. It happened this way: When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother, "Dear woman, here is your son," and to the disciple, "Here is your mother." From that time on, this disciple took her into his home. John 19:26-27.

Matthew 13:55-56 lists that Jesus had four birth brothers and several sisters, yet before he died, he placed his mother in the disciple John's home.

There are also places in the New Testament where Jesus asks people to leave their families and follow him. Why did Jesus say and do these things concerning family, and what does this mean for our families today?

When I became born again ten years ago many of my relationships fell apart. All of a sudden Jesus became everything to me, and many people who knew and loved me didn't understand this. It was a difficult time of transition, and the biggest transitions happened in my relationships. There were people I walked away from as I followed Christ, and many people who walked away from me because I'd become a Jesus freak.

Today, I still sometimes struggle with loved ones who don't understand the choices I make for Christ. After praying about this recently, and seeking God's word on the matter, I realize that I don't need to stress about this. I can let go and let God handle things.

Jesus proclaims that a believer's true family are those who do the will of God. This is why I believe that Jesus put his mother Mary in John's home on the day he was crucified. John was a believer and Jesus' birth brothers and sisters were unbelievers. In John 7:5 it says, "even his own brothers did not believe in him."

Jesus made the decision to place his mother (a believer) with other believers. This teaches us the importance of surrounding ourselves with believers as well. Jesus was saying not only can you choose your friends, you can and should choose your family too.

One of the greatest things the Holy Spirit led me to do as a new believer was to lay aside many of my unsaved relationships and build bonds with other Christians. While doing this, the Lord also encouraged me to continue to love and serve family members who still wanted to spend time with me.

In 1 Corinthians 15:7 it says that upon his resurrection, Jesus appeared to James (his earthly brother), then to all of the apostles. The Bible makes it clear that Jesus did not give up on his unbelieving family. In fact, in Acts 1:14 it says, "They all joined together constantly in prayer, along with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brothers." So we see that Jesus brothers did become believers once Jesus rose from the dead because these birth brothers were in the upper room praying for the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.

Jesus' brother James ends up writing the book of James in the Bible. And church history tells us that James was later beheaded for being a Christian. Jesus' brother Jude also wrote a book of the New Testament.

When it comes to family, we are called to love and pray for our unsaved relatives, but we are not to put our hope and trust in those relationships. As believers, our hope and trust are now in Christ. We need to allow God to build us a family out of the brothers and sisters we will live with for eternity.

A Gift Pony

2011-05-14T08:36:00.000-07:00

About six months ago I began praying for a pony.

I grew up on ponies and have wanted my children to have this bittersweet experience too. I say bittersweet because I broke bones (usually the arms of other little girls with me), yet many of my fondest childhood memories involve riding ponies.

But when our girls were young, we did the pony thing. After our little daughters landed in the dirt numerous times and Lacy got kicked in the chest by her naughty pony, we sold the bratty beasts. After that, Scott vowed no more pint size horses. Quietly, I grieved this loss as we continued by trial and error to build our family out of our own growing-up experiences.

After the pony fiasco, we embraced sports: Scott's childhood brickwork, and soccer soon ruled our life.

About the time we hit six kids with another on the way, like those bratty ponies, soccer had kicked us to the ground. Draining our finances and our family time, soccer was nearly a seven day a week commitment. I wanted to hang up a post office flyer: Thirteen-year-old son missing. Sun-streaked blond hair hanging in eyes. Search for boy on a soccer field.

We knew it was time to take a break from sports and circle the wagons at home. This is when I began longing for a pony again. Scott said absolutely not, reminding me of our pony disaster a decade ago. It appeared a pony was out of the question for our string of little boys. So I began to pray...

One night at our small group Bible study out of the blue somebody said it wasn't right to pray for a pony. "I'm praying for a pony," I admitted a bit sheepishly. We then had a lively discussion about what should and should not be prayed for. This friend who brought up praying for a pony said she didn't feel like people should ask God for that sort of thing. God can not be bothered with pony longings.

"I believe God is our father and we can ask him for anything," I argued. "Like a wise earthly dad, he won't give us everything we want because that would spoil us, but he will give us gifts because he is the giver of all good things."

A few weeks ago, a wonderful Christian family came to us offering our children their beloved pony. They knew nothing of my pony prayer. Their youngest child was graduating from high school and their family had outgrown the pony.

"We want him to go to a good home," they said. "Would you like to have him?"

"More than you know," I said with tears stinging my eyes. God was giving us a pony!

Adding serendipity to all this, our new pony Sunny is blind in one eye just like my favorite pony of all time, Lyric was blind in one eye.

Walking up to Sunny yesterday, I put my arm around his maney neck and gave him a hug. Sunny leaned into me like Lyric used to do and I found myself feeling that little-girl-pony-love all over again deep in my belly. Closing my eyes, I thanked my Dad in heaven for our gift pony.

The old saying goes: Don't look a gift horse in the mouth. This means not to analyze a gift, just accept it for what it is...

"Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights..." James 1:17.

The Art of Vulnerablity

2011-05-05T11:03:00.000-07:00

There is nothing more vulnerable than a newborn child. Left alone a baby would soon die. Babies need to be fed, clothed, cleaned, carried, and loved. Above all, loved. Life in third world orphanages show that infants who are fed and cleaned and clothed, but left unloved, often don't live.

The word vulnerability literally means the ability to be vulnerable.

How good are you at being vulnerable? Do you even want to be vulnerable?

As a baby you had no choice in being vulnerable: you were vulnerable because God made you that way. He could have made you like a baby deer that can run like the dickens within hours of its birth. But God didn't do that for humans. God made it essential that newborn humans must be held. Carried. Loved.

Sadly, a lot of us are not loved correctly when we are children so we grow up lacking the ability to live vulnerably. Not to mention the fact that the world teaches us that being vulnerable is a bad thing.

Stand on your own two feet. Pull yourself up by your boot straps. Carry your own load. Do it your way. Be independent. Live your life.

We grow up hearing all these voices and sooner or later we believe that this is how we are suppose to live. Trusting only in ourselves. But there is nothing in the Bible that says: Do it your way. In fact the Bible says that doing it your way is a sin.

"We all like sheep have gone astray; we have turned, every one, to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all" Isaiah 53:6.

You don't have to lie, steal, or kill to commit sin. Just going your own way is a sin says the Bible.

Today while thinking about it, I made a list off the top of my head of ten things that make me feel vulnerable.

1. loving others
2. saying I'm sorry
3. naked with my husband
4. sharing my past
5. sharing my dreams
6. raising my children
7. riding a horse on a mountain trail
8. forgiving those who hurt me
9. being honest before others
10. being honest before God

I encourage you to make a vulnerable list too. Then read over it slowly and ask yourself why these things make you feel vulnerable.

In viewing my list, I realize that the things that make me feel vulnerable are also things that fulfill me. If I didn't push through and do these things that open me up, my life would be a lot less full. I don't want to live a life half closed. I want to live fully open.

To live wide open, I have to live vulnerability. And the secret of vulnerability is trust.

Last night while giving seven-week-old Christian his bath, I looked into his blue eyes and saw complete trust as I held him in the water. Christian is a colicky baby, but he loves the bath. To get him to stop crying at night, Scott and I swap turns taking a bath with him. As a baby, Christian has no idea that all we would have to do is remove our hands and he would drown. In realizing this, I also realize that all God would have to do is remove his hands and I would drown in this world too.

Knowing how vulnerable I am in God's hands makes me long to trust Him more. As I embrace my vulnerability with God, I can embrace vulnerably in general. Knowing that God won't let me go gives me the courage to practice the art of vulnerability.

THE LAMB

2011-04-22T08:57:00.000-07:00

A week ago I am driving in the car with our 13 year old son when I decide to brave the sex talk. It has come to my attention that our junior higher doesn't know much about the birds and bees. Down deep this pleases me, that we've done a decent job sheltering our son. Confident I can answer any question from a boy who isn't quite sure how babies are made, I boldly say, "Ask me anything, honey. Whatever you want to know I will tell you."

After briefly assuring him with my eyes, I look out the window at the sheep along the road. Lambs everywhere. The grass emerald green on the rolling hills of the Sutter Buttes.

"What's a condom?" he inquires softly.

I swallow... here we go... I watch a lamb race away from his mother across a meadow with a meandering stream. How I love driving through these buttes every day with my children to get to town. "A condom stops babies from coming..." I pray as I talk. Please, Jesus help me explain this well. I give a brief lesson on the way babies arrive as we drive. My son listens hard.

"Any more questions?" I say, feeling as if we're doing fine. Good talk so far. More lambs and sheep along the road. I'm smiling. We are his sheep, he knows us by name. We are fearfully and wonderfully made.

"What's a flavored condom?" My son says soft as the eye of a storm. He watches the lambs too, his gaze intent on avoidance.

Did I hit the breaks? I hear screeching in my mind for a hundred miles. A flavored condom? I've never heard of such a thing. My son's eyes collide with mine for a moment. We are both baffled, yet something is dawning. The knowledge of good and evil. We turn back to the lambs and they still look innocent, but now I see how they must be slaughtered. Grief sweeps over me. I search for fig leaves to cover my mental nakedness.

"Well... that's quite a question..." I'm swallowing hard now. "Condoms are also used for STDs. Do you know what an STD is?"

"No," he admits.

I rephrase it. "What VD is?"

I'm so missing the ABCs right now. I flash back to singing in the car with my little boy the ABC song along a distant country road. Have we driven that far away from his childhood?

"No, don't know VD." He's shaking his head, his sun-blonded bangs sweeping his forehead. He looks so young. Everything in me screams that my son will not be slaughtered by sin, but it has already started. My heart aches.

I tell him about STDs. Talk it up trying to scare him. "Sex outside of marriage can kill you..." I find myself sliding into paranoid parent mode and my grief intensifies. Finally I sigh in resignation. "You're going to have to talk to your dad about the rest of this stuff."

We leave the buttes and roll into the valley where my son's school is... Jesus must hike through the Kidron Valley on his way to Jerusalem. Passover on the horizon, and beyond that, the crucifixion. In the Kidron Valley lambs are being slaughtered by the thousands for the upcoming feast. Every Jewish household will need a dead lamb. The streams of the Kidron Valley run red with blood. In sandals, Jesus walks through these streams of sacrifice. Does he see his own sacrifice that will soon bleed him dead?

My son nods looking relieved. In giving up, I'm relieved too. I dwell on why this world needs a flavored condom and how many of those sweet lambs in the Sutter Buttes will be eaten come autumn.

A few days later, I find myself in Sam's club picking up Axe deodorant for my son. All junior high boys wear Axe, I'm told. On the Axe shelf are two choices of fragrance: Dark Temptations and Phoenix. Of course I choose Phoenix. I don't want my son covered in Dark Temptation. In the meat section my gaze drifts over the lamb chops. I pick up beef instead.

"Get clean to get dirty," proclaims the Axe website, which I check out later at home. Pictures of scantily clad women crackle on the web page. It disturbs me that boys are being groomed to fall to temptation by a deodorant company. My husband has talked with our son. I thank the Lord that the boy has a godly father who can answer questions that frighten me.

I've been studying what the Bible says about temptation and I know there is a cure for the sexual sin sweeping today's society. My son doesn't have to be slaughtered. The cross is in view.

Hebrews 4:15-16 says, "For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are --- yet was without sin. Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need."

This high priest is Jesus and he is the answer to every temptation my son will ever face.

In Matthew and Luke, chapter 4 of both gospels, the temptation of Jesus is addressed. I read each one and my heart quiets. The devil is defeated. Today is Good Friday. The lamb that takes away the sin of the world has been slain.

EASTER CALVES

2011-04-20T07:01:00.000-07:00

When I was little I loved looking for Easter calves. After an early a.m. church service on Easter Sunday, we would walk out into the pasture searching for newborn calves. I believed in those wet-behind-the-ear days that Easter calves came from God. I wasn't sure how it happened, but I sort of envisioned God birthing this blessing on the earth with the help of cows of course.
Not every year brought an Easter calf. Yet other years, two, even three graced the morning. There they would be on the dew damp grass standing on shaky legs or curled on the ground in tight little fetal calf positions. The curled up ones were my favorite. Sometimes a little girl could pet those lying on the ground if she approached very slowly with the mother not around.
As I grew older, I lost interest in the Easter calves. Teenage girls tend to seek out boys, not slippery newborn bovines. By the time I turned 18, I was wildly in love with Scott. Calves in the pasture meant nothing to me. Scott and I spent spring break with our friends at the beach. In the arms of my boyfriend, Easter came and went without the thought of an Easter calf.
How life would change for me the following year. Three months before Easter, Scott broke up with me. Crushed, I moved to Reno, Nevada by myself. I got an apartment and a job and cried most nights. As Easter approached, my heart longed for home. When the restaurant I worked for had hired me, I told them I needed to be home for Easter. "No guarantees of holidays off," my new boss said without feeling.
Two days before Easter it looked like I would have to work. On top of that, a snowstorm was brewing in the Sierras. My tiny Toyota Celica was not the car to conquer the pass.
"Please, God," I prayed. "Let me get home for Easter." I believed in God in those days, but I wasn't "born again" as Christians say.
When the snowflakes arrived on Good Friday and landed in my hair as I walked to work, again I prayed, "It seems impossible now, but please God, let me make it home for Easter."
Sure enough, on top of the snow, I was on the schedule to work Easter Sunday. Nobody was about to trade with me. I didn't even ask. "Please God, I'm so homesick. Take me home for Easter," I prayed as I worked that Friday.
On Saturday morning back at work with snow blanketing the sidewalks, again I prayed. "I don't see how this is possible, but I want to go home. I long to see an Easter calf."
It had been ages since I thought of the Easter calves. Now I couldn't get them out of my mind. In California spring had surely sprung, but where I was in Reno, winter still held the land captive. All was gray and drab, stick trees and high desert drear. I closed my eyes and pictured green pastures, daffodils and tulips blooming in my mom's planters.
"If you can drive in the snow, head home after your shift today," said my boss as he passed me in the bakery shop. I was stacking warm cookies on the shelf doing my best not to break into tears over being stuck in Reno for Easter.
"Please don't tease me about this. I'm really homesick," I told my boss. I thought he was kidding me about Easter off. We were short-shifted on Sunday. I couldn't imagine my boss letting me miss work.
My boss smiled, his eyes compassionate for a change. "I'm not teasing. Go home. I'm tired of looking at your sad, little face. Just be back for the night shift on Monday. Happy Easter, Paula."
Tears spilling from my eyes, I bounded over and hugged my boss. "Thank you! Thank you!"
"You're welcome, now get back to work, young lady."
"Please, Lord, please stop the snow now," I prayed after that. "Please, God, you know I can't get over the pass in snow."
Several hours later one of the afternoon shift employees strolled in. "The snow's gone," she said. "I can't believe it melted that fast. You should see the sun shining out there."
"Thank you, God! Thank you!" I sang to myself for the rest of my shift.
The following morning I attended church with my mom in California. Upon returning home, I asked my dad to walk with me to look for Easter calves. My parents own a ranch in the Sutter Buttes. Sometimes you have to walk awhile to find the cows.
"Oh, please, God, grant me an Easter calf this year," I prayed as we walked.
When we finally found the cows, there they were. Not one, but two newborn calves.
Tears splashed down my cheeks. Two calves. Maybe this meant that Scott would come home too. That we would get back together and marry someday. I hadn't heard from Scott since he had broken up with me. I missed him so much that Easter.
Today looking back, I realize those two Easter calves were indeed a promise from God to me. Not only would Scott come home and we'd marry, but a decade later the two of us would also come to know and love Jesus. In a way we are Easter calves.
If you long to be an Easter calf too, know that I'm praying for you. My road to redemption was a long, broken one. Perhaps yours is as well. Through it all, I see now how Jesus led me so sweetly in the end to His cross. There is so much beauty in belonging to Jesus. Pray for a way to get home this Easter.

Happy Easter my friend... You may have read this post last year. If so, I hope you didn't mind reading it again. I would love to write a new Easter post for this year, and I still may if I can find the time and the energy to blog this week with all the kids home and baby Christian keeping me up all night. My brain is mush these days and a worker at Walmart today asked me if I was buying baby gear for my daughter's baby. I said, "No, it's my baby," and she looked at me as if I were nuts. I seriously have been asked a handful of times at Walmart in the past five years if I'm the grandma. No wonder I hate shopping at Walmart... perhaps I am nuts, but I sure love my baby :)

Fires and Strawberry Jam

2011-04-06T14:24:00.000-07:00

With winter passing I realize how much I've been loved... each morning my husband has made a fire for me, before he showers, before his coffee, before the sun comes up. He pads from our bed, down the cold hall, past three of our sleeping sons sharing one room, out the door to the woodpile where he fills his arms with heavy logs. The kindling must be chopped too, the hatchet steady in his hand, steady the way he is under the morning moon. It's 5:30 a.m.

I can't remember the last time he gave me flowers. Or a card. Or fastened jewelry on me. The heat from the fire on me every morning, along with coffee on my tongue, two cups left in the pot for me, more than enough. I usually only drink one. This is better than the sparkle of jewelry. This is love gifted daily...

Twenty-two years of marriage gives a spouse perspective. Love making is a process roped together with life making... fire making, coffee making, baby making...

"I like you barefoot and pregnant," he says from time to time. It used to be his joke. Now he really means it. The legs don't get shaved that often and he says he doesn't mind, but I keep my toenails painted pretty. No crazy colors. He prefers natural.

Natural takes work. Brush the teeth several times a day. Eat healthy foods. Exercise, no money and time for the gym. Instead I chase muddy boys through the pasture, clean the house in high gear, weed the yard, it's about five acres. Walk to the mail box, another five acres, feed the horses slabs of hay on the way. Keep my hair long for him and my body slender. But not too slender. He doesn't like bony.

Cook his dinner, must be meat in there. Eat by his side at the table with the children. Make his lunch: peanut butter and jelly sandwiches his favorite. Homemade jelly prepared by Oma, my mom. I've really got to learn how to make jelly for my husband. I keep saying I'll do this when I don't have a baby on my hip, but I've had babies on my hip for twenty years now so this summer with baby on hip I will stand in Oma's sweaty, summer kitchen and watch her make strawberry jam. Again his favorite.

A husband who keeps a fire burning deserves a wife who makes strawberry jam, don't you think? I also need to master texting since he's a high school teacher who texts. If it was up to me I would still call him from a phone booth, but he's into texting as his students do.

Like fires and strawberry jam, real love is painstakingly made. Through sickness and health. In patience and perseverance. In daily talks. There have been seasons where we talk in the middle of the night when the whippoorwill outside our window wakes us up. Some days are just too crazy with kids to always look into each others' eyes and say, "You know I really love you," or "we really need to pray to keep our love alive."

Sometimes love comes easy, other times not. When he shaves his head out on the patio I get upset. I like his hair longer too. When I go blonde he complains, "Where is the little redhead I fell in love with?"

Yesterday we sat down together and chose a dozen of our favorite songs to make a date night play list. When we met twenty-five years ago our taste in music was way different. To my surprise last night we agreed on every song. Fires and strawberry jam are worth the effort.

MERCY IS IN THE HOUSE

2011-04-04T09:06:00.000-07:00

Sunday afternoon I am driving down the road when I see my neighbor teaching his grandson how to ride a bike. It is a perfect spring day. The sun shines on my neighbor's thinning hair and on the golden hair of the grandchild. Along the road almond trees bloom. In the distance snow-covered mountains look as close as my backyard.

As I watch my neighbor push the little red bike, balanced on training wheels, the grandchild grinning for all his worth, I suddenly and profoundly feel God's presence. It's a heavenly moment until the Lord whispers, "Beloved, you are angry with me." I am about to argue the point with God, when, in a flash, He shows me all the reasons I am angry. God is not vague. People and places vividly come to mind involving divorce, cancer, and suicide. Suicide is the kicker for me.

Tears splash down my cheeks. I recall another Sunday afternoon with this same neighbor several years earlier. I am driving down this very road when I come upon my neighbor's house and death is at his door.

I flash back further in years to another front yard where I sit on the freshly mowed grass beside the body of my favorite uncle. My uncle is covered with a blanket awaiting the morgue's taxi. It is so like my uncle to have mowed the lawn before killing himself.

Flashing deeper into my soul, just hours earlier probably after mowing his lawn, my uncle comes to my house to give me his record collection. We talk all afternoon, the whole time he holds my one-year-old daughter on his lap. My uncle laughs. He cuddles Cami while sharing his favorite memories with me. He even talks about Jesus. I look at the records he's brought. Pick out my favorite one. Point to a song I loved when I was a child, El Paso, by Marty Robbins.

I don't notice that as my uncle leaves he takes the Marty Robbins record from its album cover and carries it back home with him. In his living room, he puts the record on his stereo. Turns up the volume so he can hear El Paso in the garage where he has work to do. Before the work, he writes a note. Short and sweet and to the point. "I've made my peace with Jesus," is the last line before he signs Love, Danny. My Uncle then hangs himself in the garage and the work he's done devastates our family.

The Marty Robbins' record plays on in his living room, over and over repeating this song, El Paso. My grandmother finds my uncle in the garage. It's been less than thirty minutes since his death. Must be her mother's instinct that brought her here so quickly. She calls me and her first words are, "He's done it." Normally I'm a crier, but not a tear comes forth in the face of this shocking announcement. Not a single tear until I wake up the next morning having slept the shock away. Now I cannot stop crying.

This Sunday afternoon before passing my neighbor on the road where he is teaching his grandson to ride a bike, I am in a surly mood. For days I'd been irritable. Weeks really. Months perhaps. Thinking upon it, I realize I've been mad for some time. But my anger is down deep. Hiding. Not just from others, but from myself as well. Yet God sees my anger and today He calls me on it. I can't believe He tells me that I'm angry in the middle of such a beautiful moment. Here I am marveling at spring upon the earth. My smiling neighbor with his grinning grandson. In this moment of profoundly sensing God's love, He pinpoints my anger.

In the flash of God's reckoning I see divorce riling me too. A couple who have ministered in our church for years have split. They aren't the first Christian couple I know to shatter, actually there are many, but they are the first I have deeply admired and loved since becoming a Christian.

Then there are my cancer friends. More anger ensues. Precious Christians who have come to God's altar for healing. We've laid hands on them. They've been anointed for healing by the elders of our church just as the Bible instructs. After their time at the altar, they appear to be healed. Even the doctors are impressed. But now the cancer is back. It will be a miracle if they spend this Easter on earth with their families I watch weep at the altar.

Another friend has fought cancer for years. She keeps running to Christ and He keeps healing her, but not fully. Last year I met her at the altar to pray. She stood before our pastor as he prayed over her and anointed her with oil. I stood behind her with my hands on her shoulders praying too. Our worship leader sang a beautiful song. I felt so close to God. Tears drenched us all. At the end of the prayer time, my friend turned to me. "I'm going to be okay," she said with a radiant smile. Standing there with my friend at the altar, I catch a glimpse of heaven and in that moment I am ready to die with my friend if the cancer wins the day. Then the song ends and it is time to return to our shadowed seats in the congregation.

It is taking my seat in the dark that angers me after praying with my cancer friend who died a few weeks ago. And accepting my seat on the grass beside the body of my uncle. And the seat in my car as I drive up to my neighbor's yard where his son died. "Stop allowing people I love to die!" I want to wail at God. But I've been raised to believe that wailing at God is not allowed. Yet I read the Bible and some of it sounds like wailing to me.

Then there is the lofty seat of judgment I perch upon before my divorcing Christian friends. How could they do this to Christ? To their Christian family? To each other and their own children? To younger Christians like me who have admired them so much? I agree with God that I'm angry and I feel pouty as a twelve-year-old whose all-knowing parent has just told her, "Take your seat because I said so."

A few days later after major prayer, I view a fellow Christian's blog. She has posted a song: Complete in Thee. The old hymn has been digitalized. I like it so much I stick it on my Facebook wall. And I listen to it several times a day until the anger in me breaks.

While I am writing this blog, my three-year-old son Garry James tells me that Mercy's in the house. He says this several times to help me understand. All of a sudden it resonates in my heart: Mercy is in the house. I feel as if God has said this to me over my anger, over suicide, over cancer and divorce.

"The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. 'The LORD is my portion,' says my soul, 'therefore I will hope in him.'" Lamentations 3:22-24.

The Mercy Garry James is talking about is actually our little rat terrier who replaced Bell, the rat terrier puppy my husband ran over in our driveway a few years back. I was so broken on the day that Bell died, but I can't imagine life without our dog Mercy.

Garry James settles down with Mercy on the couch to watch Go Diego Go, his favorite video. The sweet little black and white dog cuddles up to him. Mercy is like that, she's all about love. God is like that too. He says, "Beloved place me like a seal over your heart, like a seal on your arm; for love is as strong as death, its jealousy unyielding as the grave" Song of Songs 8:6.

I need to hear this, that God's love is as strong as death. "Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting? ... But thanks be to God! He gives us victory through our Lord Jesus Christ" 1Corinthians 15:55-56.

Little Faith and the Faithfulness of God

2011-03-17T11:36:00.000-07:00

Last spring I'd just returned home from a writers' conference and was all geared up to pursue a long dreamed of writing career when Scott informed me that he wanted another baby.

This declaration from my husband upended my plans considering long ago I discovered that I'm not good at writing and having babies simultaneously. It seems all the blood goes to growing the baby, then caring for the little creature, and my brain stops working. Then it takes several years to find my mind again so I can write after bambino arrives.

It's not that I was against another baby last spring. I admitted that if a ten month old landed on our porch steps, I'd be happy. But the thought of nine months of pregnancy in my forties did not charm me. My last pregnancy at forty had been a challenge. The results of an ultrasound pointed to possible Down syndrome, and though our sixth child was born healthy, I struggled with the fear of this happening again in a subsequent pregnancy. With me in my forties now the odds of Downs shot up against us. Of course I don't believe in odds, I believe in God's providence, so holding onto the birth defect argument was pretty pointless. I'd already decided that obeying God and my husband was more important than a healthy baby anyway, but I brought all these worries to the Lord last spring nevertheless.

And here is what the Lord said to me, "Oh you of little faith..."

I heard this chastisement clearly in my spirit.

"Seven children requires more than a little faith," I whined to God. Picking up my Bible, I read about the feeding of the five thousand in the gospels, and then just a short while later, the feeding of the four thousand. The interesting aspect of these two stories is that Jesus' disciples experienced the miracle of the feeding of the five thousand and yet still doubted how the four thousand would be fed right after that. In response to their unbelief, Jesus said, "Oh you of little faith..."

I felt like Jesus was saying this to me over having another baby. When it was all said and done, I knew I needed to obey my husband and open myself up to another child, but I also needed to open myself up to God to grow in my faith.

I'm so grateful I did. As I sit here blogging today Christian Scott Bicknell sleeps against me. He's curled into a breech fetal position on my chest, his favorite sleeping spot, which isn't surprising that he still naps in a fetal position considering his actual due date isn't until this Sunday the 20th of March. I call him my little peach because the peach trees began blooming around the time of his birth (March 7th) and are now in full blossom out in our yard. Christian is recovering from jaundice so he presently looks like a little yellow peach.

By God's grace, I've continued my quest to read the Bible in 90 days in the midst of Christian's birth. In doing this I cannot escape the overwhelming theme throughout the Bible that God measures our love for him in our obedience to him. From Adam and Eve to 1 Corinthians where I'm reading right now, God proclaims that love for him equals obedience. "If you love me, you will obey me," God states throughout the Bible in many different ways and themes. I understand now why God reacted so strongly to Adam and Eve's disobedience in the garden. What Adam and Eve displayed was a lack of love for God when they did what he told them not to do: eating the forbidden fruit. It was never about eating the fruit. It was about love betrayed.

Perhaps you don't measure love in obedience, but believe me, the God of the Bible measures love this way. I've sensed this love/obedience tie for years, but it certainly has become more biblically clear to me as I've read at least 12 pages of the Bible a day for nearly the past three months.

We all have different faith journeys. Different purposes on this earth that God created each of us to accomplish. I don't believe everyone is called to have a large family. I know many people who would give anything for just one baby, or a second or third child to add to their home, but their bodies have resisted this longing and they remain childless or have less children than they hoped for.

The Bible says that God gives children, and also that God gives the empty womb. Hard to take, I know. Especially when we want something different than God grants us. Several people I deeply love have battled infertility. Infertility crushes the spirit, at least until a person surrenders to the God who loves them. Then they realize that God has his own plan for their lives, and that plan is always, always the best for that person be it a house full of babies or no babies at all.

Life on this earth is passing away. Even 80 years of living is but a blip in light of eternity. In heaven we will not be married and we will not bear children. We will be like the angels, the Bible states in Luke 20:34-36.

Jesus also says that those who are disobedient will not enter heaven. Only people who love and obey God will spend eternity with him.

So as my little peach of a boy wakes now and I stare down at his precious little face as I end this blog, I am overwhelmed by the grace given to someone like me...

Me of little faith washed in the wonder of God's faithfulness...

A Glimpse of Heaven

2011-02-22T07:42:00.000-08:00

Last night I caught a glimpse of heaven. This happened while I prayed with my son Luke. Up until that evening with Luke the day had been really sad for me. That morning a special friend died. She'd battled cancer for a number of years and a handful of times I prayed with her, asking Jesus to conquer the cancer. A year ago I stood with this friend at the altar of our church as the pastor anointed her with oil. I profoundly felt the presence of God then as we pleaded with the Lord for her healing. Few times in my life have I seen the hand of God so plainly upon someone, yet my friend's cancer progressed and this week she died in the middle of her life.

My friend did not have it easy here on earth. She endured a failed marriage and the loss of her only child, a sweet little boy born the same year as my Luke. When our sons were both two-years-old, my friend's little guy drowned in his baby-sitter's backyard. That day shattered everyone. Due to her cancer, then in the early stages, my friend was unable to have more children. She also suffered the loss of a precious one-year-old niece on Christmas day not long after losing her boy.

The grief allotted to this friend and her family seem unbearable to me. Yet my friend never lost her sweet smile or the golden glow of the Holy Spirit on her face. She was always telling me how good God was. When I spoke at a women's retreat at our church about the faithfulness of Jesus, I asked this friend to stand up because I wanted all the ladies to see someone profoundly touched by God: not because of her suffering, but because of her sweetness, which was unexplainable in the midst of such a tragic life.

So this glimpse of heaven came last night after my son Luke had spent the day hiking in the hills with friends from church. I could tell by Luke's eyes that he'd done some serious crying as he walked in the door. This surprised me since Luke is at an age where he rarely cries and when he does, he tries his best to hide his tears. I asked him what was wrong, but he wouldn't say. He said the hike went fine and then hurried upstairs to his room.

Lately Luke has been asking a lot of hard spiritual questions. We've raised him at a Christian school and in church and he can quote the Bible better than some preachers I've heard, and as a young boy Luke accepted Jesus as his Savior, but only recently has he shown a genuine interest in God. After giving Luke a bit of time alone upon realizing he was upset, I went to his room to see if I could comfort him. It was then that he shared with me his fear that he might not truly be saved.

"Will you pray for me, Mom?" he asked with tears in his redden eyes.

"You bet," I said. "Do you know that the Bible says the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom? Being afraid of God is a good thing. True salvation begins with true fear of the Lord."

While praying with Luke for his salvation, a vision of my friend now united with her son suddenly appeared to me. They were standing with Jesus watching over Luke and me. Rooting for us. Interceding for us. The image was so powerful that even though they were far above in heaven, golden warmth and light enveloped me all the way down in Luke's room. It came from above in a slow, gentle rush and the peace was amazing.

"Thanks, Mom," said Luke upon opening his eyes. There was such shining softness in my son's 13 year old gaze that I caught my breath.

"Thank Jesus," I whispered not wanting the warmth, peace, and light to go away. "The Lord has good plans for you, Luke. Plans to prosper and not harm you. Plans to give you a future and a hope."

Luke smiled. And I smiled. This promise from Jeremiah 29:11 was one of the first verses I memorized from the Bible. It reminded me of the day of my own salvation ten years ago.

I don't understand why my friend and her son died so soon. And so sadly on this earth. But in that glimpse of heaven, time meant nothing and there was no grief up there. My friend and her son had finished the race before Luke and me and now they stood joyfully with Jesus. This glimpse of heaven encouraged me so much this week. I hope it encourages you too today.

Way Giver

2011-02-17T11:56:00.000-08:00

God sometimes speaks to me through children's movies. On a recent afternoon in the middle of Kung Fu Panda, a favorite Bicknell boys flick, God showed me my sinful tendacy to be a "way getter" instead of a "way giver." This happened primarily during the scene where the wise old turtle Master Ooway is blowing out candles. There are thousands of candles and the old turtle is barely moving each wick with his soft breath. Master Shifu, the little red panda who reminds me of myself because of his impatience, can't stand the wait of all those candles, so he rips around in a flash extinguising the flames for Master Ooway.

It's not really the candles bothering Master Shifu. Impatience is just a symptom of his problem. Shifu is all anxious over the Dragon Warrior. It has been Shifu's job to train the Furious Five. The intent is that one of these Kung Fu fighters of the Furious Five will become the Dragon Warrior. Master Ooway tells Master Shifu that not only will the Dragon Warrior bring peace to the valley, the Dragon Warrior will bring peace to Shifu as well. For the valley and Shifu have the same enemy: Tai Lung. Tai Lung was once Master's Shifu's beloved student, but evil was found in Tai Lung and Master Ooway rejected him as the Dragon Warrior. Tai Lung is now bent on revenge and only the true Dragon Warrior can defeat Tai Lung.

But this blog isn't about the Dragon Warrior, or maybe in a way it is...

In the Bible, God's great adversary Satan is known as the dragon. Revelation 20:2 says, "He (God) seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil, or Satan and bound him for a thousand years."

So the real Dragon Warrior is Jesus. It is Jesus who will defeat the dragon and bring peace to the valley and to the anxious little red panda. What the little red panda Shifu needs to do is surrender and wait. Instead of being a "way getter" he needs to learn to be a "way giver" and let the real Dragon Warrior deal with the enemy.

Like the little red panda, all my life I've fought to have my way. My husband calls me the "getter done girl." This week I went to the Roseville mall with my mom and my three-year-old son. We weren't going to shop, our mission was to get some makeup at Macy's and I was only along for the ride since I'm suppose to be taking it easy. My mom likes to do the driving. My son is determined to steer as well. On top of this, I am eight months pregnant. There isn't a patient bone in my body right now. Only a trip to Walmart with young and old would have proved more challenging. On this outing, I kept reminding myself to be a "way giver." Oh how I need to learn to rest and trust and wait on the Lord to change me and to change those I love. There is a spirit of control in me that so needs to be broken once and for all.

This is becoming more clear than ever as I struggle to parent Cami and Lacy, our nearly grown daughters. I used to always hear how hard it was to raise teenage girls. We didn't experience this in our home. Our girls have been a dream until recently. The other night I found myself watching the clock waiting for Cami, a sophomore in college, to come home. By two in the morning, I was not a happy camper. To Cami's credit, she'd texted her dad letting him and I know that she was safe, just out dancing with her Christian friends in Roseville... Christians don't dance! They do Bible study together and go to bed early... See the anxiety growing in this little red panda? Actually I don't have a problem with dancing. I have a problem with letting my nearly 20 year old daughter find her own way on her journey of faith. Why can't Cami just listen to me and stay on my well-defined faith trail?

So there I am at two in the morning in God's ear telling the Creator of Heaven and Earth what He needs to do with Cami as if I know it all. Not only am I trying to control Cami, I'm trying to control God and it is exhausting, especially since I'm ready-to-pop-pregnant at 43 years old experiencing a pregnancy that, as always, is out of my control.

And the Dragon Warrior Jesus is so sweet in the stillness of the night. "Rest and trust," He tells me. "I will bring peace to the valley and peace to you," He whispers to my heart. "Stop trying to get your way, and just give way to me. Be still and know that I am God," Psalm 46:10.

A Soft Place to Fall

2011-01-26T10:20:00.000-08:00

I recently watched a Planet Earth special of breath-taking scenes of nature played out in daily life without a human in sight. One scene in particular struck me. It was a mother wood duck in a forest waiting for her babies as one by one they bailed out of their sky-high nest. These ducklings appeared really small with fluff instead of feathers. The nest was way up in a tree and the little ducks fell instead of flew to the ground. They landed in a big pile of leaves, bouncing and doing back flips, yet seemingly uninjured. I wondered if Momma Duck or God or both, lovingly arranged this soft place to fall.

How I would love for all my children to fall softly in this world. To land in a prepared place where they won't get hurt. To be given time to grow their Christian feathers out and learn how to fly with God before the trials come. If it was up to me, I would simply keep my kids in the nest until they had their "faith wings," until they were grown up tried and true Christians. That's my problem, I want to be God with my children.

Admitting this humbles me. That when it comes to my children, I want to be God. That I'd like to decide when my kids are big enough to make that leap out of the nest. That I want to plan where they fall. Actually, I don't want my children to fall at all, I want them to fly, so not only do I have a God complex, there's pride involved too.

This realization has come about because our daughters are nearly 18 and 20 years old now and both are at the edge of the nest longing to fly. I don't think these girls are ready for the world yet, but ready or not, the leap is about to arrive. Now I find myself piling prayers underneath my daughters like leaves hoping that when they fall, it's in a very soft place.

Obviously God is much better at being God than I am so I've been repenting of the sins of control and pride in my mothering. Our three-year-old son Garry James and I watch a lot of Charlie Brown and in that cartoon you can never understand what the adults are saying. Awhile back God showed me that this is how I sound to my teenagers when I take on the role of the Holy Spirit in their lives. I become an invisible adult my kids would rather tune out. This is not the kind of mother I want to be. I long to be a mother of love and wisdom and Spirit-filled grace.
So once again I'm on my knees crying out to God to change me. To put me in my place: a soft place to fall too.

The Fog of Self and Clarity of God

2011-01-23T10:44:00.000-08:00

This morning I awoke to a clear, bright dawn. We've had a lot of rain and fog so it was wonderful to see the California sunshine. But driving to church, we hit a fog bank. Suddenly complete gloom engulfed us. We could hardly see the lines on the road right in front of us. When we arrived at church, the fog was so bad, it was hard to find the entry doors. Yet I knew the church was there because for nearly ten years now we've worshiped in this place. The fog didn't change the location of the church, but it sure changed the focus of things.

This reminded me of something I've been thinking about all week. The Bible says God knows every intent of the heart. So why do I worship God? What is my heart's intent? At first, the answers that came to mind seemed good: He died for me. He loves me. He's never once let me down. Many rock-solid reasons surfaced about why I worship God, but I soon realized that all these answers were about me. So who was I really worshiping? Myself or God?

I've been reading through the Bible in a way I've never read it before. Our church is pushing a program right now to either read the Bible in a year, or in 90 days. A handful of times, I've read the Bible in a year, so I decided to take the 90 day challenge. The three month reading plan is set up to cover about 12 pages a day. What I've found by reading the Bible this way is that it unfolds sweepingly, like an epic movie. The most interesting aspect is that God truly shines as the central character.

In the past, while reading the Bible in smaller portions, I've always found Moses, or Samuel, or King David, or some prophet seemingly the main character, or in the New Testament, Jesus and his disciples. I've never really seen the central character of the Bible as God until now. In my head, I've always known God was the main character, but it hadn't hit my heart before this way.

In light of really seeing the character of God, I realize that the way I've been approaching Him in prayer and worship isn't quite right. My approach has been human based instead of God based. It reminds me of that often quoted President Kennedy statement: "Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country." In other words, "Ask not what God can do for you, but what you can do for God."

I've come to see that approaching God is truly about Him, not about me or the people I'm praying for. The heroes of the Bible knew this. Their prayers were full of God and often began this way:

Because You are a merciful God...

Because You are slow to anger and abounding in love...

Because we are a people called by Your name...

For Your namesake hear our prayer...

The emphasis is always on God, not the believer. In light of this, I've been doing some soul searching about how I pray and worship. Instead of just asking God to do something for me or someone else like: heal, deliver, or save, I've begun to pray in this way: "If it brings You glory, God, heal. Because you are a merciful God, deliver. For your great name, save. See how the focus of the prayer has shifted? The fog of self lifts and the clear light of God settles sharply into play. No longer is the prayer about the person, the prayer is about God, and rightfully so.

After going through all his pain and suffering, Job said to God at the end of the book of Job, "My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you" Job 42:5.

I believe this is what happens when the fog of self lifts. No longer have we only heard God, we have seen Him and His glory is far brighter than we could ever imagine.

A Spiritual Inheritance

2011-01-07T08:20:00.001-08:00

Last week while reading two books at the same time, the Bible and Patrick's Swayze's Time of My Life memoir, I was struck by something that sent a chill up my spine.

In the Bible under 1 Samuel 2:33 it says: "Every one of you that I do not cut off from my altar will be spared only to blind your eyes with tears and to grieve your heart, and all your descendants will die in the prime of life." God told the Priest Eli this because Eli allowed his sons Phinehas and Hophni, who were also priests, to run wild in the temple with no regard for the Lord. These wicked sons slept with the women who served at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting. They also gorged themselves on the sacrificial food brought to the temple for the Lord. The Bible says Eli was a very fat man. Obviously these sons inherited gluttony from their father too.

The same day I read the passage in 1 Samuel about Eli and his sons, I also read in Patrick Swayze's memoir this quote from Swayze: "It's a fact that Swayze men have never lived to ripe old ages. My father died at age fifty-seven, the same age I am now. My paternal grandfather also died young, and most of my uncles never saw the other side of forty." Only months after finishing his memoir, like his father, Patrick Swayze passed away at just fifty-seven years old.

Is there such a thing as a "dying young" curse placed on a family by God? I believe there is and sadly it seems the Swayze family has fallen under such a curse. In other places in the Bible, I've read about descendants dying in the prime of life because one of their ancestors deeply displeased God. There are many other curses listed in the Bible that also befall people. Read Deuteronomy chapter 28 beginning at verse 15, the Curses for Disobedience. If you believe the Bible, this passage should sober you.

As a parent, I am concerned about the legacy I will leave my kids. The last thing I want to do is bring curses on them. I've already seen how easily generational sins can be passed on to children. Upon gaining my driver's license at 16 years old, I put the pedal to the metal just like my mom. When my daughter was granted her driver's license at 16, that lead foot afflicted her too. One day while riding with my daughter, I asked her to slow down. "I got it from you, Mom," she tossed in my face. After that, we prayed together not to be speeders.

What we inherit spiritually has been weighing on my mind the past few months. Partly because of my own experiences, and partly because I keep unintentionally picking up books that speak on this subject of spiritual inheritance.

Recently while reading Francine Rivers latest mother/daughter novels, God forced me to face something I've been trying to escape for years. Here it is in a nutshell: while pregnant with each of my children something arises that threatens the pregnancy. It's been a little different with every baby, but the result has always been the same: I find myself on bed rest begging God to heal me and allow my baby to live. I've had premature labor, a serious infection, a torn placenta, more bouts of premature labor, a Down Syndrome diagnosis, this always seems to happen about midway in my pregnancies and has occurred every time. A number of family members have reminded me that my grandmother lost a baby girl in the middle of pregnancy. So did my mom. In fact, my mom lost two pregnancies.

Perhaps it's in the genes, or just coincidence, but I don't think so. I don't believe in coincidences. I think something spiritual is going on and Jesus has been pushing me to recognize this and deal with it. So finally this pregnancy I did. It was painful to work through, I had two months of bed rest to do it, but I'm so glad that God didn't let me off the hook this time as he has in my past pregnancies. I feel lighter now, as if a burden I was born with has been lifted. Hopefully my daughters will never experience this pregnancy curse.

As Christians, it's important to remember that Jesus bore every curse on the cross for us. The blood of our Lord covers all. If you think you may be under a curse somewhere in your life, I encourage you to take it to the cross. Ask Jesus to help you work through it. We all have a spiritual inheritance to face. Let us face our inheritance in the light of God's love and healing grace.

Anything In My Name

2010-12-30T13:14:00.000-08:00

When I was in college, I had a friend who loved throwing her daddy's name around. Daddy was a bigwig in the Nevada gaming industry, actually the vice president of a large casino. Whenever this friend and I walked into that casino, the first thing my friend said was, "I am Dave Dawson's daughter." Dave Dawson adored his little girl. Immediately out rolled the red carpet. Food and drink were on the house. If a show was in session, the front row seated us. The country crooner Johnny Lee, a popular singer at the time, kissed me at one of these concerts. Lee was the guy who sang Looking for Love in all the Wrong Places from that John Travolta-Debra Winger 80s movie: Urban Cowboy. Walking out into the audience to greet us, Johnny Lee said something along the lines of: "You girls are special, I can tell." Then came the kiss.

I was nothing more than a tipsy, twenty-one year old college girl, but I knew someone important that night and that made me important.

The right name does open doors, even in the spiritual realm. Especially in the spiritual realm.

A week ago in the middle of the night, I was on my knees beside the bed of our very sick little boy. Joey was on fire, fever flaming through his body, his eyes glassy and pleading with me, his mommy, to help him. The doctor thought maybe it was mono. I didn't even know a five-year-old could come down with mono. The fierce duration of this illness frightened me. I'd been praying for Joey's healing for over ten days, and he only seemed to get worse.

Ask anything in my name and it will be done for you, John 14:14. This scripture kept tumbling through my mind. It had been listed in one of my devotions just that morning. Now, at 3 a.m. there on my knees leaning my head on Joey's mattress, I grabbed hold of this scripture with all my heart because I sensed this was the medicine that would heal my son.

Jesus was the name I was counting on. Jesus: a name above all names says the Bible. But before this name was going to help me, God and I needed to have a serious talk.

You see, we'd been over this before, me and God. Ask anything in my name wasn't a new concept to me. I'd first heard it with my heart about ten years earlier. I say with my heart, because before that, I'd heard this verse read outloud in church while growing up, but it meant nothing to me really. Then, ten years ago, when I was a brand new born again Christian, I began surrounding myself with other real Christians. One of these Christians, a woman named Clara, had a sixteen-year-old grandson dying of cancer. Clara, with tears on her cheeks one day, said to me, "I don't understand it. I've asked in His name that Jake would be healed, and still my grandson's dying."

Being a baby Christian, I had no idea what to say in response to Clara's grief and confusion over this scripture not working for her. Now that I'm a decade old Christian, I'm still not sure what to say. I talked this over with God the other night beside Joey's bed because Jake's death continues to haunt me. He was a beautiful boy, a strapping, star high school athlete. I found out I was pregnant with John on the day Jake died. The memory remains oh so bittersweet. Never will I forget that morning the news of Jake's death came. The cottonwoods growing in our backyard were in bloom and white little tuffs of fluff floated all around as I sat in the sunshine on our porch speaking on the phone with a broken Clara.

You must pray for my will to be done before you can ask in my name, it seemed I heard God say the other night as I asked Him why this promise did not come through for Clara with Jake.

God's will is a hard thing to accept if it brings a terrible loss into your life as it did Clara's. I certainly didn't want to lose Joey, but I knew in that moment that I had to surrender my son to God. "He's yours, Lord," I prayed with tears running down my face. "Your kingdom come, your will be done. If you want to take Joey, take him."

I pushed my pregnant self up into the chair beside Joey's bed. He was asleep now, his hair damp with sweat, his cheeks still rosy from fever. I cried for awhile, then thought about the time I was so sick a few years ago when God used this same scripture to speak to me. During that season of my life I kept asking in the Lord's name for healing, but the healing just wasn't coming. Ask anything in my name, God seemed to be telling me, but each day when I did this, nothing happened. No healing came. Finally one morning sick as could be, I pulled a scripture card out of the little glass box I keep on my bathroom counter, and there it was, Ask anything in my name and it will be done for you. In anger, I threw that little scripture card across the room, then sunk down on the bathroom rug and wept.

"You ask in unbelief," I heard God say while pressing my feverish cheek to the round, shaggy rug. The impression of that statement was so strong that I looked around the bathroom for Jesus himself.

I didn't see the Lord standing beside the tub, but in that moment of truth, I agreed with Him.
Right there in the loo I repented of my unbelief and from that day forward, began to heal of that mysterious sickness I'd had for several months.

Sitting in the chair in Joey's room in the wee hours of the morning last week, I confessed the unbelief blighting my heart. "Your will be done, Lord," I repeated again, and then, "Forgive me for any lack of faith as I ask in your name for Joey's healing." A short while later, I went to bed. I slept for maybe an hour, then awoke with a start. My heart was hammering in my chest, that gallop of the Holy Spirit I immediately recognized.

"Ask in my name," I heard the Lord repeat himself.

"For Joey's healing?" I clarified.

"Yes, for healing."

"In the name of Jesus heal Joey," I said breathlessly, thanksgiving flooding my soul.

Each day since then Joey has improved. The fevers are finally gone. He's back playing with his brothers, though he tires easily. I continue to pray over him, reminding myself as I do that above all, Joey is God's little boy much more so than mine.

Under the Christmas Tree

2010-12-21T18:21:00.000-08:00

So this week Garry James left something for Santa under the Christmas tree. It was a warm, steamy gift, but unfortunately, it wasn't cookies.

What amazed me is that we were all in the room when Garry did it. The living area, kitchen, and dining are all together at our house in one big room. Our Christmas tree sits in the corner of this space, presents piled underneath it. On this rainy Christmas vacation all six of the kids, along with Scott and I have been just hanging out, some of us reading books, the boys stacking blocks in front of the fire, all of us together like in a little log cabin with just four walls, only bigger, with a tile floor.

Thank goodness for the tile because Garry's gift for Santa would have stained the carpet. I'm surprised we didn't smell it. Not right away, we didn't. In fact I didn't smell anything until Garry James came to me and said, "I pooped under the Christmas tree."

"What?" I answered like Luke our junior higher answers "what" when he's heard me, but doesn't want to understand what I'm saying.

"I pooped under the Christmas tree," Garry James repeated himself.

"You can't be serious," I said to our two year old like he was a forty year old person telling me this. My mind just couldn't comprehend why a human being would do such a thing. Even a three feet tall human being.

Maybe Garry was talking about one of the dogs pooping under the tree. Perhaps he was confused about who'd done the pooping.

I looked over at Nahla, our yellow lab, on her rug across the room. She was sound asleep, being a very good dog because the last thing Nahla wanted was to be thrown out in the rain. Plus Nahla has never relieved herself in the house so I just couldn't fathom her sneaking over to place a pile under the tree.

"Show me," I said to Garry James, still operating in unbelief that there really was boy poop beneath our lovely tree.

Garry James took my hand like the sweet little tow-headed tot he is and led me to his dirty deed. There was the poop pretty as you please right beside a neatly wrapped present for Grandma. Bigger than dog poop and now I could smell it.

"You've got to be kidding me," I said to Garry James. "You really did that? With all of us here not seeing you?" Standing before the evidence, I still struggled to accept it. Perhaps that was rubber poop. The kids playing a trick on bed rest mom to get me off the couch.

"What did Garry do?" asked John about five feet away playing with blocks. To John's seven year old credit there was a couch between him and the poop, but still, I was about as far away from the dukey as John and I could sure smell it now.

"Don't you smell it?" I said not only to John, but to everyone in the room. "I don't smell nothin'" said five year old Joey, playing blocks with John.

"Scott," I said patiently. "Come look what your son left under the tree for Santa." Over at the kitchen table, Scott was studying a history book.

When one of the kids does something I don't like, I make sure to let Scott know that it is his offspring not mine, who has disappointed me.

Any other time, I would say, "my" son or "my" daughter because I'm a proud momma, but I have to say that in all my twenty years of motherhood, I have never experienced a child pooping under the Christmas tree. This certainly qualified as one of those "look what YOUR son has done" times.

Scott walked over to where Garry James and I stood beside the tree. When he saw the poop, he bent over laughing.

"Don't laugh," I scolded. "Laughing will only encourage more of that!" I pointed to the poop like it was a family member. Like More of That was one of those relatives you moaned about when they showed up at your door on Christmas day. You know the kind: they come, they drink, they burp on the pumpkin pie, they tell off-color jokes, and you quickly send the kids upstairs praying they haven't learned any new dirty words or appalling tricks like... pooping under the Christmas tree... I guess kids don't have to be taught bad manners by bad relatives. It seems children are born with bad manners. It is good manners they must be taught.

A dear old lady once said over the birth of a precious baby, "Look at that. Another little sinner born into the world today."

I was surprised by this statement. Seeing a baby never made me think of sin. But how right that little old saint was. Anyone who has lived with a two year old knows that "children are sinful from their mother's womb" as the Bible says.

So apparently potty-training has hit a whole new level at our house now. We've had poop in the tub, poop on the back porch, poop in countless pants, but never have we had poop beside the Christmas presents.

Now I know why God makes two year olds so cute. If Garry James wasn't that adorable imp standing there holding my hand admiring his poop with me today, I might have done what my dad did to our dogs when I was growing up: rubbed his nose in it.

Crazy At Christmas

2010-12-17T08:38:00.000-08:00

I've never had a Christmas like this before. No Christmas shopping. No parties. No baking, decorating, or dancing in the rain. It's been years since I danced in the rain, but this year I would if I could. Not in front of anyone. Not this white woman in her forties who can't dance unless she's drunk (which, thankfully, I haven't been since my thirtieth birthday), not to mention seven months pregnant, trying to bust a move in the mud, seriously, this could scare away Christmas.

Anyway, I spent last week on bed rest staring at an angel ready to dive off the top of our Christmas tree. Scott set the tree up the weekend after Thanksgiving, but I am usually the one to put the ornaments on the boughs, and I wasn't able to do this this year because I have a couch stuck to my backside. So we had an empty tree with lights and a suicidal angel for awhile. After wrapping the silver tip with electricity, Scott stuck the angel up there in a hurry because one of the boys was yelling from the bathroom that he was "done!" That's what gets yelled around here, "I'm done!" our sons holler wanting to be wiped by a big person. Scott's been a little overwhelmed being the only wiper on duty these days so he plunked the angel up there cockeyed and dashed off to the loo and the poor angel spent the week holding on by the skin of her halo.

Each day I would look at her and think, I see you, sweetheart. At least you have wings in case you jump. Staring at the desperate angel made me ponder why Christmas brings people to the brink of themselves. And after thinking about it for days on end, I think I know why.

It's the birthday boy. If you have issues with the guy celebrating the birthday, it's hard to enjoy his party. In fact, why even go? If you have no relationship with that baby in a manger, there is no reason to be happy about a giant party for him. You're thinking there is no reason to celebrate. No reason to toast and be merry for a guy you could care less about. No reason to bring a gift. And if a bunch of other people are giddy up to their gills about this party and you don't even like this guy, then it can sure bring out the inner Grinch in your soul.

So you let the Grinch out. Hopefully like that old Dr. Seuss Grinch, your Grinch will ruin the party for everyone this year. Wipe the smiles off those foolish people's faces. You'll growl "Seasons greetings!" through gritted teeth. Make it really clear that Merry Christmas is not for you. Slam on your breaks in front of some grandma's plastic manger scene. Get out, gouge the lawn, and kick baby Jesus out of his straw bed. And still you don't feel better. In fact, you feel worse. So you drive to Raley's, purchase half the liquor department, and self medicate. Drunk, you climb the Christmas tree with kitty under your arm. You toss the cat to see if the fur ball really will land on its feet. Someone needs to land on their feet because you feel like yours have been kicked out from under you. You're barely hanging on by a pine needle, and all because of Christmas...

But it's not really Christmas that has you crazy. The whole Christ thing gets to you. Why?

Have you ever really thought this through to its climax? Why people get so bent out of shape over Christmas? And Christians for that matter. I mean nobody bashes on Buddha. They don't dog Hinduism or get irate over Islam. But offer some prayers in Jesus' name and watch the fur fly.

As I stared at that angel half hanging from our tree for a week while I lay on the couch I realized how meaningless Christmas is without Christ. It's nothing but a fool's race of spending, drinking, and dressing up when you feel fat already on the tide of Thanksgiving. I remember those ridiculous days of Christmas without Christ and I don't miss them. While pondering why people panic at Christmas and jump out their windows, I also meditated on what Christmas really means to each and every person whether they hate Christmas or not: salvation. That's the height and depth of it. Jesus saves. Which is good news for those going crazy at Christmas.

Merry Christmas from the Bicknell Family

2010-12-13T16:02:00.000-08:00

I know many of you get our Christmas letter through the mail, but for those of you who don't, I wanted to share with you our letter on my blog this week. Thank you all so much for reading my little stories. I always pray for God to bless each of you with His loving kindness.

We close this year grateful for the Lord’s blessing upon our lives. Our big news is that we’re expecting a baby on the first day of spring, though to most of you, this news isn’t big. Or even surprising. Still, we are happy to announce another son’s arrival come March. That makes five boys in a row much to Cami, Lacy, and perhaps Opa’s consternation.

Opa was out here chainsawing old almond trees the other day surrounded by his grandsons when a wayward limb knocked the chainsaw onto his leg. Bloody and growling with four, wide-eyed boys in his wake, Opa limped to the house seeking first aid. I tried to talk him into going to Urgent Care, but of course, Dad refused. I got to tweezer frayed long johns and jeans out of his hamburger gash before he went back to work for the day with a tightly bandaged thigh. This made quite the impression on the boys and had me bemoaning the fact that man-training will be going on around here for years to come. Added to that, Scott makes the boys nunchucks and swords from the wild bamboo grove in our ravine and allows wrestling in the living room on any given Sunday, and all week long as well.

Though the wild boy bunch has years of growing up to do, Cami and Lacy are young adults and often off on their own adventures now. Cami is in her second year of college finishing up her general education before stepping into a speech therapy major. She remains at home, working part time, along with going to school fulltime, and will probably leave at the end of summer headed for Sacramento State University.

Lacy has one more year of high school, and then hopes to hit the mission field for a semester before settling into college. She and Cami have both done Mexico mission trips, and together they did a mission outreach to Haiti a few months after the devastating earthquake. Thank you to all who financially and prayerfully supported the girls on this life-changing adventure. They had the time of their lives working in an orphanage and cleaning up rubble while spreading the gospel.

Luke continues to play on a competitive soccer team and loves hunting with Opa and Uncle Patrick. Luke shot another large buck this year, which we again made into deer sausage that the boys microwave and eat like crazy. Luke is also gearing up for his first mission trip this coming summer, a journey to Brazil with our church youth group.

John (7), Joseph (5), and Garry (two and a half) have taken up hunting with Opa too. Opa was brave enough a few weeks ago to load all the boys into his pickup for some deer hunting. The trip was going “super,” as Opa would say, the boys dressed picture-perfect in their camouflage clothes, only apparently the little predators were not seat-belted in on the dirt road, and when the dandy buck was spotted and the brakes slammed upon, G2 (as Opa has dubbed his namesake) torpedoed into the dash, then smashed against Opa’s over-sized beverage, cooling off the excited hunters with a tsunami of ice tea. G2 then landed on Opa’s rifle in a howling, banged-up fit. One can only imagine the shock of the buck witnessing such a spectacle. I’m sure the big one that got away laughed his way back to the other bucks with the “dumb hunter” story of the day.

Opa has vowed to never hunt again with a grandson who needs a car seat. Good thing Oma keeps the home fires burning making little ones happy beside the hearth while the bigger boys feed the family.

Scott continues to enjoy teaching history at Faith Christian, and this year coached Luke’s junior high soccer team. By His grace, Jesus remains our reason for the season.
“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” John 3:16.

Christmas blessings and love to all,
Scott, Paula, Cami, Lacy, Luke, John, Joseph, Garry, and Baby Number 7.

My Dog Evie

2010-12-02T10:21:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I cried over a dog that's been gone nearly twenty years. She was a pit bull named Evie, a fifty pound mass of muscle with cropped ears and a jaw like an alligator. Most people were afraid of my dog Evie and I preferred it that way. She was my protector, my sidekick, and my best friend for a difficult season of my life. Just writing about her now, I get all weepy.

Evie was a Christmas present from my husband Scott the first year of our marriage. Actually, she wasn't a pit bull. She was a blue-blooded American Staffordshire terrier that we paid six hundred dollars for and had her flown down from some zealous dog breeder in Idaho who insisted on cropping Evie's ears before releasing her to us. The whole ear-cropping thing bothered me then, and still does. Why cut off half of a dog's perfectly good ear? For months I used tampons and wine corks to train Evie's sawed off ears to stand up right like they were supposed to. Wine corks in public and tampons in private. The tampons were softer and better for her tender ears said the dog breeder.

The most embarrassing moment of my first year of marriage came when Evie paraded into the living room with a string hanging out of her mouth in front of a roomful of guests. A few beers in already, Scott said, "What the #&%# does the dog have in her mouth?" That was back before we were Christians when my Army helicopter pilot husband cussed for a hobby. Scott is living proof that Jesus saves because he is now a Christian high school teacher who carries a Bible everywhere he goes. But after swearing back then, Scott jerked the string out of Evie's mouth before I could stop him. Unfortunately it wasn't one of Evie's clean, private ear trainers. It was my tampon straight out of the garbage can. Let's just say I wasn't pregnant when that happened.

The guests took it well. Everyone had a drink in their hand and were good at cussing too so the moment passed in swearing and laughter. I didn't think it was funny. I marched Evie back to the bathroom and told her how badly she'd embarrassed me in front of company. Then to make my point, I took out Evie's wine corks and stuck tampons in her ears. "See how that makes you feel in front of all those people, young lady," I said gulping down my wine. I was twenty-two years old with freckles still on my face, trying hard to appear grown up in the presence of older people.
Evie gave me that big jawed grin of hers, happily wagging her tail, then she bounced back out to the living room to show off her "private" ear trainers.

A few days ago I was missing Evie so bad because I'm back on bed rest with my current pregnancy and I was alone feeling a bit sorry for myself, staring at the walls in an unusually quiet house since I had to farm the boys out for awhile. Each of my pregnancies has brought bouts of bed rest. My first pregnancy may have been the hardest since it was so new and scary; except I had Evie and she stayed on the couch with me the whole time, giving me all her brown-eyed sympathy. When a pit bull gives you sympathy, you take it and you feel better. It's not like some fluffy poodle's sympathy.

Evie knew how it felt to be pregnant. She had her own litter of pups. The morning Evie gave birth, she followed me around whining until I sat down on the floor in our living room trying to figure out what was wrong with her. To my surprise, Evie quickly crawled onto my lap like a big, frightened chicken. I weighed about a hundred pounds in those days. Evie was half my size. I didn't know Evie was in labor until a minute later when she dropped her first puppy on top of me. "Wait, stop, what are you doing crazy dog?" I screamed. I think both of us were horrified by what was happening.

Evie looked at me like, why are you freaking out? I’m the one in labor here. You just sit there and catch puppies crazy girl! I call myself a girl because, barely into my twenties, I still felt like a girl in those days, a very young girl facing bloody puppies in my lap.

Evie and I survived the shocking event. She had every puppy in my lap, and those puppies eventually made me a lot happier than they did Evie. By the time the puppies were three weeks old, I had to keep reminding Evie that they were her babies not mine. "Look," I said one day pointing to all those hungry yappers in the laundry room. "You have to feed them, Evie. I do everything else. I can't do that for you, too!"

Evie, looking like an old sow pig with her milk bag dragging the floor, sat down in the kitchen and gave me that "I’ve had it" look.

"Sorry, girl,” I told her. “I clean up after the little poopers. Now you get in there and do your motherly duty."

The day we gave all those hungry, half-breed puppies away, Evie ran gleefully around the yard like a convict just released from the state pen. It was a sweltering hot day in Alabama where we lived in a cinder block house on a military post. Evie had gotten herself in trouble with my dad’s lab back in California before Mom and Dad shipped Evie out to join us because we had to get base housing before we could bring our dog and we’d been living in a studio apartment waiting for post housing to open up.

"You are going to bake your brain out there. If you have a brain left, Evie!" I yelled from the sliding glass door after the last family departed with their free puppy. Evie ignored me, dashing across the grass like a goofy clown.

Evie's elation didn't last long. About the same week we gave away the puppies, I discovered I was pregnant. Soon after that, I was too sick to get off the couch. I had to throw up in a bucket because I couldn't make it to the bathroom. Evie took up watch on the couch with me, lying at her end looking sick too, and sometimes even jumping down to the floor to heave and gag until I stumbled up to open the sliding glass door so Evie could go throw up in the backyard. Patiently, Evie would sit at the door waiting for me to let her back in. Then, looking ill too, she would lie on the couch with me again. The first few times Evie did this, I cut out her table scraps thinking she was just over indulging in people food. When I realized Evie's throwing up always corresponded with mine, I told her to get over it.

"Evie, I'm the pregnant one, not you," I impatiently informed her. "Just because you had your puppies in my lap, doesn't mean I need you to suffer along with me through this. You are a dog," I explained. "I have never heard of a dog with morning sickness, especially when it is the master who is pregnant!"

Evie exasperated me sometimes. I really could write a book on Evie, but this is a blog so I better hurry along my story.

There were days I held on to Evie during that first pregnancy and cried my eyes out. Evie was probably thinking: See, now you know how I felt dumping those $&*#@ puppies in your lap! I think Evie was a cusser. She heard enough of it around my husband and his Army buddies.

I sobbed into Evie's red and white fur the night I went to my second Lamaze class in a row without Scott because he was busy studying for his flight exams. Every other woman had a husband sitting behind her with his arms around his wife, practicing birthing while there I sat alone and afraid having my first baby clear across the country from my mom and practically every woman I knew.

"I'm done with Lamaze," I tearfully told Evie after that second class by myself. I didn't even know if Scott, a soldier during the first Gulf War, would be there for the birth so why bother practicing it with him? Around that same time, Scott was ordered to make out a last will and testament, while I attended a mandatory wives' meeting preparing families for the possibility that spouses could die in battle.

Evie licked my tears sympathetically, and if I could have read her mind (as I swear she could read mine), I know I would have probably heard that dog say, "Let me go to that Lamaze with you. My pit bull muscles are bigger than any of those silly men there holding their wives."

Evie was always good at cheering me up when I was sad. She could make me mad as a wet hen too, like the day she carried the kitchen garbage into our bedroom and ate leftover Chinese food on our white feather down comforter. Evie dragged the complete metal garbage can on top of the bed, and then emptied it there while I was out grocery shopping.

Sadly, the day I gave birth (I'm cutting this short again, because it's a blog) Evie had to stay home with my mother-in-law while I went to the hospital alone. Scott met me there and we made it through a Lamaze type birth only because it was an Army hospital and they didn't give epidurals or little else to ease the pain. A Special Forces field surgeon delivered our daughter Cami with forceps and told me to quit whining while he pulled Cami out by her head with those salad tongs. The Special Forces doctor had just come from the war so he probably felt little sympathy for a woman giving birth when he'd just left an Iraqi battlefield.

When I returned home from the hospital, I found Evie chained in the yard in the rain looking broken in spirit. My mother-in-law is not a dog lover.

I felt so bad for Evie. I brought her into the house, toweled her off, and showed her the baby. To my surprise, Evie was a lot happier to see my baby than her puppies. She immediately became our infant daughter's bodyguard, curling up watchfully wherever baby Cami was.

I wish this story had a happy ending, but it does not. When Cami was four months old, we joined Scott in Germany for his tour there. Evie we left at my parents’ ranch. We thought that would be a better place for her. It wasn’t. One of my parents’ neighbors shot and killed Evie because she ventured onto his property. This happened the same week my favorite uncle committed suicide. My cousin had recently survived the Linda high school shooting of 1992 (the first school shooting I ever heard of) and the L.A. riots had taken place late that spring. By that summer when Evie and my uncle died, I thought the world had gone crazy. I also found myself pregnant again, and I cried myself blind over losing Evie.

At our Bible study the other night a friend asked with tears in her eyes if she would see her beloved pets in heaven. I answered, "I don't know." Another member of our group with extensive Bible knowledge said he didn't think so. He said there would be animals in heaven, but not our old pets. If you have the time, please leave me a comment letting me know what you believe about pets going to heaven... Thanks for your thoughts on this.

JEALOUSY and GRACE

2010-11-18T10:14:00.000-08:00

I've heard that the most dangerous calls law enforcement responds to are the domestic kind. Especially disputes between a husband and wife or boyfriend and girlfriend. These are the house calls that kill people. Stepping between two lovers, especially in the jaws of jealousy, can be deadly. It's been said that more police officers have died coming between a man and his wife than any other police intervention.

When we think about love bringing death this way, we usually assume some rejected guy has gone off the deep end because his lover tried to leave him, but I've been studying the Old Testament lately and the most deadly lover I've ever read about is God.

That's right, God. The 'God who loves everybody,' I have heard a hundred times over. But if you really read the Old Testament (check out Deuteronomy), this God that we hear today loves everybody, actually slays men, women, and children by the city full. And the reason God kills all these people is simply because they will lead His beloved Israel astray. Not only does God wipe out other nations for Israel, the people of Israel who betray God get the ax as well. Yep, God puts His own people to death for being unfaithful to Him.

But we live by the New Testament now, Christians tell me. God isn't like that any longer. Grace is here. God is love now.

But let me tell you, God does not change. The God of grace is the same God who killed all those people in the Old Testament. God's raging jealousy has not abated. He's as crazy in love with His people as He's always been. And just as willing to kill for them.

God himself proclaims how jealous He is: "... for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God..." Deuteronomy 5:9.

So what really is grace? Where did it come from and why do we have it?

Actually, grace comes from the ultimate jealousy killing. The God who does not change has demanded blood since the days of Cain and Abel. Not just a little blood, buckets of blood. Again, read the Old Testament. The pages of this book are soaked with blood. Someone or something was always being slaughtered so people could get right with God. That's what it took: blood and death to bring us into the presence of God and keep us there safely.

In the New Testament, blood and death are even more significant, but we'll get to that in a moment. I'm not finished with the bloody Old Testament yet.

I encourage you, if you really want to know God the Father, dig into the Old Testament. The Bible says, "Fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge," Proverbs 1:7.

What I have found is that fear of God is also the beginning of salvation. It is the beginning of your relationship knowing God. If you have no fear of God, it is because you do not know Him. When Jesus really wanted to make a point, He repeated Himself, so I say it again: if you have no fear of God, you really don't know Him.

I've pretty much stopped asking people if they are a Christian. The majority of Americans will tell you that they are. I don't even ask people I minister to any longer if they are saved. Here is what I ask: "Do you know God?" If they answer yes, then I say, "Do you fear Him? Tell me the truth, are you really afraid of God?"

This question often stumps people. People have said to me, "Why should I be afraid of God?" And then comes the famous line, "God loves everybody."

Actually, what the Bible says is this: "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." John 3:16.

It doesn't say, God loves everybody. It says, "For God so loved the world..." The world.

If you're from my generation, you may remember that Michael Jackson song, We Are The World. But are people really the world? How arrogant is that for human beings to say?

Another scripture says, "I love those who love me, and those who seek me find me." Proverbs 8:17.

And still another scripture spoken by Jesus states, "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him..." John 14:23.

The Father who kills people right and left in the Old Testament, this Heavenly Father who does not change, who is still so jealous He will kill for you, or maybe kill you if you stray, will come to you...

You know, if I didn't understand how grace works, I certainly wouldn't want this fiercely jealous God to arrive at my door.

So here is grace as simply as I know: the cross. And on the cross hangs Jesus. And he's bloody and dying for you. Why is Jesus bloody and dying for you? Because God is so jealous for your love that He put his own Son to death because of you. Because you strayed. Because you were unfaithful. Because you have cheated on God and the Almighty cannot live with your unfaithfulness. So God demands blood and death. Not just any blood and death, your blood and death. But God loves you so much, He cannot bear to kill you. So the Father puts Jesus to death in your place.

This is the grace of the jealous God who loves you.

The Dinner Table

2010-11-10T10:08:00.000-08:00

Tonight we had a family dinner. It came as a surprise considering it was squeezed between an after school soccer game and a late night soccer practice under the lights of a high school football field.
As we all took our places at the table for the gift of a half hour together, a fierce wave of gratefulness washed over me. Sad to say, family time at our house has become a battle. The fight focuses on finding time to just be together. The older kids are off to this sport or that activity or to work. Sometimes, I think they just plain want to escape their younger brothers, the wild bunch, so they don't come home as often.
Wistfully, I look back on the days when family time presented no problem. Practicing the art of being a family was relatively easy before our older kids entered their teens. Nobody had their own car then. Two family cars graced our driveway, an old army green minivan Scott drove and a maroon Expedition we fondly called the Molly Mobile. Usually we all piled into the Molly Mobile to hit the road, often beginning our journey with a prayer and an outcry over a little brother's stinky feet.
Today, there are five cars in front of our garage, at least whenever everyone is home, which isn’t as often as I would like. Two of the cars smell like powder puffs: our daughters grease their wheels with air-freshener and no brothers with unwashed tooties are allowed in their vehicles.
More evenings than I care for now we eat out of a crock pot in shifts. Recently, two-and-a-half-year-old Garry tossed the big glass lid of the crock pot onto the tile floor and it shattered into a billion pieces. Now I use tinfoil to cover the pot. It makes me hate that old pot all the more. Between athletics and jobs and church activities, it’s become a real challenge for us all to sit down at the dinner table together. My preference is a full blown meal with every chair warmed by a child's toosh, but some of these tooshes are now bigger than mine and they've got places to go and people to see. I find myself grieving that "family" is becoming an endangered species, not just in our home if we don't make some adjustments, but in homes across America.
It's plain and simple: the biggest enemy of the family is right outside the front door. In our household of eight people everyone has their outside agendas, and they're overwhelming. The pressure to sign your life away to a sport, or a job, or a club, or even church is a black hole that sucks families into oblivion.
These days as I fight to hold our family together, my grandparents and their warm, cozy kitchen come to mind. Grandma had a secret weapon in keeping her family together: morning, noon, and night she cooked a delicious sit down meal and family members showed up more often than not to sit at her table.
By the time I was in high school, I would drive to my grandparents’ house for lunch, though it wasn’t a quick trip for me. Even Taco Bell couldn't beat out my German Grandmother's food, but more than that, sitting down at my grandparents' table filled something inherently hungry in my heart, especially since my parents' table was suffering a dry spell in those years. My brother was in college at the time, and Mom and Dad, in the chomping jaws of middle age, had thrown themselves into their careers.
Grandma’s table was a different story. Not only could I eat delicious food at their peach farm, my grandparents always ate with me, asking how I was doing, laughing and talking with me for as long as I wanted, and so genuinely happy to have me there. I haven't forgotten that "dinner table lesson” I learned from Grams and Pops.
So I've begun to employee this valuable lesson: cook and they will come... prayer and laughter and gratefulness around the table help too.
I'm also finding it effective to get the recipe book out in the morning and begin baking before the older kids leave for the day.
"Is that pumpkin pie for tonight?" they will ask, grabbing their gear to head out the door.
"Yes, and I have Cool Whip too. But don't you have soccer and youth group tonight?"
"Sure, but I'll be here for dinner," they usually say when I bake something sweet in the morning.
It takes time and effort to make a dinner table worth coming home to, but what's the value of your family to you? What's your family's value to God?
Jesus knew the lesson of the dinner table. In fact, Jesus chose the dinner table as his last act of love shown to his disciples before he went to the cross to save them.

FIVE BOYS

2010-11-03T10:07:00.000-07:00

When I was 18, I sat down one day and planned out my life and then prayed for it to come true. Who I would marry, how many children we would have, where I would live, how my career would go: all sunshine and roses in the yard and writing, writing, writing... AND five boys... That's what I wanted, five little boys. Scott and I were dating and he was my husband of choice. I vowed that our handful of handsome boys would grow to manhood knowing how to put the toilet seat down for their wives.

Of course, I had no idea at the time what raising five boys was all about. My older brother was my only sibling and he and his awesome friends took good care of me. Most of my school buddies were boys back then, and Scott quickly became my best friend when we began seeing each other my senior year of high school. I'd always been a daddy's girl as well. Truth be told, I just liked boys. The opposite sex usually said what they meant and meant what they said. They played outside where the fun really happened, and I loved males' strength and straightforwardness. Girls often hurt my feelings, but boys rarely did.

I was a fast runner in those days, didn't mind having dirt in my hair, and for some reason the boys always liked me. Usually, I was the first girl picked to be on the boys' team, and I was often included in their masculine inner circle when other girls got ostracized because they were girls.

So I admit I was disappointed when our first baby was a girl. But she was so cute and sweet that I quickly came to adore her.

When our second baby arrived, another girl, a powerful wave of disappointment washed over me. Yet only for a moment because our second daughter was born six weeks early and turned blue in my arms as she looked into my eyes for the first time. Her lungs collapsed and she nearly died after her birth. Because of God's mercy, she survived and soon thrived and when we finally, gratefully, carried her home, my grandpa said, "Shoot, you brought home another #*@# girl."

I felt like a failure that day for birthing only girls, but oh how I now loved that scrappy little girlie in my arms that I shielded from my gruff grandfather that summer day nearly 18 years ago as my other little wispy-haired daughter clung to my legs whenever Grandpa came into the room.

My grandpa died a few months after his second granddaughter's birth. He never lived to see the grandsons that came along, the first, a handful of years later, and then three more in all their unabashed boyness. And yesterday our ultrasound revealed a fifth boy on the way, five boys just as I wanted way back when.

The evening before the ultrasound when we were holding family prayer night in the front yard around a cozy fire in our chiminea, our oldest boy walked to the edge of the grass and relieved himself. One after the other forming a line by age, his three little brothers joined him, even the two-year-old peeing up a storm.

I thought to myself, oh my goodness, I'm going to wear out my knees praying these boys to adulthood. Hopefully a sweet little girl who politely uses the bathroom is on the way. But as we prayed, the baby in my belly did somersaults. Just like a boy...

And from day one, I've felt we were having another boy. I even named him Cruz the day we discovered I was pregnant. It means cross in Spanish. Not that another little boy is my cross to bear; we were in Santa Cruz when we found out I was pregnant, and the cross is the most beautiful symbol on earth to me.

"God has a sense of humor," a friend said to me today. "Another boy. Your life will be crazy for years to come."

This is true. As I used the bathroom by myself today, quietly and cleanly like girls do, I looked down and there at my feet was a frightened, little frog.

"I understand your fear," I told the little frog. "Those boys scare me too. They packed you into the house in their pocket. You probably escaped in the laundry and hopped in here to hide. I will take you outside now and set you free in the garden. Then I will go back in the house and look for lizards because they carry those in too and unlike cute little you, lizards give me the creeps. Snakes I refuse to think about in the house."

After having a complete conversation today with the little frog, I realized that raising boys has changed me. I've really grown to like girls. Girls are clean and quiet and I never see them pee. They pack flowers into the house instead of critters, and wash their own faces. They paint their nails and I don't have to sit on them with a pair of nail clippers and a pry bar to get the dirt out from under their cuticles as they howl like banshees.

Yesterday at the ultrasound when the tech posted the first photo of our new little man on the television screen, Scott walked into the room and did a double take. He'd been waiting outside because daddies don't get to come into the ultrasound room until the exam is nearly over. I'd been holding off finding out the sex too because I wanted Scott to be there when the tech revealed the gender of the baby.

"Is that a picture from the other people's ultrasound that were in here before us?" Scott asked with a priceless look on his face. The photo was a shot between the legs of little man's masculinity.

"Nope. That's yours," said the tech.

Surprising myself, I squealed in delight. It had only taken God about twenty-five years to fully answer my crazy girlhood prayer of five boys. Now I'll be talking to frogs until I'm sixty years old.

P.S. I just realized that I write about bathroom stuff a lot. Sorry about that. It's my daily grind, cleaning up potty mishaps. Thank you for reading my blog. My prayer is that God speaks to you and we learn His lessons together.

Hugs,
Paula

DO OVERS

2010-10-28T09:27:00.000-07:00

I feel like I'm in a do over. As a Christian, this frustrates me because why didn't I get God's lessons right the last time? I'm talking about lessons learned while pregnant, but the issue isn't really about having another baby. The issue is dealing with the same old feelings about the same old things and hearing God echo exactly what He's said to me on the first, second, third, fourth, fifth, and sixth go around.
I've learned these lessons before, why do I have to relearn them again?
I recently read a book called the The Sacred Echo by Margaret Feinberg. She talks about this exact issue: why we keep having to hear the same thing from God over and over, and how this is really a Biblical principle, that God is okay with repeating Himself to us, in fact, God is the author of this echo and we should embrace it as Christians.
As a parent, I see the do overs and echos all over our house. Every day I tell my kids the same things. I get after our younger boys for splashing water all over the bathroom as they bathe. Worse yet, I'm constantly on them for peeing all over the toilet, the wall behind the toilet, and the floor around the toilet. Sometimes the window sill beside the toilet. Do they whip around to look out the window at the birds flying by while they pee? What is so hard about hitting a toilet bowl?
I remind our 13 year old to take his soccer stuff to school for practice each day. He's been playing soccer for nearly a decade now, practicing nearly every afternoon with a team, certainly he knows those cleats and shin guards need to walk out the door when he does each morning. They're like his nose and ears, practically a part of his body, how does he still forget them once or twice a week?
I ask our daughters to do the dishes or put away the laundry. One girl helps with the dishes, the other with the laundry, and they've done this now for the past several years. Yet both will walk by dishes overflowing the sink and laundry to the ceiling without a pause in their dancing teenage steps. They must think the house-cleaning dwarfs arrive when Snow White takes her leave. Normally, because they are good girls, I cheerfully do their chores for them when they don't get around to it, but nothing is normal right now, or maybe this has become the Bicknell normal every few years: Mom is pregnant again and has hit that magic 19th week where contractions kick in.
This means bed rest. Do over time. Surrendering to God and where He has me, pregnant and on the couch or in bed for hours at a stretch and we don't even have TV now to dull my whirling mind, spinning with all the things that need to be done in a house where eight people exist in all their mess-making peopleness.
From the couch, I get to watch a two-year-old make his own sandwich and then live with the mayonnaise on the walls until a teenager takes notice. My point exactly: what teenager notices mayonnaise on the wall? They don't even notice mayonnaise around their mouths. Perhaps if you smeared mayonnaise over the iPod they might clean off that little magic screen to carry on with that very important business of teenagerism: texting and facebooking and music surfing and what have you, but mayonnaise on the wall?
We won't even talk about a two-year-old making a sandwich...
So I am suppose to lie here pregnant on my left side staring at mayonnaise wallpaper and soccer cleats that didn't make it out the door this morning and a ringing phone with a junior-higher on the other end saying he needs his cleats by 3 p.m., all the while being grateful and joyful and filled with the Holy Spirit and I find myself once again crying out to God to have mercy on me because the joy hasn't come yet and the Holy Spirit has told me He'll arrive when I'm done repenting of my frustration.
To get past this frustration, I'm presently running down my thankful list, starting with the fact that in the past two years several of my close friends have died of cancer. These precious, beautiful, vibrant women spent time on the couch and in bed because they were too sick to take care of their families before they died while still in their early forties leaving toddlers and teenagers and shell-shocked husbands behind, and here I am with life in my womb in my forties, that little bambino fluttering around like a butterfly in this old flower and I think, wow, I'm still blooming after twenty years (I was expecting 20 years ago too in this same month and on bed rest with contractions midway through my pregnancy then as well). Each pregnancy has brought some bed rest lessons and a big dose of trusting God to get me through it.
Along with a huge dose of humility that life goes on without me all the way around. The soccer cleats somehow make it to school each day, the mayonnaise eventually gets scraped off the wall. The Snow Whites realize the dish and laundry dwarf has fallen and can't get up and they finally dance around to doing their chores. I will rise from the couch, walk to the bathroom, forget about the boys' pee all over the toilet seat, and sit down wiping away that problem, too, because... this too shall pass.
Even do overs pass.
In the meantime, as my prayer partner so graciously reminded me today, I have plenty of time to pick up my Bible and focus on God. Such a helpful prayer partner have I...
Honestly, it was easier in those younger years of pregnancy to focus on the TV. The Telly (as the British fondly call television) didn't expect me to repent of a bad attitude. Twenty years ago, I spent the day on the couch in the month of November mindlessly watching Good Morning America, Regis and Kathy Lee, a soap opera or two, and news on the rising of the first Gulf War. And when I went for a potty break, the toilet seat was dry, and there wasn't a half dozen little tooth brushes with toothpaste still smeared on them, scattered from the door to the loo like a trail of breadcrumbs for the dwarf with the damp hiney to follow back out to the couch.

Pulling on the Rope

2010-10-23T09:39:00.001-07:00

One of my earliest memories was trying to pull a rope out of the ground. The rope was about a foot long and smooth and white like rawhide. It was buried in the dirt at my grandma's horse stables. My grandma said that the rope was connected to a China man's hat and the China man lived in China, which was on the other side of the earth down beneath the stables. If I pulled real hard, the rope would come out along with the China man and then I'd have my own China man to take care of me. Wouldn't the China man be happier with me in America? Of course he would, said my grandma. "Pull and pull, honey," she insisted. "Let's get that China man up here to watch over you."
My grandma wasn't a Christian. Her philosophy about God was: God helps those who help themselves. She talked about spirits helping people too, friendly ghosts and that sort of thing.
I sure was surprised years later to read in the Bible that: God helps the helpless. He helps those who cry out to Him in time of need. He helps the orphan and the widow and people who call upon His name. God is always helping people, but it is not the proud people helping themselves who God helps.
When I was young, having a China man to take care of me sounded more appealing than having God around. I knew enough about God to realize that God would expect me to obey Him, where a China man would have to do things my way. I watched a lot of old westerns in those days with my dad. Hollywood certainly wasn't politically correct back then. The Chinese did all the hard labor in those dusty old cow town movies like laundry in big wash tubs with fires burning underneath that made the China men sweat. A China man could do my chores so I had more time to ride my pony, I decided while pulling on that rope. The China men in those old westerns also carried knives. When someone messed with them, they whipped out a wicked knife and scared bully cowboys away. You didn't mess with a China man, that's why I needed one at my side.
In looking back, I see I was always looking for someone to take care of me. Someone strong and brave and more powerful than all the things I was afraid of like the red-eyed Grinch, and man-eating wild animals, and especially Jaws. My uncle had taken us to see the movie Jaws when I was about seven-years-old. I never recovered from that film. Even using the toilet terrified me for awhile. I was afraid a shark was going to rise out of the porcelain bowl and eat me. My uncle was the son of my grandma who told me about the China man at the end of the rope. Like my grandma, my uncle loved to tease. My other uncle, his brother, was rich and had a big, fancy swimming pool where I learned to swim. Both uncles, along with my brother, and even my grandma, loved to yell, "Jaws!" to watch me Olympic swim my way out of the pool. I wasn't a good swimmer, but when someone yelled "Jaws!" I could exit the water in a flash of foam.
Since my uncle died a few weeks ago, all these memories of my childhood have surfaced.
Sometimes I feel like I'm trying to pull that rawhide rope out of the ground again, but now that rope is connected to God. I want God to tell me everything is okay, that my uncle made it to heaven and that gay marriage will never become legal in California. It's not the gay community I'm against, I loved my uncle just how he was, and I love his gay friends, but it's God's laws I want to uphold. California is where I live and election time is here, which gets everyone's blood up about issues like gay marriage. So those issues have been on my mind, along with the memories of my uncle, and my childhood.
It seems like a lifetime ago that I was a persistent little girl pulling on that rope every time I went to my grandma's horse stables. I'm sure the adults watching me thought that was so funny. I didn't think it was funny. I remember getting tired and frustrated with that old rope in the ground.
Sometimes I get weary and frustrated with God. I'm completely aware of the fact that God is not the one with the issues. California has issues. I have issues. God does not have issues. God is perfect, but I can't always feel God at the end of the rope.
The Bible comforts me in this because there are a whole lot of folks in the Bible who grew weary and frustrated from time to time, too. But they kept pulling on that rope of prayer until God answered them because God isn't imaginary like the China man. He's real and wants to watch over us.

My Uncle

2010-10-17T19:29:00.001-07:00

We buried my uncle this past week. It's the second death in our family in two months, the first being my husband's stepbrother who passed away in August. Both of these men helped teach me something important about being a Christian: we are all sinners in need of Jesus and standing on a cause is not Christ-like. Loving the lost is what Jesus did. He did not walk around holding a sign that read "Homosexuals are going to hell."
The truth is, everyone who rejects Jesus will go to hell. The most straight, clean-living, caring person will go to hell if they do not accept Jesus as their Savior. This is what the Bible says along with condemning homosexuality. All sin is condemned in the Bible. In fact, pride is listed far more often than any sexual sin categorized in the Word of God and I know a lot of prideful Christians, myself sometimes suffering from the terrible "church lady" disease.
Both my brother-in-law and my uncle were gay and I loved them very much. Before I became a Christian, I saw nothing wrong with their gay lifestyles, but I can't say these men were happy living against the grain. Actually, they were both tormented souls in their own way and after I became born again, both asked me if I thought they were going to hell because they were gay. I told them, "No, I don't think you are going to hell because you are gay. People go to hell because they reject Jesus as their Savior."
"But you are a Christian now so you think I'm a sinner," my uncle pressed me one day as we stood on my porch while he smoked a cigarette.
"Yes, Uncle, you are a sinner. I'm a sinner too. So was Grandma." My uncle deeply loved his mother, my grandma who lived a very clean life and was faithfully married to my grandpa until the day he died, but who never did accept Jesus as her Savior to my knowledge. "We are all born sinners. I don't see a difference between your sin and mine," I explained to my uncle. "Jesus died for both of us. He loves you just as much as He loves me."
"Really?" asked my uncle as if he could hardly believe it. It was during these years that my uncle began attending church with us. My uncle and his partner would sit with our family three rows from the front near the altar and I was so grateful to have these men beside us.
When the whole gay marriage debate flamed up in California, many Christian friends asked me to put signs in our yard and join in fighting for this cause. I refused to make a fuss with the Christian community not because I believe in gay marriage, I don't. The Bible says that marriage was made for a man and a woman and it also says that marriage is for life, though Christians overlook this other biblical principle all the time. One nonbeliever said something I thought was profound about the gay marriage debate. He stated in an editorial response in the newspaper, "Why should we have to live by the Bible when Christians don't live by their Bible? Christians say gays can't marry, but Christians divorce right and left. They commit adultery all the time. When Christians start living by what the Bible says, so will I."
Powerful.
True.
And heart-breaking.
I can count on one hand Christians I know who truly live by what the Bible says. Most Christians stand righteously on causes such as gay marriage and abortion and then turn around and disobey the Bible in a hundred other ways.
At my uncle's funeral, the song Victory in Jesus was sung. Hot, hopeful tears streaked my cheeks because I'm not sure if my uncle made his peace with Jesus before he died. I do know my uncle wanted peace with God. He pursued peace with Christ by coming to church with us these past four years and the Sunday before he died, he sat beside me where my last words to him were, "Uncle, let Jesus heal you."
My uncle was 72 years old, a diabetic, and hadn't been feeling well for awhile, though none of us knew how sick he was on Sunday. I put my hand on his cheek in church that day when I said this to him. My uncle closed his eyes and smiled a little smile that is forever burned in my memory. He died a few days later.

Come Away My Beloved

2010-10-08T20:59:00.000-07:00

One of the devotions I read is called Come Away My Beloved by Frances J. Roberts. It was first published in 1963 and was given to me by one of the most godly among women I have ever known, Pauline Berry. I was going to put this entry into more modern terms for you all, but decided instead to just copy it straight from the page so I didn't mess it up. I read this devotion today and felt compelled to share it on my blog for this week. I hope it arrows through your heart the way it did mine this morning. May the Holy Spirit set your hearts on fire as you study it. Prayers for a wonderful weekend in our Lord.

Cherish My Words

O My Children, obey My words. Do not wander in unbelief and darkness, but let the scripture shine as a light upon thy path. My Words shall be life unto thee, for My commandments are given for thy health and for any preservation. They will guard thee from folly and guide thee away from danger.
Hide My commandments in thy heart, and make them the law of thy life. Cherish My words, and take not lightly the least of them. I have not given them to bind thee, but to bring thee into the life of greatest joy and truest liberty.
I have asked thee to give , in order that I may bless thee more. I have challenged thee to pray, that I may respond and help thee. I have asked thee to rejoice, in order to keep thee from being swallowed up by anxieties. I have asked thee to be humble, to protect thee from the calamities that fall upon the proud. I have asked thee to forgive, so as to make thy heart fit to receive My forgiveness. I have asked thee not to love the world, for I would have thee loosed from unnecessary entanglements, and free to follow Me.
Sanctification is accomplished in no one by accident. Learn My rules, and put them into practice consistently if ye desire to see progress in the growth of they soul. Holiness is not a feeling --- it is the end product of obedience. Purity is not a gift --- it is the result of repentance and a serious pursuit of God.

A Tale of Two Rabbits

2010-09-29T15:11:00.000-07:00

When I was a kid I raised rabbits for 4-H. My dad built me a rabbit house and I had about twenty cages inside a tidy, little, bunny barn. Inside these cages, I raised meat rabbits. Yes, some people eat cute little bunnies, and for several years, I actually had my own business. It never did well, and to this day my brother still teases me about my imaginary "rabbit money."
My brother was right. I don't think I ever made a dime in my rabbit business, but I learned one very valuable lesson raising rabbits: the difference between a good doe and a bad one. A doe is a female rabbit. Bucks were boys.
Most of my rabbits were does. They produced the babies and babies is what I was after since I sold them as fryers (4-H is a brutal business). You only need one or two bucks in a rabbit house. I'm sure you've all heard the term, "breed like rabbits." Well, the truth is, not all rabbits breed like rabbits.
After not doing well at the fair one year because my rabbits were judged too bony, I spent something like a hundred and fifty dollars (a fortune for a kid in those days) on two top of the line New Zealand rabbits, one buck and one doe. These New Zealands were sure to improve my breeding stock, I was told.
Well, the buck got right to work producing batches of bunnies, the problem was, the pricey doe wanted nothing to do with him. My old bony does put out litter after litter, especially one little black mother I came to greatly admire for her selflessness. She was nothing to look at like the gorgeous, new doe I'd paid a fortune for, because with each litter, Blackie pulled out all her chest and belly fur to make warm nests for her babies. Blackie was always skinny from tiredlessly nursing her bunnies and she loved taking care of the buck. When you dumped him in the cage with her, she went right to work grooming and wooing him. The new doe tried to kill the buck. Pretty soon, my top-of-the-line buck wanted nothing to do with my expensive doe. So much for rabbits breeding like rabbits.
Another buck, my old bony guy, was finally able to produce with this new doe, but she ate all her babies, leaving little hairless halves for me to find come morning. On the next successful breeding with Old Bony, this beautiful doe had her babies on the wire instead of in the nest. Of course they all died. Though this doe was my prettiest one (she groomed herself constantly and remained fat and sassy because she shared her cage, food, and body with no one) I came to despise her.
Being self-centered is an ugly quality, even in rabbits.
I sometimes think about these two very different rabbits while raising our daughters. Though our girls could have had their own bedrooms growing up, my husband and I encouraged them to stay in the same room so they would learn to share better. This year our daughters turn 18 and 20 years old, and they still sleep in side by side beds. Sometimes late at night I hear them giggling together. They are wonderfully close sisters. Four little brothers have come after them so the sisters certainly know how to share a cage, too. By God's grace, I pray that our daughters become like the amazing Blackie rabbit.
Proverbs 31 in the Bible talks about the Wife of Noble Character. Above all, I believe a good wife is selfless. And in reading Genesis this week, I was struck again by why God made Eve in the first place: In Eden, the Lord saw that the man needed a helpmate. Women were created for men. Women today don't like to hear this truth. Even Christian women don't want to accept this teaching because we long to live life on our terms and society today says we should.
I am reading a great American novel right now about a "perfect" suburban housewife who ends up tearing lives apart by seeking freedom. Once this bright and shining wife and mother begins to free herself to pursue her long buried personal desires, all hell breaks loose in her nice little neighborhood. I'm only a quarter of the way through this big, highly acclaimed novel, but I find it striking that this unbelieving male author points out that there is no freedom in being free to live for oneself. This is a lie women believe. A lie that when pursued, does great detriment to our society, the author seems to be saying.
So back to a tale of two rabbits: I even recall the beautiful, but terrible doe's name now, Rosy. I named her Rosy, 1. because she was a reddish color, and 2. because I thought she would bring me a rosy future in the rabbit business.
That's the thing about pursuing our selfish desires, those desires at first appear rosy, but in the end, produce only thorns.

HE LOVES US

2010-09-24T11:22:00.000-07:00

For the past month our dog Nala has been running off. Nala is a beautiful golden lab, the dream dog I waited years to own. We got her for the kids last Christmas, a little white fur ball we tied a red ribbon on, placed in a picnic basket, and left on the porch for the children to find just before Christmas on a Sunday morning after church. Such a delight Nala was to us in her youth. The playful puppy in the yard crazy for our love. She was the crowning touch to our country home completing my creation of a perfect life.

Now Nala's a whole lot of trouble. Many mornings I get a phone call from a stranger on the road. "Do you own a dog named Nala? You need to come get her." The helpful stranger reads her name and phone number off the dog tag on her collar, usually around 7:30 am when I'm still in my pajamas because since I've gotten pregnant, I stay in my pajamas longer. PJs are more comfortable than my maternity jeans, and if I sit on the couch very quietly watching Charlie Brown with our two-year-old Garry, my morning sickness doesn't seem so bad.

Now I have to go get that stupid dog, and boy, am I nauseated.

"I didn't want her to get run over," says the good Samaritan who has hailed me from their cell phone a half mile from our house. "She's such a pretty dog. You don't want to lose her out here on the road."

So Garry and I, having put Charlie Brown on pause and dressed in five seconds, load Nala into the car and drive her home. I scold her fiercely and lock her up in the kennel.
For a few days, I imprison her as punishment for leaving the yard. Once I let her out, she seems contrite and faithfully stays home for awhile. So I begin to trust her again and don't watch her so closely. Then back she goes to straying and back I go to chasing her down the road collecting her from all kinds of dangerous situations.

My husband thinks we should just get rid of her. "You don't need to deal with a dog like that when you are pregnant and have six kids and me to take care of," he tells me.
"But I love her," I argue. "Nala's my companion."

Recently, my nineteen year old daughter and I were talking about God. About why He puts up with humans when they cause so much trouble in His creation. Why does God even want to have us around?" my daughter asked.
Without thinking, I said, "Well, I put up with Nala. I love her even when she's being a bad dog."

You see, the thing is, I planned for Nala. I created our yard with her in mind. I pictured her lying on our front porch waiting for me to come home. In the cool of the evening, I sit on the porch swing and scratch her head. She looks at me with those big brown eyes knowing I am her master. Knowing I take care of her. Knowing I love her. Nala has my heart.

So I chase her down the road. I rescue her from strangers. I discipline her because I'm trying to keep her safe. Each day I pray that Nala will see the error of her ways and be content to live in my care. That she will stop running.

THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK:
Is there a place in your life where you are running from God's care right now?

THE PROUD BREED

2010-09-16T14:47:00.000-07:00

Recently, I had lunch with an insightful friend. She has a theory that the thing you lacked most when you were young, God often gives you when you are a mature Christian.
I told her I thought this theory was very biblical. After all, God called Abraham the father of nations, yet for a very long time, Abraham wasn't a father. When he did become a father, the Lord made it clear that it was only by the hand of God that Issac arrived.
God called Gideon a great warrior and humble little Gideon eventually became that, but when Gideon was young, he was a shaky-kneed wimp from a shaky-kneed clan.
David, the lowly shepherd boy, God pegged a king long before David ascended the throne.
"So what was the thing you lacked most when you were young that God has now given you?" asked my friend as we talked.
Munching on a sandwich, I had to think about this for awhile.
"Humility," I finally answered.
"Really? That's not a fun one." My friend searched my face. She's an intent listener, one of those people you find yourself spilling your guts to, which I did over our three hour lunch. Under her gentle gaze, I shifted in my seat, feeling a bit vulnerable as an ache built in my chest. Memories of my youth washed over me that didn’t make me smile.
"I was a prideful child," I admitted with a particular memory haunting me.
I couldn't have been more than seven years old. Down the road from us lived a poor Hispanic couple with a single-wide trailer full of children. Sometimes those poor kids would come over to play. We lived on the top of a hill in a nice house with ponies in our pasture. On this particular day, I was sitting in a chair in our breezeway holding a bag of Doritos. Like a queen keeping court, I was presenting the chips one at a time and very slowly to these hungry kids as I ate my fill at leisure. I can't remember exactly how this took place, why I was the keeper of the Doritos and not my older brother Patrick, I don't even remember my brother being there, too bad because he was far more compassionate than me as a child, but I think I might even have been making these kids do tricks like dogs for the chips.
My dad caught me doing this and gave the chips to the children, who happily left with my Doritos bag. I then got a belt beating and refused to cry.
My dad was a proud man. He believed in the belt, but he also believed in me, his little red-haired daughter with a will as strong as his own. One of the first virtues I recall learning in our family was that we were a proud breed. My dad ranked pride right up there with honesty, so instead of making excuses when in trouble, I confessed my sin, often without remorse, and faced the belt with a stony heart.
In high school, I read a novel called The Proud Breed. I loved this book. The couple in this love story helped tame California in the 1800s. The main characters were so prideful they nearly destroyed each other, but in the end, their fiery love conquered all. I hungered for this kind of romance in my own life.
The weekend Scott and I married, a battle raged in me. In the Catholic Church where we wed, a gentle Irish priest insisted I take the vow to obey my husband. How I hated this ancient oppression of women and did not want to agree to this order. In the end, I relented and repeated the vow because I knew Scott didn't expect me to obey him once we wed. My new husband was as prideful as I was, and we were already well on our way to destroying each other.
Surprisingly, after three turbulent years of dating, our first seven years or so of marriage sailed along rather smoothly. We had two daughters and I wrote three novels that have never seen the light of day. Scott became an Army helicopter pilot and I landed a New York literary agent. My books didn't sell to publishers, but one was optioned for a movie and I traveled to Hollywood to meet the producer. I was in my late twenties and thought I would have no problem presenting that bestseller to society by the time I hit thirty. Oh, the pride of life I lived by…
Then, after turning thirty having just given birth to a son, my life began to fall apart. I developed panic attacks and breast lumps that appeared to be cancer. My pilot husband was never home. Our precious, but colicky son grew into a sickly two-year-old. After several week long hospital stays in the pediatric unit praying to the saints for our son to join the ranks of the healthy, then facing several surgeries myself to remove lumps in the end, thankfully benign, my pride took a serious beating. So did my writing career. So did my marriage. So did my heart.
When humility finally reigned in my life, salvation followed. Grace flowed. My career came to a standstill, but my marriage sweetened.
Spending my thirties pregnant with three more sons a forthright friend just labeled as hellions has humbled me more.
Pregnant again at forty-two with still no published novel, though I've earnestly written several more, keeps haughtiness at bay. My dad now calls me the old woman in the shoe. If you don’t recognize this saying, you should brush up on your fairy tales.
Plus, twenty years of potty-training will humble a person. Poop directors are a lowly breed.
It wasn't until I became a Christian that I discovered pride was bad. In fact, it was pride that got Lucifer thrown out of heaven, which led to the Adam and Eve apple fiasco, which brought about the fall of humankind.
Proverbs 16:18 says, “Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.” I just read this scripture this morning after sleepily opening my Bible to this page. I wasn’t searching for this verse. I was just praying a bit before rising and popped open my Bible at random hoping for a wink from God. The funny thing was that during my half asleep prayers before reaching for my Bible, I’d prayed about finishing this blog on pride.
So here’s my fun question to you, “What has God given you now that you most lacked as a child?”
Spend some time really thinking about this question, but a word of caution here: your answer may not be fun. Mine wasn’t. Yet, I wouldn’t trade the gift of humility for the moon. I hear God better in this humble state.

Soccer Cleats and Solomon

2010-09-09T16:43:00.000-07:00

This week our seven year old son John started soccer practice at school. It's his rookie year on a team and he's been so excited about playing. A few days ago, before his first practice, he tore through the house searching for shin guards and cleats. His two older sisters and older brother are all soccer players. Plus last Christmas all our kids got new soccer cleats. Unfortunately, John outgrew his in six months.

So the other day, John found a pair of his sister's old soccer cleats that fit him perfectly. Problem was, though they were black, they had pink strips across the toes and pink lining, along with pink rubber soles.

"Do we have a black felt pen?" John asked running up to me with the girl cleats in hand and a big smile on his face. "I'm going to fix these because I know you don't have the money to buy me new ones."

I was so proud of John being happy with those hand-me-down cleats. John spent the next hour carefully coloring all the pink off, then he and his little brother Joey went out and played a soccer game in the backyard until the sun went down. The following day the boys did the same, John playing like a prince in his painted shoes.

The day after this was John's first school soccer practice. When he left that morning he was still grinning his missing baby teeth grin, talking about how perfect his painted cleats were going to be on the field, but when his dad brought him home from practice that afternoon, John was drenched in tears.

"What happened, buddy?" I asked in alarm. I put my arm around my little guy and he leaned into me sobbing.

"Soccer practice didn't go well?" I tucked him close and ran my fingers through his short, red hair.

"They laughed at me," he managed to say.

"I don't believe it. You're a good soccer player."

"My cleats," he cried. "Two kids saw the pink and made fun of me!"

My heart lurched. "Really? They made fun of you?"

"The ink wore off. They saw the girl shoes and laughed!" John pulled away from me and ran to his room.

I gave him a little time to calm down, then went and loved on him. "I'm so sorry, buddy. I'll take you tomorrow after school and we'll buy new cleats."

"But you don't have enough money right now..." His big blue eyes drowning in tears tore me up.

"Don't you worry about that." Right then I would have sold the farm for a pair of size twos. "God always gives us what we need," I assured John.

And for the past decade God has been proving this to me, I reminded myself as I ran my debit card today at Payless Shoes praying our account wouldn't bounce buying those cleats. I don't know if I taught our young son the right lesson by getting him new cleats, but on the way home, we talked about what makes a good soccer player, your heart not your shoes, and why it's important to never laugh at others that way. We also talked about kids in Africa who play soccer barefoot.

"Your sister's cleats would make those little African boys so happy," I told John, being the proper church lady teaching our boy the basics of Christianity 101, you always mention Africa.

Staring at me earnestly from the backseat, cradling his new cleats like a beloved bunny, John said, "But I still don't like being laughed at."

Oh, the honesty of a child...

Being honest with myself, like my son in that moment as we drove down the road, I wasn't dwelling on the poverty of Africa. John goes to a private Christian school. Yet not everybody is there because they love Jesus. Some parents buy their kids a good, safe, moral education just like they buy the best soccer cleats. I imagined it was these privileged kids who had hurt my son. I envisioned the parents flying down the road talking on their BlackBerries unconcerned that their children in the backseat mesmerized by a movie were spoiled.

And then I realized there was no privilege in that. And that poverty of soul far outweighs physical poverty. That perhaps a new pair of high speed soccer cleats might not be such a gift after all. Not when added to a mountain of materialism that strands a child's spirit in a lofty, lonely place.

In that instant of understanding, ten years of my life fell away and I remembered what it was like trying to purchase happiness for myself and my kids. The mindless trips to the mall. Buying our children whatever they wanted. My husband was a pilot in those days and the money rolled in and rolled out again just as fast, and yet like a Rolling Stone, I couldn't get no satisfaction. I recalled how sad I sometimes felt. How empty in my designer clothes. What was the point of life anyway? I wondered back then until Jesus rescued me from all that.

Did the parents of the kids who crushed John on his first day of practice feel this way right now? Were they headed for the mall or the bar or a place of entertainment to numb themselves to that longing for something more? That hunger in humankind for God that is often fed about everything under the sun as Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived, wrote about in Ecclesiastes.

Solomon said, "Whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them. I did not withhold my heart from any pleasure..." But that didn't fill him up. Solomon goes onto say how he then tried to find satisfaction in work, but he says, "Then I looked on all the works that my hands had done and on the labor in which I had toiled; and indeed all was vanity and grasping for the wind. There was no profit under the sun" Ecclesiastes 2:10-11.

Solomon concludes that the whole purpose of man's existence is to, "Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is man's all" Ecclesiastes 12:13.

A Mother of Influence

2010-08-24T18:16:00.000-07:00

I'm making my way through a book titled: Mothers of Influence. It is a collection of stories about the Christian mothers of men and women who have changed the world. Today, I read about Susannah Wesley, mother to John and Charles Wesley, men who brought revival to the Protestant church. Susannah was born in 1669 and lived to 1742. During her lifetime, she bore nineteen children, only nine of which survived to adulthood. She spent at least one hour a day in prayer, often pulling a large apron over her head in her crowded household so her children knew to leave her alone with her Bible. According to her story, Susannah's disciplined household ran like a finely tuned clock.

After reading about Susannah and a few other amazing moms, I prayed for awhile with tears in my throat. Lately, my household has been running like a haplessly tuned potato gun. For the past two months I've simply been happy to make it through the day. When something goes wrong in the house, about the best I can do is launch a potato at it from the couch. Okay, I don't have a potato gun, but I grew up with one of these and they are quite the contraption.

But really, it feels as if I've done little more than lie on the couch for two months, exhausted and nauseated as our boys have bashed the house. Case in point, two days ago our twelve-year-old son washed the family iPod the way you'd wash a dish. We all share this nifty gadget since we cannot afford to purchase one for each child or one for myself. After the drowning of the iPod (he said the screen was dirty), our five-year-old son used a vacuum cleaner rod, which he was wielding as a giant sword, to break the overhead ceiling fan light in the living room. The most expensive light in the house, I might add. Then our two-year-old in potty training pooped his pants without a pull-up on. I'm not proud to say that I remained on the couch until the poop episode unfolded this way: our seventeen-year-old daughter, who was watching her toddler brother for me, employed her twelve-year-old brother (the iPod destroyer) to wrestle Mr. Poopy Pants into the bathroom where the poop fell out of the pants into the tub like a can of soda.

"It's huge," yelled my teenage daughter in horror. "Luke get paper towels!"

The twelve-year-old sprinted past me into the kitchen (he plays competitive soccer and is fast as a rabbit) and pulled nearly the whole roll off the spindle. The paper towel trail chased him back to the bathroom like a white coyote tearing down the hall.

"Stop!" I yelled. "It's poop for crying out loud!" Dizzy with my stomach rolling uncontrollably, I abandoned the couch to intervene in this family freak show. By this time you might be asking where was the daddy of all these darlings... at work, of course. I made it to the bathroom in time to comfort our two-year-old who was on the verge of tears, standing there with his poopy pants around his ankles as his sister screamed. You'd think we had a toxic waste spill for the complete chaos involved in all this.

"You use toilet paper, not paper towels to pick up poop. That way you can just flush it down the toilet." I demonstrated this action, relieved that the poop stayed in one piece and I didn't throw up in the midst of moving it.

"What do I do with all these paper towels? Asked the twelve-year-old standing in the doorway. The boy isn't dense, he gets straight A's in school, but I still had to bite my tongue so I did not sarcastically call him a genius since I was still upset over him bathing the iPod. We can't afford another iPod right now and I really enjoyed playing music with it while I cleaned the house.

Which is another failure on my part at the moment: housework. The dust is so thick on the furniture we could get out a hose and go mud bogging in the living room. Washing three loads of laundry a day, along with the dishes, and fixing meals for eight people is about the best I can do in this first trimester of pregnancy.

After the paper towel mess was taken care of, I headed back to the couch after my seventeen-year-old sweetly agreed to give the two-year-old a bath, along with his five and seven-year-old brothers. Within five minutes, the seventeen-year-old was screaming her head off again. The five and seven-year-olds were freaking out too because Garry, the two-year-old, had pooped in the tub.

"It's on me!" Howled the seven-year-old. As if piranhas were in the tub with their teeth fastened to second grade flesh.

"IT'S POOP!" I yelled in exasperation. "Poop won't hurt you!" I rose again from the couch as two wet, naked boys streaked down the hall splashing water in all directions.

"Where are your towels?!" I cried.

The boys ignored me.

I made it to the bathroom in time to see my daughter swatting at the poop like she deals with spiders, which she's deathly afraid of.

Poor little Garry again looked about to cry. "It's okay," I told him. "Everybody poops."

"Not in the bathtub! I have had it," cried my daughter. "My brothers are making me crazy! Luke ruined the iPod! Joey broke the fanlight! And Garry has pooped on everything tonight! I can't take anymore!"

Her meltdown made me laugh. I know I shouldn't have laughed when she was upset, but I did. "I'll take over," I told her when I finally got control of myself.

"You are the mother," she reminded me in a huff.

At least little Garry was still looking at me with love and respect. After drying him off, I gave him a reassuring hug. "You want to wear a pull-up now?" I asked him.

He hugged me back, his fat little fingers tangling lovingly in my hair, then he nodded his head and smiled, as relieved to be offered a diaper as a man offered a parachute on a broken plane. The hug reassured me too.

"We'll try it again tomorrow," I said, speaking about his potty-training, and also my mothering ability.

I'm resigned to the fact that A Mother of Influence book will never be written about me. Perhaps they will make a movie, Desperate Mommies, maybe. I've never seen Desperate Housewives. We haven't had TV in our house in years. We do watch DVDs though, which include a lot of I Love Lucy, Laverne and Shirley, and Seventh Heaven. But the bulk of our family entertainment is the crazy way we live.

So after reading about Susannah Wesley, pregnant nineteen times and still praying an hour a day, which makes her magnificent in my eyes, I'm considering getting an apron that fits over my head. Perhaps that will improve my mothering ability. The apron I wear now is small and cute because I want to look fetching in the kitchen when my husband comes home. After seven challenging pregnancies, you'd think I'd rethink this desire to look fetching...

Truthfully, I know what I need right now is to rely more on God. I pray often and read my Bible every day, but since I got pregnant, every normal thing is now a struggle. Nothing is finely tuned in my life. Even the dogs seem to know that I'm not up for yard patrol these days. I used to scold them and lock the pups up when I caught them digging holes in the lawn or chewing on my garden gloves. I'm too worn out to do any of that. I picture them out there on the lawn whispering in their doggy language, "She's lying on the couch again. Those kids are repelling from the rafters. Let's dig to China today."

People ask me at what point were you broken in having kids? Meaning, when did the number of your children overwhelm you? I always tell them three. Three was the number that made me a born again Christian. I'm not joking. Baby number three did me in. I realized then that I needed a higher power in my life. And it seems with every pregnancy, I learn this important lesson all over again. Without God's abundant grace, I'm just a mother of one, big, fat, out-of-control mess.

Morning, noon, and night sickness...

2010-08-06T19:30:00.000-07:00

I've always wondered why they call it morning sickness. I've never had just morning sickness. In my experience it is morning, noon, and night sickness. Any hour of the day, I could toss my cookies to the crows that roost in Yuba City. Last night I was at our son's soccer game in the river bottoms. Of course I had to use the bathroom because this is another constant thing in my pregnant life right now, and the port-a-potty was about the nastiest thing I have ever seen. After stepping into that furnace of feces, I fell out of the blue, plastic, bomb drop gasping for air with my eyes ablaze. I then drove to a nearby Taco Bell. I made this trip three times during the game. Twice for me and once for our two-and-a-half-year-old who would much rather pee on a tree, but since we were in public, I thought it best to return to the nice Bell bathroom.
It's all coming back to me now: why pregnancy and I do not get along. My husband keeps telling me how cute I am. How he loves it when I'm pregnant. "You're so focused," he said to me today with a big smile. "What is going through your mind, Babe?"
"Throwing up on you," I told him.
He laughed. "But you haven't thrown up yet," he said.
"That's because I'm focused on not throwing up. But if you don't stop smiling at me, I promise to throw up on you."
I know. I know. I called my prayer partner Kay this morning. "You've got to pray for me," I told her. "I'm having the hardest time being sweet right now. Everything is irritating me. I'm irritated that I'm irritated."
"Your hormones are raging," she offered.
"Is that a good excuse to be irritated with people at Taco Bell?"
"Of course not. Let me pray for you."
So she prayed for me and I still wanted to throw up on my husband and the people at Taco Bell.
My husband is giddy over this pregnancy. Giddy like I've never seen him. Already he's leaning over talking to my stomach. I'm two months along and to my distress back in maternity jeans, but really, I told my better half today, "I don't even think the baby has ears yet. You're talking to yourself, dear."
I never call my husband "dear." I hate that term. It reminds me of a retirement home, which reminds me that I will be over sixty years old when this baby graduates high school.
Right now my hubby really is the better half. I did not say "dear" lovingly. I was thinking more along the lines of: if you don't stop talking to my stomach you will be roadkill deer, dear.
I called my prayer partner back this afternoon, but she wasn't home. I was going to ask her to pray for me some more. Heaven knows I need it.
I'm ready to call the governor and take him to task over something he said today. "You're never like this," said my husband. "Since when do politics upset you?"
"Forget it. I won't call him. I'll just drive down to Sacramento and throw up on him. He got his wife pregnant a bunch of times too." Four times, but after you break the three kid barrier, everyone has a say in the matter.
Truthfully, I've been walking around repeating over and over, "I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength." I did this during my last pregnancy too. I never envisioned myself pregnant again in my forties. Only movie stars and Looney Toons get pregnant in their forties.
Since I'm already in maternity jeans and have seven months to go, I decided yesterday to hit eBay to see if I could find another pair of my favorite fat pants. Problem is, my favorite fat pants are expensive. I like Seven of all Mankind. Serendipity, I just realized that my favorite maternity jeans have seven splashed across the pockets. Perfect since this is baby number seven for this Looney Toons lady.
So I get on eBay, find my size and style, and go to battle. Of course I lose. I back out at thirty dollars. I haven't paid more than twenty-five dollars for a pair of jeans for myself in ages. Just last week, I paid thirty dollars for a pair of jeans for our twelve year old son who is starting junior high this month. I remember how badly I wanted Calvin Kleins in the seventh grade so I caved at the mall with my son. But his cool jeans came with a warning. "Wear them around your waist or I will duct tape them under your armpits."
See, I told you I've been struggling with being sweet. Speaking of sweet, this is how sweet God is. Today I stopped by the local consignment store to look for a pair of jeans I could enjoy wearing and there they were: my size, my style, the same Seven maternity jeans I tried to get on eBay yesterday. For twenty-four dollars they were mine. Thank you, Lord, for being so good to me even when I am not good. Not good at all.
So back to morning, noon, and night sickness. It's night now and I could seriously throw up. I'm already in my flannel pajamas because even my Seven maternity jeans felt uncomfortable an hour ago. For the past three days, I've had a filet of fish sandwich from McDonald's for lunch. Under normal conditions, I wouldn't touch one of these greasy, fishy buns if I was on the last leg of the Donner Party, but I'm hoping to have one tomorrow. Our son has another soccer game in the morning. This one in Sacramento. Perhaps during the game, I could stop in at McDonald's, use the bathroom, pick up a filet of fish, then head on over to the capitol building and throw up. Don't get me wrong, I still respect authority. I'll only aim for Arnie's shoes.

What I learned from a three-year-old...

2010-07-30T18:18:00.000-07:00

This past week I helped with Vacation Bible School at our church, VBS as it's called for short. To my alarm, this year I was put in charge of nearly a dozen three-year-olds. Teaching tots is not my gift. I much prefer walking college kids through God's word. The good news was that I didn't have to teach these little ones the Bible. Someone else did the teaching. I was put in charge of receiving these tiny students from their parents and guiding them from class, to games, to snack, to the bathroom, and back to class, and then returning them to their parents several hours later.
The first morning I held a sobbing boy in my arms, while two teary-eyed girls clung to my legs, and several more youngsters with quivering lips stood as close to me as possible while their parents hurried off. I'd just left my own five-year-old looking on the verge of tears in his group across the room, and I was thinking, I wonder if the Crusades started out this way? All this angst in the church can't be good...
In the past I've always worked VBS registration or with the older VBS kids who, for the most part, seem happy to be there. So these tears were a new experience for me. I thought perhaps our class motto could be, "Melting down for Jesus."
The bright spot of the first day happened during craft time. Tears had dried, but smiles were slow in coming. The boy, Hayden, who had sobbed against my chest upon drop off, sat stoically, holding a crayon in his hand, but not doing much with it. Beside him a very quiet little girl named Lily colored. She looked about as happy to be at VBS as Hayden.
"Lily," I said. "What a lovely picture you are making."
Lily looked at me with penetrating eyes. Measuring me for honesty, I decided. "Really," I assured her. "You picked the perfect color for Jesus' face. That yellow makes his face all golden. I like that."
A glimpse of a smile crossed Lily's lips. Hayden was watching me too with courtroom eyes. Boy, these three-year-olds were tough nuts to crack.
"You're doing a great job too, Hayden," I said. "That one line of blue is the perfect way to begin your picture."
And here is where the beauty began: Lily unexpectedly gave Hayden her undivided attention. "I like your picture," she told him. "Put more blue on it."
Talk about parting the Red Sea. Hayden began scribbling a Mona Lisa. Lily continued to cheer him on, and grace flowed. Under Lily's praise and appreciation, Hayden became quite the little man. He sat up straighter. His eyes shined. Lily was suddenly his everything. He was drawing to please her, and in that moment, I realized that I needed to encourage my husband more in this life.
The next day when Hayden and Lily showed up for VBS, it didn't take them long to again lean on each other for comfort and support. I found this so sweet, and I was reminded that a husband and wife should be that for each other... a comfort and support in this world.
I don't know how many of you would agree with me that marriage is kind of like VBS. It starts out with singing, the wedding, right? Then there's the first class, you learn something easy like Noah's ark and how to brush your teeth together. Then you play some games, golf seems pretty popular with couples, then you head back to class for more instruction because the games don't always go so well. Especially when men do the golfing and wives get stuck watching the kiddos.
Then there is the second classroom visit. This one's more serious. You learn that you are a sinner and Jesus died for you. No wonder marriage is hard sometimes. By now, Lily is leaning her head on Hayden's shoulder during Bible time and he's stiff as plaster trying to hold her up.
The last day of VBS, Hayden and Lily breeze through the routine together. What was so big and scary a few days ago for these three-year-olds is now a great bond between them. Hayden gives the craft he worked so hard on to Lily when he's finished, and again they sit practically on top of each other during class time.
I love how it was God who thought this whole thing up in the beginning. Like Hayden on that first lonely day at VBS, Adam was trudging through the garden when God decided he needed a helpmate.
Bam... there was Lily... I mean Eve... I mean me.
Thank you, young Hayden and Lily for reminding me that God made woman to get her man through VBS.

THE PILGRIMAGE

2010-07-22T09:30:00.000-07:00

A year ago at this time I was working hard on a novel I believe was from God. To my amazement, the whole story played out in my mind like a movie over a few days time last May in the middle of something difficult I was going through. That difficulty quickly passed, but the story wouldn't let me sleep. I took notes like crazy in May, and on the first day of June, sat down at my computer to write. By September, I had a novel in my hand that I carried to the ACFW conference. It was my first Christian writing conference and the results were mixed. My agent was happy to have me there and we had a wonderful dinner together with a dozen of his other writers. One of those writers became a dear friend, a critique partner, and best of all, a prayer buddy. She is now a rock in my writing life.
As far as editors go, I ended up approaching only one with my new novel. The response wasn't encouraging. First the editor said, You must change your main character's name. It's awful. Then the editor went on to say that I had way too much going on in my story and I needed to learn my craft. Go home and read some good fiction, was the editor's advice. It was all I could do not to weep as I left that meeting.
Beyond humble now, I met with a couple other editors at that conference. I did not pitch my new novel to them because I'd lost all confidence in the manuscript. A second editor asked to see another book I'd written, a historical romance I completed before giving birth to our sixth child, Garry James. It didn't take that editor long to reject my historical. She came upon my hero cursing God in chapter two and promptly rejected the novel for the cursing. Again, I was deeply embarrassed and humbled. And I apologized to God as well.
After licking my wounds for awhile and reading some great fiction such as Lost Mission by Athol Dickson, I went back to work on my new novel. Because I'm the stubborn type, I kept the main character's name "Destiny" and continued to call the novel Holding Destiny.
But the thing that threw me the most coming out of the ACFW conference was that when I returned home, my husband Scott told me that he wanted another baby. Scott also said I needed to back away from my writing career and put more time into our home and family. I had to admit, Mac and Cheese had become our common meal. Still, this news from hubby hit me in the gut. In the beginning, I wrestled a fierce wave of resentment. All those, "When is it my turn to pursue my dreams?" emotions overflowed.
At the end of this tirade of flesh, I dropped to my knees. It was then that I realized there was no room for a "my turn" in my life. There was only "God's turn" and if my husband wanted baby number seven and a wife who put her writing once again on hold, I needed to surrender to this.
By spring, to my relief, I wasn't pregnant, and I was ready to attend another writing conference. This time it was Mount Hermon and again I met my wonderful agent there. Before going to the conference, my agent had sent Holding Destiny to a couple of editors. One editor responded the next day after receiving the proposal. She liked what my agent sent her, but her first request was that I change the main character's name. I may be stubborn, but I'm not stupid. I immediately renamed that character Amy. This editor also felt the book was too dark, so I quickly rewrote the novel eliminating the darker elements, but to my disappointment, the editor decided she couldn't pursue the project. So I headed for Mt. Hermon with two versions of my new novel in hand, the original version and the softer themed one I'd just completed. This conference I left my historical at home. I decided that my new novel deserved my best shot and I would only try to sell it.
At Mt. Hermon, one of the editors my agent had contacted before the conference asked to meet with me. She seemed excited about my new novel and liked the darker elements in the original work. She also said the name "Destiny" was a bit over the top, so we agreed on going with the name Amy for now. She gave me some tips on what she'd like to see in the novel and told me to send the manuscript when I was ready. In April, I emailed her the novel. I haven't heard back from her yet.
At Mt. Hermon, I shared with my agent that my husband wanted another child. My agent said the nicest prayer for Scott and when I came home from the conference, to my utter surprise Scott said, "I think I will get a vasectomy in July, but I still want to try for a baby until then."
In June, my parents took us to Pacific Grove for a short vacation at the ocean. While praying and walking through the dunes, I came upon a doe and two spotted fawns. For a moment it seemed God shined his light on the deer and I wondered if that meant the Lord was going to give us another child. In the mountains a few weeks later, I saw another doe and fawn, and then we went to family camp last week. Redwoods Christian Park is about 15 miles from Mt. Hermon. The first day of this camp as I was walking and praying in the redwoods, I came upon a doe and fawn. In that moment, I realized I could be pregnant. The next day, during my prayer time, while I was studying my Bible, I felt eyes upon me. I was sitting on a porch of the house where we were staying at the camp. It sits at nearly the top of a mountain in a redwood grove. When I looked up, there stood the doe and fawn about fifteen feet away watching me. Sunlight streamed through the towering redwoods onto the mama and baby deer. I knew at that moment that I was pregnant. My Bible reading that day confirmed it for me. I've been studying the life of Obed-Edom, the man from 1 Chronicles who took the ark of God to his home when King David was too afraid to do so. In chapter 26 of 1 Chronicles, which I was reading on the porch when the doe and fawn appeared, the text says: Obed-Edom had eight sons, for God had blessed Obed-Edom (1Chronicles 26:5).
I made a vow to God right then and there on the porch that I would not fear or question this pregnancy. I would trust in the Lord with all my forty-two-year-old heart (Proverbs 3:5). I hope you don't mind that I added my age in there. Forty-two. You see why I need to trust God in this? I also vowed to believe God: that a pack of boys are a blessing from the Lord. Along with our two teenage daughters, we have four sons and my biggest challenge is getting them to use the toilet. Our boys would rather pee on trees or each other or on our poor dogs then use the bathroom. Wash their hands... hardly. Pray for me not to beat this wild behavior out of them. I guess a forty-two-year-old pregnant woman will have a hard time catching young boys running and peeing through the yard, anyway, so no need for real concern. I doubt I'll have the speed or the balance to beat these boys in the coming months.
Another challenge I faced last week was finding a pregnancy test at a Christian camp to show Scott that God had answered his prayers before the dreaded vasectomy day arrived. The camp store is stocked full of Bibles, T-shirts, and Noah's ark toys. Needless to say, I did not find a pregnancy test there.
We had to drive to a Rite Aid to solve our problem. I took the test in the pharmacy bathroom, but shoved the test stick in my purse without waiting for the results. Scott and I then headed for the ocean to view the stick together on the beach.
In Santa Cruz, we decided to drive up the hill to the Catholic mission instead of going down to the sea. Though, we are presently members of the Nazarene denomination, our roots are Catholic, and Scott and I still love the Catholic Church. Holy Cross cathedral crowns the high ground of this beach town where the old mission is located. This beautiful, white building soars into the sky- you can see it from the highway- and I have always wanted to go inside this striking landmark. With two-and-a-half-year-old Garry James in tow, we walked up the church steps and found the double doors of the cathedral locked. Undaunted, we sat down on the steps and said a prayer together. Then I pulled the test stick out of my purse and without looking at it, handed it to Scott. During our other six pregnancies, I've always taken the pee-stick test alone. This time, I wanted Scott to be the first to know the results. There on the church steps, Scott looked at the stick and let out a whoop of joy. The Hispanic gardener who had been keeping an eye on us as he tended the churchyard, came over and told us we could go into the mission church when it opened in five minutes. He pointed across the street to the old mission.
"We came here to dedicate our baby to the Lord," I told the gardener. He looked at Garry James and smiled. "Not that baby," I explained. "We already gave him to the Lord. We want to dedicate the baby we just found out we are expecting to the Lord."
"Oh, you are on a pilgrimage," cried the gardener, a huge grin splitting his brown, weathered face. "I will get the keys to open the cathedral!"
Before we told him he didn't have to do that, the gardener was off, and then back again unlocking the door for us. "Stay inside as long as you like, the church is yours," he graciously said.
Scott, Garry James, and I then walked to the altar of this magnificent church. We kneeled there and Garry James pointed to the huge crucifix hanging high on the wall behind the altar. "Jesus... sleeping," said little Garry.
"Yes, that is Jesus," I answered. How our Nazarene raised toddler knew that was Jesus hanging on the cross, I don't know. I've had Protestants tell to me how upset they are that Catholics keep Jesus on the cross. As a newly converted Protestant, I agreed that I liked the cross better without Jesus twisted and broken there, but now nearly ten years into my Protestant walk, I have to say, I don't think the Catholics have gotten it wrong keeping Jesus on the cross. The Protestant faith could use a good dose of guilt that leads to repentance. I'd like to slip into every Protestant Church in the United States and replace their crosses with life-size crucifixes. At least for a month or two...
Okay, sorry for the rant. I'll get back to my pregnancy story.
So there at the altar in Santa Cruz with Jesus sleeping on the cross, Scott and I offered this new life growing inside me to the Lord. He (or by some miracle, she) is about the size and shape of a tadpole right now. I have named our little tadpole Cruz (which means cross in Spanish), and just hope he won't join his brothers in peeing on the dogs when he's older.
This morning, I read on Facebook that many of my writing friends are gearing up for this year's ACFW conference. I confess I cried today because, with a tadpole on my string, my career is probably once again pond water. But I am now on a pilgrimage, as the church gardener put it, and I wouldn't trade this spiritual journey for anything.
Last March I was at Mt. Hermon hoping to become a bona fide novelist. This March, by the grace and mercy of God, I will be bringing Cruz into the world.
I sure appreciate your prayers :)

TOUCHING THE ARK

2010-07-08T15:48:00.000-07:00

Today while reading the Bible, I was struck by the story of Uzzah, a man who touched the ark and died in the old testament. I'm not talking about Noah's ark. This was the ark of the covenant of the LORD, the chest that contained the ten commandments. What struck me about Uzzah's death was that he touched the ark with good intentions and still was put to death by God. The following scriptures explain this event...

"If it seems good to you and if it is the will of the LORD our God, let us send word far and wide to the rest of our brothers throughout the territories of Israel, and also to the priests and Levites who are with them in their towns and pasture lands, to come and join us. Let us bring the ark of our God back to us, for we did not inquire of it during the reign of Saul" 1Chronicles 13:2-3.

So David and God's people went to get the ark. The Bible goes on to say, "They moved the ark of God from Abinadab's house on a new cart, with Uzzah and Ahio guiding it. David and all the Israelites were celebrating with all their might before God, with songs and with harps, lyres, tambourines, cymbals and trumpets. When they came to the threshing floor of Kidon, Uzzah reached out his hand to steady the ark, because the oxen stumbled. The LORD's anger burned against Uzzah, and he struck him down because he had put his hand on the ark. So he died there before God" 1Chronicles 13:7-10.

I believe the death of Uzzah is important for us to understand because many good-intentioned Christians today make this same mistake. When God's holiness is underestimated or ignored, bad things happen.

Unfortunately, disregard for God's holiness is rampant in today's Christian community. I have attended the same church for nearly as long as I've been a real Christian - close to ten years now. In this time, I've watched the hand of God strike people and it has frightened and sometimes even angered me. There have been times when I have questioned why God would allow terrible things to happen to his people. Then later, to my shock and utter sadness, I have found out that a great deal of unholiness was involved in a number of these people's lives.

When God struck Uzzah, scripture says, "And David was angry because the LORD had broken out against Uzzah. And that place is called Perez-uzza to this day. And David was afraid of God that day, and he said, 'How can I bring the ark of God home to me?' So David did not take the ark home into the city of David, but took it aside to the house of Obed-edom the Gittite. And the ark of God remained with the household of Obed-edom in his house three months. And the LORD blessed the household of Obed-edom and all that he had" 1Chronicles 11-14.

Obed-edom hosted the ark of God because a man after God's own heart, David, flinched away from God's holiness that day. Later on, David prepared a place for the ark in Jerusalem, and then he ordered that no one but the Levites could carry the ark of God (1Chronicles 15:2) because the Levites had been chosen by God for this very purpose. David didn't want another well-meaning Israelite to die because, like Uzzah, holiness was ignored. Speaking about this, David said, we did not inquire of God about how to move the ark in the prescribed way (1Chronicles 15:13). The second time around, David took great care when touching the ark of God. Obed-edom, a musician who worshiped God, became a doorkeeper for the ark.

When I was younger in the Lord, I didn't understand the cost of holiness, but time and again I've watched God move in such away that when unholy hands touch the Holy things of God, lives are exposed. Secret sin is always, ultimately revealed and a high price is paid in the church. Nothing has humbled me more as a Christian than watching other Christians crash and burn.

From one Christian to another, I urge you, fellow believers, to conduct your lives carefully. If you have hidden sin, avoid ministry until you are right with God. Do it for your own well-being, and also the well-being of the church. Confess and repent of any unholiness in your life. If you do not want to confess and repent, leave the church. Do not touch the ark of God unless the blood of Jesus covers your hands.

The Bread of Life

2010-07-02T10:41:00.000-07:00

While reading the Gospel of John, I came across something that struck me as very important for a Christian to know. This happened in John chapter 6 where Jesus is having a conversation with the Jews after his miracle of feeding the five thousand. The Jews were so pleased by this food miracle that they followed Jesus. Jesus' response to them following him was this, "Truly, truly, I say to you, you are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. Do not labor for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you. For on him God the Father has set his seal" John 6:26-27.
This story in chapter 6 reminds me of some people today who follow Jesus. Folks will come to church because they have a problem. Perhaps they are hungry, or they need a job, or their marriage is in trouble. Maybe they've just been diagnosed with cancer or some other bad disease and they turn to God for help or healing. But once the storm passes, they don't need Jesus anymore so they go on their way no longer pursuing the Savior. These people make me sad, but not nearly as sad as those who stay in church because they continue to want only earthly food from Jesus. I call these people "manna Christians."
Jesus said, "Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh" John 47-51.
Jesus' point here is this: the people in chapter 6 of John were God's people. They knew God's rules and went to church. They even accepted Jesus once he did the miracles for them. Today we would say they were "good Christians," yet, many of these people did not really believe. They didn't get the "bread of life" concept because the "manna of God" was enough for them. Jesus says, "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is of no avail. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe" John 6:61-64.
Unfortunately, I see this same unbelief in church today. We live in a Christian nation where over sixty percent of the American population says they have had a "born again" experience. Many people I know go to church and call themselves good Christians. Yet over and over I run into manna followers instead of bread of life followers. Manna followers are the people who come to church to be fed by Jesus for earthly reasons. Bread of life followers are the ones who eat Jesus' flesh and blood because they want life in the spirit. Bread of life followers have an eternal view that rules them. Manna followers are driven by their earthly wants and needs.
Only the Holy Spirit can illuminate for us whether we are a manna Christian or a bread of life Christian. Jesus says that those who eat the manna will still die. Only the bread of life brings salvation. The sad fact of the matter is this: many churches today settle for manna Christians.
At the end of chapter 6, Jesus says, "This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father" John 6:65.
The best way I know to figure out what kind of Christian you are is to take the "how I became a Christian" test. Did you decide to be a Christian by yourself or did Jesus save you? If you don't know with your whole heart that Jesus saved you, that God made you a Christian, then I would say you are a manna Christian. A bread of life Christian knows they've been born from above and the things of Jesus are what matter most.
Now if you are a manna Christian, take heart. Many of us start out as manna Christians who somewhere along the line, swallow the bread of life.
Pray that Jesus will feed you the bread of life. That the things of God will become more important to you than the things of this world. That you will fall in love with Jesus and truly live.

GRATEFUL

2010-06-26T08:46:00.000-07:00

My mom and I just returned from a trip with John (age 7), Joey (age 5) and Garry James (age 2). On Wednesday, we began our journey at the dentist office. Garry James had his first checkup. I thought for sure this would be like stuffing a cat in the toilet, but to my surprise, Garry James was the perfect patient. The teeth cleaning and dental exam went great for all three boys. No cavities, and our new insurance covered the cost. The only hitch happened in the reception room after the exams. Clutching his toy for good behavior, Garry James tried to pee on the reception room plant. When Garry James dropped his pull-up and aimed for the palm, my mom screamed. I was speaking with the receptionist when this happened. The receptionist jumped out of her chair, her mouth agape. My mom grabbed Garry James and dragged his bare backside down the hall to the restroom. The receptionist informed me that in all her 18 years at this office, she'd never seen such a thing. I wasn't sure if she meant a two-year-old trying to pee on the palm, or a grandmother screaming and then towing a toddler with his pants around his ankles past her desk. Needless to say, I should have known right then this was going to be a difficult trip.

My mom and I have taken trips together with the children in the past, but always with Cami and Lacy, and not since Garry James joined the clan. Scott and Luke are at canoe camp for the week. Cami and Lacy are back east visiting relatives. With three little boys and no help from our built-in babysitting sisters, my mom and I had our hands full this time.

Our plan was to drive four hours north to Montague after the dentist visit. My parents have a vacation ranch up there in the middle of nowhere. Driving to Montague is like heading into the wild west. High desert, rolling hills, Mount Shasta rising in all her snowy glory overseeing this open, endless land of deer, antelope, and cattle. My parents idea of a vacation is ranch work. Getting your hands dirty doing something useful is what my mom and dad enjoy.

Things went relatively well on the highway for the first hour and a half until we stopped in Red Bluff to buy an apple tree. My mom has retired and all she thinks about these days is growing fruits and vegetables. She has a garden at her house, a garden at my house, and a garden in Montague. On top of that, she's been planting fruit trees all over the place. She's a regular Granny Appleseed.

So in Red bluff my mom buys this tree and has some guy place it in the bed of the truck. Then we drive on to the Ide adobe historical park on the Sacramento River. As the boys race toward the water's edge, my mom informs me that the ice chest containing all our food is missing. My main concern at the moment is the boys tumbling into the river. The water's flowing high and fast right now. Even low and slow, a small boy landing in the Sac would be a disaster. I race through picnickers at the park to catch Garry James while calling for John and Joey, who are running ahead to the river, to return to the truck.

A trip back to Red Bluff does not retrieve our ice chest. The guy claims he never touched the chest, so we continue on without any food or drinks.

In the town of Mount Shasta, we stop at the headwaters of the Sacramento River. The sign beside this crystal clear creek flowing out of the side of a mountain says "no bathing, wading, or swimming in these headwaters." Tossing aside his flip flops, Joey plows right in before I can stop him. Garry James plops down at the edge of the water wrestling to unfasten his sandals to join his brother in the stream. John fretfully points to the sign and then to Joey dancing in the creek.

"I don't appreciate feet in my drinking water," says an ancient hippy with waist-length gray hair and a jug in her hand. She's glaring at Joey as he jumps around in the icy water hollering about how cold it is. My mom loudly orders me to get Joey out of the stream as she heads back to the truck to collect every drinking vessel available to fill with Mount Shasta's finest. My concern is that Mom's rounding up a pee cup or two in this process. Potty-training a two-year-old is no fun on a long drive, actually the four hour drive, that in the end, will take us over six hours even with Mom running truckers and other grandmas off Interstate 5 as I hold a cup for Garry James to pee in every half hour.

Now that Mom has replaced our lost water that was in the ice chest, we search for a grocery store in Mt. Shasta. The only one we find is a "whole foods" joint where a single cucumber costs $2.69. I'm surprised the milk is sold in a carton, not from a goat that customers can milk themselves to insure its "wholeness." The woman who took offense to Joey jumping around in her drinking water must shop here. The store is full of old hippies. After looking at the prices, I buy milk and a bag of popcorn for the boys. My parents have a pantry in Montague. Knowing my mom, there is Rice-A-Roni and jello stocked there, if nothing else.

Sure enough, we have Rice-A-Roni for dinner. This is after several more hours of John and Joey fishing with my mom in the oldest rowboat I've ever seen on a pond out in the pasture. Five inches of brown water rolls back and forth in the bottom of the boat while Mom and the older boys catch one perch after another. Garry James tromps around in the mud along the shore. I try to read one of my summer books I've brought along, but there is no enjoyment to be had. Ants attack me and Garry James throws mud in my direction. The boys do their best to convince me to cook them perch for dinner when they are done fishing, but I refuse. With the sun going down on nearly the longest day of the year, my fun-o-meter is pegged.

The next morning we drive forty miles to Walmart. We replace the ice chest, and buy some packaged food that doesn't cost us the farm. We also stop at the feedstore/nursery in Yreka to buy another apple tree. Then it's another long drive up to some remote high desert lake for another round of perch fishing. Not a single fish is caught, but both Garry James and Joey fall into the lake fully dressed. Garry James ends up running around in nothing more than wet sandals and a hat, peeing wherever he pleases. While Joey keeps his wet jeans on and continues to fish, casting his worm into my hair on several occasions. I lay Joey's shirt and shoes out to dry along with Garry Jame's wardrobe while wiping worm guts off my face.

My mom, in her drooping straw hat, keeps fishing out on the dock where thirteen-year-old, chubby-cheeked country girls in bikinis are trying to sunbathe. Mom claims this fishing excursion is all about her grandsons, but I have decided she is the one who secretly loves to fish when she's not planting apple trees. We look like the Okies from Muskogee, but fit right in with these rural families camping around this lake. I feel a sunburn coming on and spend most of my time untangling the lines the boys keep casting everywhere but the water.

Mom finally decides fishing is better back at the pond in the pasture. Off to the ranch we go, another hour in the truck with the pee cup. Once there, she and the boys fish until the cows come home. Up here cows really do come home at night, back to the barn where they are safe from mountain lions, bears, and coyots. Mom and the boys decide to save the perch they are catching so they can transport these fish alive to a smaller pond closer to the house. I'm the lucky girl who gets to pack this heavy bucket of water and two dozen perch to the next pond when they are finished.

As I dump the perch at sunset, clouds roll in and thunder booms in the distance. It really is a gorgeous night with a breeze from the thunderstorm breaking the heat. A turtle cruises across this spring-fed pond. I think my arms are out of their sockets, but for a moment I am alone not holding a pee cup. Mom and the boys have finally settled down in the house for another round of Rice-A-Roni, along with Walmart pizza pockets, and sure enough, jello. Tomorrow the long ride home looms. I realize my thoughtful mom has purchased me a new ice chest that I like better than the one that was taken in Red Bluff. The boys have had a great time fishing their hearts out. I hear coyotes yapping in the golden hills of this nowhere place, and it hits me: I am somewhere. I am smack in the middle of God's will for my life and I am suddenly grateful.

BOILING THE FROG

2010-06-17T08:29:00.000-07:00

I'm a country girl. I've cooked a few frogs in my time. Fried them, actually. Frog legs taste a bit like chicken with a little fish flavor thrown in. Not something I enjoy eating, but my boys find catching and cooking a bullfrog right up there with a sushi outing. An exotic treat, really about the experience of the thing rather than the nourishment of the matter.

Recently, I was thinking about how the world cooks Christians. It's like boiling a frog. The frog isn't thrown into bubbling water, he is placed in a pot and the heat is slowly turned up. This is a patient process. The frog grows warmer and warmer but he doesn't realize he is beginning to sizzle. He stays in the pot because it's gradual. The heat desensitizes the frog because it comes steadily, comfortably. The way the world overcomes a Christian.

And our world is changing. Last week in London, Princess Diana's little black dress from 1981 sold for 276,000 dollars. Twenty-nine years ago when a 19 year old soon-to-be princess wore this dress, there was a minor scandal because she showed her creamy shoulders and ample decolletage. Today the dress looks downright modest. It took nearly thirty years for society to grow accustomed to women wearing see-through gowns.

This past Sunday at church, I walked up to the altar and wept before God. I'm so tired of fighting the world. The battle has been building. With six children, every time I turn around I am drawing a sword against something: movies, television, Internet, video games. Our oldest son's favorite store is Gamestop. I walk into that place and want to throw up. I realize this is not a popular stance. Just this past month I have had three people tell me how judgemental I am. I know the Church Lady and I don't want to be her. But I refuse to let my children boil like frogs in this world.

Let me tell you a story about a little boy named Samuel. Samuel's mother was Hannah and before she had Samuel, she was barren. She made a vow to the Lord that if the Lord gave her a son, she would give him back to God. So at the tender age of being weaned from his mother's milk, Samuel was taken to the temple and handed over to a priest named Eli. Eli was to raise this little boy for the Lord. Here, I cringe because Eli couldn't raise his own sons right. Eli's sons, Hophni and Phinehas, priests like their father Eli, were wicked men, 1 Samuel 2:12.

I did a little study about Hophni and Phinehas and found that their names were Egyptian. To my surprise, I discovered that Hophni means "tadpole" and Phinehas means "nubian." These two men, though they were raised to be God's servants, had no regard for the Lord. They were gluttonous, blasphemous, they lay with women who served at the tabernacle. 1 Samuel 2:22.

Sadly, in our modern church today, we still see this kind of behavior. We grow Christian kids who can quote Bible scriptures better than the pastor, but who swim in a soup of worldly entertainment that eventually leads to full-blown sin as these "church kids" become young adults.

So what's a parent to do? Let's look at Eli for a moment. In 1 Samuel 4:18, the death of Eli is described. When Eli was told the ark of God had been lost to the Philistines and that his sons died on the same day, the old priest fell backwards off his chair and broke his neck and died due to his great weight. Eli was fat because he had gorged himself on the sacrificial food God's people brought to the temple. Eli wasn't just guilty of raising his sons wrong, he took part in some of their sinful habits. Truth be told, Hophni and Phinehas probably learned to be gluttonous from their father, Eli.

I believe the lesson here is that before you try to purify your child's life, purify your own. Ask God to show you where the world has a foothold in your heart. Is it television? Shopping? Drinking? Eating? Vanity? Greed? Here's what I know about the world. It can never be satisfied. There is never enough food. Never enough money. Never enough pleasure. Never enough vacations or video games or provocative dresses and pedicures to fill any person's heart. If you are a Christian in the world's pot, you will be boiled. Maybe not today. Perhaps not tomorrow, but eventually you'll walk blindly around Gamestop feeling like the Queen of Sheba in a see-through gown.

I love my children. I want to make them happy. But more than making them happy, I want to please God. When I stroll out of Gamestop with my smiling son because we've finally agreed on a video he can enjoy and I can live with, usually a soccer video, I whisper a prayer of thanks. But I don't kid myself. After that thanks, I plead with God to protect our family. I tell the Lord what a vulnerable, little polliwog I really am on this earth. How if Jesus doesn't deliver us from the pot, our whole family will eventually boil like bullfrogs.

In 1 Samuel 2:35, God says, "I will raise up for myself a faithful priest, who will do according to what is in my heart and mind. I will firmly establish his house, and he will minister before my anointed one always." The Lord proclaims that he himself will raise the priests. Eli didn't raise Samuel, the Lord did. My prayer is that the Lord will raise this generation of Christians too. That Jesus will lift us out of the world's pot and place our feet firmly upon the rock of his salvation.

SCARS

2010-06-10T16:20:00.000-07:00

Today while mowing the lawn in the sun, I found myself trying to pull my short shirt sleeves down to cover my upper arms. All my life I've avoided sunburning this part of my body. Today it hit me: why do I need to protect my upper arms and not the rest of the skin on my arms?
Out of the blue, the three inch scar on my mom's upper arm came to mind. She has a huge chunk of flesh missing just below her shoulder because she had a melanoma when I was little. I was so young, in fact, that I don't remember her having the life-saving surgery that scarred her.
Today, I realized that I have spent perhaps thirty-eight years protecting my upper arms because of something that happened to my mom. I don't have a scar on my body like she does, but apparently I have a scar deep in my subconscious, and this scar actually makes me behave a certain way.
Startling...
I believe God showed me this today because this morning on the phone I had a conversation with a precious Christian friend who has some subconscious scars too. Together we prayed, asking God to show us the lies we believe and why we believe them. Lies that keep us bound to certain behaviors. Many of these lies formed when we were young. So young that we don't remember what birthed the lie that shaped us this way.
Many of us are scared. Perhaps even badly broken like the man in John chapter 5 of the Bible who had been an invalid for thirty-eight years until Jesus came to him. "When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, he said to him, 'Do you want to be healed?' The sick man answered him, 'Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am going another steps down before me."
Isn't this so like us? Giving reasons for remaining broken? Making excuses the way this man did with Jesus? We especially do this when we've lived with the brokenness nearly all our life.
Jesus' response to this man does not seem sympathetic. He says, "Get up, take up your bed, and walk."
In that instant, the man was healed. After he was healed, he did what Jesus told him to do. He took up his bed and walked. Later on, when Jesus saw this man out walking around, Jesus said to him, "See, you are well! Sin no more, that nothing worse may happen to you."
Now that certainly wasn't sympathetic. Sin no more... What does sin have to do with brokenness?
Actually a lot. Have you ever heard the term, "Hurting people hurt people?"
It's true. We all know this. In our brokenness, we sin. We fear, we worry, we doubt, we get angry, we fail to love. We teach our children these same behaviors, creating a whole new generation of broken, little folks who then raise another generation of broken, little folks.
It's like the story of the ham. A family was cooking a big, beautiful ham for Christmas. As the husband watched, the wife cut the end of the ham off and fed it to the dog. Then she tucked the rest of the ham into the pan for cooking.
"Why did you do that? That was a perfectly good piece of ham you just gave the dog."
"My mother always does this. I'll call and ask her why this is done," says the wife.
On the phone, the mother tells the wife, "Well, your grandmother always does this. I'll ask her about it."
When eighty-eight-year-old Grandma is asked to explain her ham preparation, she says, "I've used the same pan all my adult life and it only fits that size ham."
Insane, isn't it?
Which takes us back to Jesus' question, "Do you want to get well?"
I read a true story about a shepherd who had a beautiful sheep. The shepherd loved this particular ewe, and she produced lovely lambs that looked just like her. But she had a bad habit the old shepherd couldn't break her of. She was always getting out. No fence could hold her and she taught each of her lambs her escape tricks. Those lambs taught other lambs how to flee the shepherd. One day, though he loved her, the old shepherd took out his knife and killed the beautiful ewe.
This story has never left me. I have six children; six lambs I'm raising for the Lord. I want to be healed because I don't want my children covering their upper arms in the sunshine or doing something worse like the beautiful ewe. Plenty of sunscreen, yes. A broken behavior because of a hidden scar? No way.
I hope you will do this with me today: ask the Lord to shine His light on you. Pray that Jesus will reveal your scars and heal your brokenness. No more excuses. Christ doesn't accept those. The only scars worth keeping belong to Him. Those are the ones on his nail-pierced hands.

THE HEART OF CHRISTIANITY

2010-06-01T10:00:00.000-07:00

For Memorial Day our church did a service honoring those who died for what they believed in. Video clips were shown. American soldiers sacrificing for their country in our current wars ran across the screen, followed by a film of how each disciple lost his life for Christ. What struck me most in these films was a photo of a Marine with a tear running down his face. He looked so big and strong holding his weapon in full battle gear, but that tear was so very tender upon his dusty cheek. This soldier grieved the loss of a friend. Someone he loved. Someone who fought and fell by his side.

I have often heard that soldiers really fight for each other in battle. Men at war forge friendships that turn into a love so enduring that they willingly sacrifice their lives for those they fight alongside. When interviewed, Medal of Honor winners who survived the combat that won them acclaim have often said they acted courageously simply to protect their friends. They weren't thinking about the cause of the war, or devotion to their country, or even protecting their families back home, they acted out of love for their fellow soldiers.

This brings me to the heart of Christianity. Many people don't realize that there is a spiritual war happening on this earth. This war can't be seen with the naked eye. Every human being is a part of this war. Not by choice, but by birth. It's like being born in Afghanistan right now. Afghani babies don't decide whether or not to join the war, they land smack in the middle of it wet from their mother's womb.

God and the devil have gone head to head since Adam and Eve. Jesus came to save every person who calls on the name of the Lord during the fight. And this war continues today. The Bible says someday this war will end, but right now it rages on.

Recently, I was trying to describe to some dear friends who don't go to church why I am a Christian. I was kind of fumbling around, awkwardly using terms like born-again and being saved, when that soldier's face with the tear flashed in my mind. A sudden wave of love swept over me and I said something like, "I met Jesus and he became my friend and he died for me." I'm not sure of my exact words, they were far from eloquent, but in that moment, I realized with complete clarity why I am a Christian and the simplicity of it left me breathless.

The twelve apostles who followed Jesus when he walked the earth as a man became Christians for the same reason I have. They met Jesus, became his friend, and then Jesus died for them. They weren't following a religion or a cause called Christianity, they followed a man known as the Christ who was also the Son of God. After Jesus died, rose again, then went up to heaven, the earthly war raged on. These first friends of Jesus ended up dying terrible deaths too because they loved Jesus and were now fighting His war. In the two thousand years since, many more friends of Jesus have died in this spiritual battle. They didn't die for Christianity, they died for Christ.

Some may ask, well how does one become a friend of Jesus today when He's up in heaven and I'm down here? Further more, I don't see this spiritual war and I find it very hard to believe it's really happening.

I remember feeling this way, asking these same questions, struggling with these same doubts. All I can say is that I kept seeking until I truly met Jesus. Supernaturally, Jesus made himself known to me and my whole life changed. This is the missing ingredient in many Christian conversions: the supernatural power of God. If you call yourself a Christian, but haven't been touched by the supernatural power of Jesus and you have no idea that there is a spiritual war going on, then I humbly suggest that you aren't a real Christian yet. Keep seeking...

After I met Jesus and he became my friend, my eyes were opened to this spiritual war. Seeing the war surprised me more than seeing Jesus.

And here lies the heart of Christianity: Jesus in battle for you. Jesus gathering friends to help rescue you. Real Christians aren't religious. They simply love Jesus and have followed Him into the fight.

I have posted a video clip in the blog that follows this one titled: A Life in Pages: Memorial Day 2010. I copied it from Angela Hunt's blog. Please watch this video. It says so much about the heart of Americans, but it says even more about the heart of God. The ending of this clip is what got me. I hope it gets you too. We don't deserve to be rescued, but Jesus gave himself for us just the same.

2010-06-01T09:01:00.000-07:00

A Life in Pages: Memorial Day 2010

A SWEET LAND

2010-05-27T09:01:00.000-07:00

The writer Jack London called California "a sweet land." London was an adventurer who'd seen the world. He chose to settle in California's Sonoma Valley, one of my favorite spots.

Last month we drove through Sonoma on our way to the ocean for Cami's birthday. We stopped and strolled the shady Sonoma town square, eating ice cream before pressing on for San Francisco. It was in Sonoma where California's state flag was born. The Bear Flag rebellion took place here in 1846, ushering California under America's wings.

In the city by the bay, we walked over the Golden Gate bridge. Though, I was born and raised in California, I'd never done this before. The height of the towering, red bridge dizzied me. It was a crystal clear day with the ocean blue sapphire rolling as far as the eye could see. Dolphins swam below us, leaping under the bridge on their way out to sea.

Driving further down the coast, we watched the sun set from a pier pounded by foaming waves. Back home in northern California the following week, we hiked through the picturesque Sutter Buttes. In the heart of the Buttes is a lake cradled by steep cliffs. Our sons fished for bass as red-tailed hawks swirled overhead. During the Bear Flag Rebellion, the Buttes, rumored to be the smallest mountain range in the world, were used as a base camp for the Americans revolting against Mexico, the country that owned California before the United States claimed her.

This week I've been angling with the boys and my dad on the Sacramento River. The stripers are running, large ocean bass that swim up the waterway to spawn. Because we've had a good year of rain, the river is running high and clear right now. Last night we left the river with sundown splashing golden light through the mighty sycamore and cottonwood trees that line the riverbanks. A beaver went about his work with a branch in his mouth and a deer edged down to the water for a drink.

While I write this blog, I'm watching out the window as our boys pick cherries and eat them straight from the trees. Our dogs sit under the boys' ladders, three rat terriers, a faithful golden lab, and a stray mutt the girls brought home several weeks ago. The mutt has proved herself a watchdog by sleeping under our bedroom window at night. She follows our children wherever they go on our twenty acres, growling at any threatening thing. She's like Old Yeller, but young and white. By the looks of her teeth, she's probably only a year or two old.

Sometimes I have to remind myself that my California of oceans and rivers, cherry trees, and the Sutter Buttes is a state in recession with major immigration and drug problems. The gay marriage battle here is like Mt. St. Helens before she erupted. Lots of folks are simmering, not just over gay marriage, but other complicated agendas I'd also like to ignore. For the most part, I no longer watch or read the news. It's depressing, and all those talking heads have taken God out of the equation.

Some would say I have my brain in the sand, but I read the Good Book every day and it says, "Taste and see that the Lord is good" Psalm 34:8. The Bible also commands, "Fear the LORD, you his saints, for those who fear him lack nothing" Psalm 34:9. This is the agenda I choose to follow. I often remind myself that the world's economy is not God's economy. God made the heavens and the earth, his resources are limitless. When Jesus needed to pay his taxes, he sent Peter fishing. The fish Peter caught contained a coin that covered the government's portion that year.

Yesterday on the river, I asked seven-year-old John to say a prayer that the Lord would provide us with fish. Not to pay our taxes, but so we could have a striper dinner. Striped bass is white and tasty, my favorite fish to eat. On his knees in the boat (he already happened to be on his knees messing with the minnow bucket), John said the most sincere little boy prayer for us to catch a fish. He ended it with, "And make it a big one, Lord!" Five minutes later, his grandpa hooked the big one. John, our net-man, couldn't lift it by himself into the boat. I also caught a couple of smaller stripers, each nearly two feet long. We'll be eating fish tacos till the cows come home.

Today I saw a soldier holding his two small children. He actually has four little ones, and tomorrow he heads back to Iraq to finish his tour of duty there. He's a dear friend of ours, a California kid like me who loves to fish and hunt and play on Pacific beaches. Memorial Day is just around the corner. May we never forget to thank God for all the good we taste and see here in America, and for the men and women who protect this sweet land.

STAND BY ME

2010-05-20T08:57:00.000-07:00

The song Stand by Me, originally released in 1961, made a comeback when I was in college. Scott and I were dating at the time and that became our song. We were young, but I was ready to get married. Scott, on the other hand, was set on joining the Army for a life of adventure. Tired of dating, I told him that I wanted a station wagon and babies. Back then the only SUVs were the big Chevy Suburbans, which few families drove. People with lots of kids owned station wagons. "If you don't see a station wagon and babies for your future too, then we need to part ways," I said to Scott.

Breaking my heart, Scott replied, "I don't see this for myself right now so I guess we're done."

After this conversation, we went to the barber shop and Scott got his first Army hair cut. Then I put him on a bus bound for military training. I thought we were finished that day.

Nine months later, out of the blue, Scott returned ready to get married. There was a lot of pain under the bridge of loving him and I wasn't sure I wanted Scott back. I prayed in those days, but I really didn't know Jesus. Torn over this life decision, I asked God what I should do. I was in my little Toyota and only had about ten minutes before I reached my apartment across town so I said to the Lord, "If Scott is the guy you want me to marry, please let me hear our song before I get home." The chance of this happening was slim to none, but I also knew God could produce the song on the radio if He wanted to.

Several tunes played before I reached my driveway. None were Stand by Me.

I was crying when I walked up the stairs to my apartment. I really took this as a sign from God that I was not meant to marry Scott.

When I opened the door of my college pad, there sat my roommate watching the movie, Stand by Me. The song was even playing on the TV at that moment. I was beyond shocked.

A week later, Scott and I became engaged and the first song we danced to at our wedding was Stand by Me.

I tell you this story because this coming week is our 21st wedding anniversary. Thankfully, I never got that station wagon with the faux wood panel doors, but six babies in a Suburban have come to us by the hand of God. In all honesty, I've had years when I didn't want to stand by Scott. We've weathered seasons when walking away from our marriage seemed appealing. I even decided I wanted a divorce eleven years ago. I was a church-goer in those days, but I hadn't laid down my life for the Lord, yet. Rarely did God speak to me back then, but one night at the height of my brokenness over my marriage, I heard the Lord say, "No divorce."

It really was that simple and that clear. I also sensed God saying, "Now is the time to lay down your life for me. You will do this by laying down your life for your husband."

This was so not what I wanted to hear that night. I didn't want to fix what was broken in my life, I wanted something new. The temptation to start over was overwhelming. Divorce was an open highway headed for relief, but there was God standing at a crossroad of my life pointing his finger up a steep mountain incline. "I will go with you," Jesus assured me. "You stand by your husband and I will stand by you."

It was the best choice I ever made, climbing that marriage mountain with the Lord at my side. Serving Christ means we serve others. Doing what we think is best for ourselves is never an option. And it's never about who's right. Real Christianity is about being right with God. Jesus says, "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me" Matthew 16:24.

This never feels good in the beginning. In the middle it hurts too. It is only when we reach our destination that the weight of the cross is removed from our shoulders.

The destination at the top of my mountain was a redeemed marriage. In the midst of this, I was given a redeemed husband and three more beautiful children. Had I left Scott eleven years ago, we would not have John, Joey and Garry today; three precious little boys who fill our lives with laughter. I would not have the marriage I've always dreamed of, and my life would not be a sweet aroma to my Lord.

My devotion today from Streams in the Desert talks about the world's supply of attar of roses. To maintain their strongest scent, the roses must be gathered in the darkest hours. The pickers begin at one in the morning and finish at two, said James Creelman, the man who visited the Balkan Mountains and tells this tale in the devotion. Creelman goes on to say, "At first it seemed to me a relic of superstition; but I investigated the picturesque mystery, and learned that actual scientific tests had proven that fully forty percent of the fragrance of roses disappeared in the light of day."

If you are in a dark place right now, remember this attar of roses story. The scent of who you are in Christ should be at its strongest in the night. This can only be done in the power of the Holy Spirit when we lay down our lives for the Lord.

THE WEARY KIND

2010-05-13T14:58:00.000-07:00

There is a new song out called The Weary Kind. It is the theme tune from Crazy Heart, the movie with Jeff Bridges that won him best actor this year. I really like this song, The Weary Kind. It hits home in this sin-filled world. Life is full of weary souls. And some of these worn out people are Christians. The Christ-filled life shouldn't be this way.
Why is there so much weariness both in and outside of the church?
I believe the answer is sin, but if you are the weary kind of Christian, before you take this to heart, let me say that it may not be your own sin wearying you. Other people's sins can steal our strength and crush our spirits the same as our own sin can if we allow it.
When I became a Christian, I eagerly embraced the church. I mean this in a broad sense: Jesus' church, all my brothers and sisters in Christ, not just the church I attend down the road. Jesus said we are all parts of one body. I joined my new body with great expectations. It took awhile to discover that, like me, my new body wasn't perfect.
In time, I realized I'd become the weary kind of Christian. How this happened, I wasn't quite sure, but the one thing I could definitely put my finger on was sin. Sin in the body was discouraging me.
Unfortunately, many Christians live the same way the world lives. The only way you can tell the person is a Christian is because they say they are a Christian and they take part in the church body. We could argue here over whether or not this kind of Christian is really a Christian. Some may be saved, many probably are not. The Bible says that those who love the Lord, obey Him. But even true Christians sin. Some sin badly.
People let us down. It's the nature of the beast: we will all battle the flesh till our dying day. Some Christians fight harder than others to overcome their sinful ways. The mistake I made that brought on my weariness was having my eyes on those Christians mired in sin. Sin affects others. There is no way to sin alone. The whole body suffers when one member sins. Thank goodness the Bible says that love covers a multitude of sins.
We can learn a lot from the heroes of the Bible. I love how in the desert with about two million back-sliders, Moses, when he grew weary, cried, "Lord, show me your glory!"
Moses rarely looked for help from people. And usually he didn't bother to correct God's straying folks, either. He simply went straight to the source of life, God, and said each time he was worn out, "Show me your glory!"
God's glory is what renewed Moses.
Habakkuk the prophet had it hard, but he too found his strength in God.
Because of the sin of God's people, God raised up the Babylonians, a dreaded and fearsome nation, to come against Israel in Habakkuk's time. But here was Habakkuk's response, "O LORD, I have heard the report of you, and your work, O LORD, do I fear. In the midst of the years revive it; in the midst of the years make it known; in wrath remember mercy" Habakkuk 3:2.
The book of Habakkuk ends with the prophet rejoicing in the Lord, though his country was crumbling. He talks about the crops failing, no food to eat, and the flock being cut off from the fold, but yet Habakkuk says, "I will take joy in the God of my salvation. GOD, the Lord, is my strength; he makes my feet like the deer's; he makes me tread on my high places" Habakkuk 3:18-19.
An important thing to remember that Moses, Habakkuk, and nearly all the heroes of the Bible have in common is that they prayed for God's sinful people. They pleaded with God for mercy. They wanted God's people healed, not cast out of the fold and destroyed.
Most encouraging of all, here is what Jesus said about the weary kind, "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest" Matthew 11:28.

A MOTHER'S SOUP

2010-05-07T07:36:00.000-07:00

A few days ago, I stepped out the back door to find John, our seven-year-old, and Joey, five-years-old, working away at my flower pots. These pots are old wine barrels cut in half. We have two right outside the kitchen door. The dogs have taken over the barrels, sleeping there, so I no longer bother to keep flowers in them.
"What are you boys up to?" I asked red-haired John, and blond, curly-haired Joey, watching them take dirt from one pot to add to the other pot.
"We're making you soup," the boys said in union, grins on their dirty, little faces.
"Soup, huh? What kind of soup?"
"Don't know yet," said John.
"For dinner," said Joey.
I was in the middle of making dinner myself, and though, I could see a mess brewing, I decided at least the boys were playing by the door where I could easily keep an eye on them.
For nearly an hour, the boys labored there at the pots. Sometimes I would see them race across the yard coming back with weeds and such, but for the most part, they worked beside the back door.
When I was nearly done with supper, I decided I needed to get the boys cleaned up before sitting them at the table with the rest of our crew. When I looked out the kitchen window, here came John with the dog pan. As I stepped out the door, he poured the contents of the large pan into the pot. It was now brimming with mud, water, weeds, and so many of my spring flowers that I wanted to scream. Many times I have told the boys, "No picking flowers from Mom's planters." This year they'd been so good about it. I thought I finally had my sons trained to leave my flowers alone.
Standing beside the pots, I smelled something stinky. I looked around for Garry James, our two-year-old, thinking perhaps he had a poopie diaper.
"It's done, Mom," said John proudly, stretching out his hand to present the finished pot.
"We made you dog poop soup!" cried Joey. He too was standing about ten feet tall with their accomplishment.
"For Mother's Day," added John, his face sweaty from his endeavors, his blue eyes sparkling with little boy joy. "I used the shovel to put all the dog poop in the pan so I didn't touch the poop!"
That explained the smell, even though the pot was bursting with my roses, sweet peas, Juniper's beard and other flowers I love that had been stripped from my planters.
The expectant looks on the boy's dirt-covered faces forced me to swallow the fierce words on my tongue. Instead, I sweetly said, "I'm getting Daddy. He has to see this." Smell this right under our dining room window... I was thinking not so sweetly.
"Come look what your boys did," I told Scott when I found him sitting with Garry watching Dora. "What did they break now?" he asked, shoving aside his school work.
"My flowers," I said, singing that song in my head, You're Gonna Miss This. The wistful country tune has become my mantra while raising our six children. Often I remind myself that someday the children will be grown and gone and my flowers will be beautiful in the flower beds instead of clenched in the grubby, little fists of one of my boys and presented to me in a wad of petals.
I followed Scott to the back door and watched his face as the smell hit him.
"What did you boys do?" Scott asked calmly. Scott is always calm, at least on the outside. Years ago, this made him a good pilot. Today it makes him a good high school teacher. And a really good daddy.
"We made dog poop soup for Mom!" Joey's grin can light up the planet.
"I see you used a bunch of Mom's flowers." Scott looked at me. He knows picking my flowers is a perfect way to unleash my wrath.
I smiled at him. "It's my Mother's Day present."
"Well, Happy Mother's Day, babe." He turned back to the boys. "So whose idea was it to add the dog poop?"
"Joey's," John announced.
Joey could not have looked more proud of his ingenuity.
"Of course it was Joey's idea," said Scott.
"We wanted it to smell for Mom," John explained.
"And it is going to smell wonderful while we eat supper right beside this window." I patted the boys' sweaty heads before returning to the kitchen to put dinner on the table.
"You boys go wash up," said Scott as he stepped inside the door and promptly closed the window.
Scott came over to help me put the food on the table. "Should they be in trouble?" he asked with a smile.
"How can I be mad at them? They made me dog poop soup for Mother's Day."

Prayers for patience and joy with your children this Mother's Day :) Happy Mother's Day!

TEN THOUSAND YEARS

2010-04-29T20:50:00.000-07:00

A precious friend of mine is at Stanford Medical Center for surgery. I have prayed over her, wept over her, written about her, and now must release her to the mercy of God. How I hope that when they open her up in the morning, a miracle will be there in her body. The doctors expect to confront cancer, instead I pray they find restored flesh and organs: my friend's sickness swept away by the hand of God.

Isn't that what we all long for in these battles we face here on earth: God's hand sweeping all sorrow and sickness away? We all have our wars... relational wars, financial wars, forgiveness wars, addiction wars, hate wars, and health wars... everyone I know is fighting some kind of war.

What war are you presently fighting? Are you there on your battlefield now? Can you see it? Is it your marriage, or your lack of marriage? Your bank account or lack of bank account? Your desire for something that is killing you? Or perhaps your lack of desire for that which can bring you life? Do you want Jesus? Do you groan as "the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit groan inwardly..." Romans 8:22-23.

I don't know about you, but I am groaning right now. Groaning for the healing of my sweet friend at Stanford. Groaning because I want others to reach for Jesus. Groaning because I still wrestle sin and Satan and sometimes it feels like I'm losing the battle. But not the war, I remind myself... I can't lose this war because the war has already been won. Jesus went to the cross, hung there, bled there, died there, and walked out of the tomb on a Sunday morning with nail-pierced hands raised in victory. My cancer-stricken friend's Savior lives. He's with her at Stanford.

Is your battle today a hospital room? A bank after your home? Bills on the counter that you can't pay? Drugs in your veins? Your rebellious child's face? Sin sucking your sweet life away?

Please go there with me... what is the war you face today? Now picture Jesus beside you.

Something profound happened to me during Palm Sunday service this year while I was down at Mt. Hermon at my writers' conference. I woke very early Palm Sunday morning, spent time with my Bible in prayer, then met a bundled up group of Christians before daybreak to climb to the top of Mt. Hermon for sunrise service at the cross. There we watched the sun crest across the valley and listened to a sermon about humility.

Later that morning I went to the Palm Sunday service in the conference center's tabernacle. By the time I hit that second service, I could not stop weeping. God's mercy flowed out of me in tears. Near the end of the service, the song Amazing Grace was sung. I thought I intimately knew this song the way I know my lover Scott, but something strange happened to me during this song on Palm Sunday. It came in the sixth stanza of the hymn near the end. Here is the verse...

"When we've been here ten thousand years,

bright shining as the sun.

We've no less days to sing God's praise,

then when we've first begun."

And it hit me: ten thousand years from now my friend will be cancer free. None of my friends will be bleeding from divorce. My financially devastated friends will no longer lose their homes because heaven is theirs. Kids will be raised. Drugs won't exist. Forget hate and crime and the news that constantly reminds us our world is broken. The concept that "this too shall pass" took on a whole new meaning for me in the light of ten thousand years.

So back to the battles we face here and now... Where is your war today? This is battlefield earth, friends. We are in a combat zone down here. If God has blessed you with a season of peace, kiss the ground. Get on your knees, then look up. Look up! Your Savior lives. Jesus is with us and ten thousand years from now Jesus will still be with us. If Jesus doesn't heal my friend's cancer at Stanford, in ten thousand years she and I will smile with Jesus anyway.

Oh, how I pray that you will experience victory today in your battles. Each of you in pain because the war is at your door right now, I pray for you, my friend. There is so much victory in Jesus. Such comfort and grace in His arms.

And remember, if the battle rages on... In ten thousand years you and I will be smiling with the One who won the war for us two thousand years ago at Calvary.

To listen to Amazing Grace drop down to the next blog. I have posted it there :)

PRAYERS FOR PROTECTION

2010-04-22T18:38:00.000-07:00

Two days ago my teenage daughter and I went to the mall. We settled in a parking lot where a group of young men lurked near the store entrance. They appeared to be gang members, but I paid little attention to them. My daughter Cami and I were in a hurry, having only twenty minutes to grab a birthday present for a friend before heading to my other daughter's soccer game. Our SUV was perfectly fine when we walked into the mall. When we came out twenty minutes later, our tire was flat to the rim. This was a good tire gone bad in a hurry, which baffled me, but again, I didn't give it much thought. I got on my phone and began calling for help.
The parking lot was quiet due to a rainstorm. No people were about except for the gang members, and, strangely, there was a couple flirting and kissing and leaning against a car parked near ours. The couple's car was even running, but the couple chose to stand beside their car in plain sight instead of ducking the rain by getting inside the idling vehicle. These were not kids, this was a couple probably in their thirties, mind you.
"Boy, this is dumb and dumber," I said to my daughter, motioning to that giddy couple in the drizzle, then pointing to us with the flat tire. Dumb and dumber is an inside joke Cami and I share. We have these days where we bump into each other in the kitchen or crack heads like both of us have lost our balance or our brains while trying to make dinner or do dishes together.
"They are definitely dumber. Why are they wasting all their gas?" asked Cami. "Why don't they at least kiss in the car where it's warm and dry?"
"Fools in love," I replied, noticing again the gang members lounging under the mall eve watching us. By now I was throwing up prayers such as, help us, Lord. Let someone answer their phone at least. I was on my third call when I finally reached my dad.
"I'm real busy here at work, but I'll be over when I can get there," said Dad.
After hanging up with my dad, I told Cami, "Try to get a friend to come pick you up. This is going to take awhile. Maybe you can grab a ride to the soccer game and I'll be there once the tire is fixed."
A few more phone calls and Cami found a lift to the game. Finally, my dad appeared, and when he did, the soaked, but smiling couple climbed into their car and drove off. They'd been there laughing and kissing for nearly an hour in the rain as the gang members intently watched.
Together my dad and I removed the tire, left the car on the jack, and went to a nearby tire shop to have the tire patched. By now it was nearly five p.m. We were blessed to get to the shop shortly before it closed. The man who fixed the tire, which had been punctured, said it looked like perhaps a screw driver had done the damage.
Back at the car, my dad while putting the tire on, could not be seen by the gang members a ways off on the other side of the car. I'm guessing that I appeared to be alone at that point when I went to the other side of my car for several minutes. One bold young man from the group strolled over offering to help me then. When I told the young man that my dad was there on the other side of the car fixing the tire, the young man appeared quite disappointed. I thanked him for his nice offer to help and watched him sullenly return to his friends.
My tire was now on and my dad and I climbed in our cars at the same time and drove away with the gang still staring my way.
I thought little about all this until I went to bed. Mostly my mind had been set on getting over to my daughter's soccer game before it ended. I did make the last few minutes of the match and my daughter's team lost.
When I lay down to sleep that night, my mind began replaying the strange afternoon in the mall parking lot. I realized that on Monday during my weekly time with one of my prayer partners, I felt strongly that we needed to pray for protection in the coming days.
"I don't know why I feel this way," I told my prayer partner. "But protection is really on my heart for us this week." Usually this would have worried me, but after praying with my partner about it, I didn't think again about protection until I lay there in bed on Tuesday thanking God for helping us with the flat tire. All of a sudden it hit me that perhaps Cami and I had been in danger that afternoon. That someone had punctured our tire with the intent to make us vulnerable. That maybe that nice request to help from the gang member had carried evil tidings. Thank you, Lord for that silly couple in love who never left my side until Dad arrived, I prayed upon realizing that the young man did not approach me until I seemed alone in the parking lot. Thank you so much, Lord for protecting our teenage daughters who drive in their cars alone every day and who sometimes go to the mall by themselves.
The angel of the LORD encamps around those who fear Him, and delivers them, says Psalm 34:7. And in Hebrews 13:6, "The Lord is my helper; I will not fear. What can man do to me?" These Bible scriptures are in my devotions this week along with other scriptures about protection. I follow a daily reading plan so I did not choose these scriptures upon realizing I needed protection. These scriptures are printed in the devotions and set upon a date years in advance. Two of these devotions were written nearly a hundred years ago. In one of my devotions, Daily Light for Every Day the scripture on our flat tire day reads, "Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me" Psalm 23:4.
My guess is there have been many times in my life that I needed protection without even realizing it. Times when God surrounded me with angels in the midst of danger and delivered me from evil when I didn't even know I needed deliverance.
I do know that the time I spend in prayer is far from wasted. That this prayer routine has brought protection. I have several prayer partners I pray with weekly on different days. And I pray every day with my children and husband. I also pray daily on my own with a Bible and my devotions. So many times my devotions and Bible reading have lined up with events in my life. I believe that prayer not only brings protection; it brings peace with God and all kinds of other blessings.
"When the righteous cry for help, the LORD hears, and delivers them out of all their troubles" Psalm 34:17.
How true this promise is even when we go to the mall ;)

A ROOSTER AND SHEEP

2010-04-16T08:33:00.000-07:00

It is still dark out when I hear the rooster. It crows from across the pasture reminding me that I have denied Christ too, and yet, still, the Lord asks me to feed his sheep. But before we talk about sheep, let's talk about that rooster.
Our son John was a recent kindergarten grad the day he decided he could take my brother's rooster. John had been watching Kung Fu Panda and practicing his karate. John could now kick higher than his head, which is red and about three feet tall. That old rooster had gotten the better of John and his brothers too many times, John had decided. You see, I would send our boys over to gather eggs and feed my brother's chickens when my brother was out of town, which was often last summer. Even John's big brother, eleven-year-old Luke, was afraid of the rooster. Poor Joey, John's little brother, took a beating from the rooster the previous week and John had had enough.
"I'm not scared of that old rooster," John told me as we cracked eggs together that June morning. "I know karate now. I'm gonna teach that bird a lesson."
"John, that rooster is as tall as you. He could peck your eyes out," I informed my six-year-old son, being the good mom that I am.
"He's gonna peck my foot when I kick him in the head," John replied full of redheaded sass.
Smiling, I went about my breakfast-fixing business. I knew John was as frightened of the rooster as the rest of us. When I fed the chickens, I took a broom. That old rooster was big and mean. He'd flown at me with his spurs out. A smack with the broom worked, but you had to be quick. The bird would give you the chicken-eye, and here he'd come. I hated that rooster.
The day John reckoned with the rooster only he and Oma were there. We call my mom Oma, which is grandma in some dialect of German I've been told. Oma and John drove over to feed the chickens and gather eggs for my brother. Oma was taking her time at the car when John ran ahead to the chicken coop. Minutes later Oma heard John's terrified screams. Oma ran to the pen as fast as grandmas can run to find John sprawled on his back with the rooster dancing all over him. Oma kicked like crazy using her grandma karate on the rooster, screaming along with John and peeing her pants in the process.
When the two arrived at my house, both John and Oma were a wreck.
Sobbing in my arms, John said, "That old rooster nearly pecked my eyes out!" John was crying so badly I could hardly understand him.
"If you don't have a pair of pants that fit me, I'm going home," said Oma in a snit. "John and that rooster about gave me a heart attack. My pants are soaked."
We were standing in my laundry room. I'd been folding clothes when the battle-bloody duo arrived. I inspected John's wounds, scratches on his neck and back, then found some sweats for my mom. The sweats belonged to Cami, our teenage daughter. Cami didn't wear the sweats outside the house because they have writing across the rear. So an hour later I watched Oma wash out my kitchen floor with words shouting from her behind. John was on the couch watching Kung Fu Panda wondering what went wrong in the chicken coop, no doubt.
So now we are back to Peter, me, the rooster, and sheep.
It is often in the dark of early morning that I hear my brother's rooster crowing. My brother lives about twenty acres away. Sometimes I'm in the middle of prayer when the rooster sounds. It never fails, I think of Peter's denial of Christ, and then remember my own shortcomings of faith. What always happens is this: grief hits me that I'm so weak and broken, and then I remember Jesus' talk with Peter on the shore of the lake after the resurrection where Jesus made his disciples breakfast.
"Peter, do you love me?"
"You know that I love you, Lord."
"Feed my sheep."
Jesus does this three times with Peter because of the three times Peter denied Jesus before Jesus was crucified. In my head, I am Peter having this conversation with Jesus.
"You know that I love you, Lord," I say in all my brokenness. I'm loving you with all that I am. You and I both know that all that I am isn't much.
"Feed my sheep," Jesus tells me. Jesus looks at me, seeing all the way through, all my shortcomings of faith and still my Lord asks me to feed his sheep. Which means that I am capable of this. That this is my calling: feeding sheep. The country girl in me knows I can do this sheep feeding thing. You see the feeder doesn't make the food. The food is provided already. All the feeder must do is carry the food to the sheep. By God's grace, I am capable of this. And the good news is the Lord has not asked me to feed roosters. John and I can leave that old rooster to Kung Fu Oma.

IMPATIENCE

2010-04-10T08:55:00.000-07:00

"Impatience is stealing the joy from my life," I told Scott as we sat in gridlock traffic in Santa Cruz a few weeks ago. It was an impossibly beautiful day. Rain had just washed the world clean and now the sun sparkled all over the place. Everything was in bloom as we headed into the mountains where redwoods rose higher than any other tree on earth. Problem was, we were moving at about five miles an hour. I had all the time in the world to admire the beauty beside the highway, but I was feeling agitated and annoyed.
"Everywhere I go I've had to wait recently," I told Scott. "The line I'm in has Grandma counting her pennies, or the woman whose credit card won't work, or the guy who decides he needs a round of lottery tickets he's gonna fill out at the counter."
"God is working on you my little get-er-done girl," Scott said with a smile.
"I know that," I answered, trying to convince myself that being stuck in traffic was a good thing. "Look at those rhododendrons. Have you ever seen them bloom like that before?" I even had time to count the blossoms because our car came to a complete standstill. I did this grudgingly thinking I wanted to get out and weed under the highway's hedges as we waited.
Later we came upon the road problem. An SUV had rolled. Family gear was strung all over the highway. A small child, no more than three or four years old, lay unmoving on a stretcher. Other accident victims were being attended to, but not the child.
"Impatience probably caused that wreck," said Scott. "The roads are slick from the rain, but people don't want to slow down." For years Scott was an Army helicopter pilot. He understands safety and has often explained to me how important it is to go at things patiently.
I could not take my eyes off the little one on that lonely stretcher. We had a son that size at home.
We skirted the scene of the accident and soon an ambulance screamed up behind us.
Please let that be the child alive and on his or her way to the hospital, I prayed. But just as the ambulance passed us, the lights switched off and the siren went silent.
"That's not good," said Scott. "Guess they don't need to get that patient to the hospital any longer."
The ambulance merged into traffic and drove the speed limit along with everyone else. There was a somber feel on the road.
I stared out the window at the rhododendrons with new appreciation. My children were alive.
As I contemplated this happening, I realized that my impatience was tied to pride. Accidents are humbling, especially when people die. I am grateful to God that this was not my accident. God humbled me as a bystander.
Now when I feel impatient, I picture that child on a stretcher. I breathe in and out practicing the gratefulness of life. When a person is feeling grateful it is nearly impossible to harbor impatience. Pride cannot hide in a thankful heart.
I have also realized while writing this blog that patient (as in sweetly waiting) and patient (as in a sick person) are spelled the same. Interesting don't you think? Thankfully, Jesus is patient with me the patient.

MY KINGDOM IS NOT OF THIS WORLD

2010-03-25T07:46:00.000-07:00

I often hear Christians talking about the government. A lot of folks are upset right now over the health care legislation. In faith-based circles there is a movement building not to pay taxes if that tax money will be channeled toward abortions. During the election in California in 08, many churches put signs up and poured their money into stopping gay marriage. Over and over I have heard Christians say, "We need to think about our children. What can we do to make this world a better place for them?"
First let me say, having six children, I understand this line of thinking. I want my children to have a good life on this earth, but the reality is, that may not happen. Here is why it may not happen: "But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power..." (2 Timothy 3:1-5).
Are we in the last days? I don't know. I sure see a lot of Rome's follies rising in the United States and we all know what happened to Rome. In the ruling days of Rome, here is a quote from a Christian, "I am a grain of God. Let me be ground between the teeth of the lions if I may thus become bread to feed God's people." The martyred Ignatius said this before dying in a Roman arena.
Ignatius didn't say, "Let's fight the government. Let's get more Christians elected to change the country."
Christ didn't respond this way, either, about Rome. In fact, Jesus lost many of his disciples exactly because he did not take on the government. The Jews wanted a messiah who would overthrow Rome. Christ's words were these, "My kingdom is not of this world" (John 18:36).
When it came to taxes, Jesus said, "Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's and to God the things that are God's" (Matthew 22:21). Jesus knew Caesar was killing innocent people, the roads were lined with the crucified in Jesus' day, still Jesus said, give Caesar his money.
Recently a sweet sister-in-Christ asked me, "What are we supposed to do then about gay marriage and abortion and the bad things happening in our schools these days?"
I shared with this friend that in the Bible when God's people faced battles they fasted and prayed.
"That's it? Shouldn't we do more than that?!"
"Love the lost," I answered. "Bless and pray for the people passing this kind of legislation."
By the way, this is not my personal suggestion. I am only repeating what Jesus said to do.
I have had this same conversation with numerous Christian friends and their response has been the same as this friend's. "We have to do more than fast and pray! This is our world..."
Here, I believe, is really the heart of the issue: confusion over what world we belong to as Christians, along with our unbelief of God's authority in this present darkness.
Jesus tells us not to love this world. Our mission here is simply to spread the gospel. Jesus says, "I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world" (John 16:33).

Stradivari and Guarneri del Gesu

2010-03-11T19:19:00.000-08:00

A few days ago in one of my devotions, I read that Stradivari of Cremona marked every one of his now priceless violins with the name of Jesus. This really moved me and I wanted to blog about it. In researching to write the story, to my deep disappointment, I found that it was not Stradivari who marked his violins with the name of Jesus, but Giuseppe Guarneri, a violin maker fifty years younger than Stradivari who crafted stringed instruments at the same time in the same northern Italian city of Cremona.
Stradivari and Guarneri are known as the greatest luthiers (violin makers) of all time, but while I knew Stradivari, I'd never heard of Guarneri (keep in mind, I can't shake a can of beans, let along play a violin, but music touches me deeply, especially when used to worship God).
Researching further, I found that out of the great musicians who live by violins, some prefer Stradivari and some Guarneri instruments. I also found that Stradivari's early instruments aren't as good as his later craftings. Stradivari's "golden period" instruments sell for millions.
I didn't come across the same info. with Guarneri (don't know if his first violins were as good as the ones he made later), but I did read that it wasn't until 1731 that Guarneri began to mark his instruments with the label monogram IHS (Iesus Hominem Salvator: Jesus Saviour of Man) which led to his nickname: Giuseppe Guarneri del Gesu. Del Gesu in Latin means "of Jesus." Unlike Stradivari, Guarneri made his violins swiftly and sold them cheaply, yet they rivaled Stradivari's instruments created more slowly and sold largely to the wealthy. Kings ordered Stradivari's violins.
The name Stradivari is widely known, yet Guarneri today not so. And when Guarneri is talked about in modern times, he and his violins are always remembered by the name del Gesu.
The gist of the devotion that started all this for me was: what is your life marked by? Whose label is on you?
Violins carry labels. Stradivari and Guarneri del Gesu are the masters of the musical realm. Their labels on a violin make that violin nowadays nearly priceless. Hundreds of years after they lived and crafted their instruments, I could see how a Christian writer of the early 1900s who put together the devotion I follow today could make the mistake of confusing these two men. That writer didn't have the Internet to do research and she wasn't really talking about violin makers, after all. Her point was: whose label is on you?
Going deeper for me, is the fact that two men made miraculous violins and one man is known by his own name, Stradivari, and the other man is known by del Gesu (of Jesus). The world has exalted Stradivari, and to me it seems, forgotten Guarneri (unless you love violins).
Yet, in my digging I found that many musicians favor the Guarneri violin because it all but plays itself. The Stradivari violin is known for being temperamental. You have to be a great musician to make the most of the Stradivari. The Guarneri makes the most of the musician.
Now light has just flooded my being because in blogging this piece I just learned the lesson God has been trying to teach me lately.
The prideful woman I can be wants to make the most of the Stradivari. But the broken woman I truly am needs the Guarneri.

SPIRITUAL AUDACITY

2010-03-05T07:54:00.000-08:00

Nearly a hundred years ago a little devotion, Springs in the Valley, was compiled. In one of the entries Robert Louis Stevenson says, "No man is of any use until he has dared everything."
What the devotion entry really explored was spiritual audacity.
I looked up the definition of audacity online in Merriam Webster and it said, "bold or arrogant disregard of normal restraints."
Not quite what I thought audacity meant. The whole "disregard for normal restraints" threw me into the end zone. I felt like doing the victory dance over this touchdown of understanding, but I'm much too humble a Christian for that...
"Bold or arrogant," so much for humility. I'm sick of false humility in myself and in today's Christianity. Jesus was spiritually audacious and I want to be audacious too.
When Jesus tore up the temple, tipping over tables in his outrage at those who sold sacrifices there I don't think onlookers labeled the Lord as humble. I think what really fired up Jesus in the temple was knowing that he was the real sacrifice and these other sacrifices sold for money in his Father's house led people away from faith and into legalism. The point of sacrifice is that it costs you something and that something isn't money. That something is blood.
On his journey to the cross, Jesus walked humbly, obedient onto death is what the Bible says. Even then, however, he was bold, perceived as arrogant in his answer to the high priest's question, "If you are the Christ, tell us."
Jesus replied to the religious people, "If I tell you, you will not believe, and if I ask you, you will not answer. But from now on the Son of Man shall be seated at the right hand of the power of God" Luke22:67-69.
I have to be honest, religion is wearing me out. Since becoming a Christian, I've made a lot of rules for my life. I've imposed those rules on others, not non-believers, but Christian brothers and sisters. When my siblings have fallen short, I've thought less of them and more of myself.
Divorce comes to mind. Ten years ago when I became a Christian, God's first instruction to me was, "Do not seek a divorce."
I was unhappy in my marriage back then, but I obeyed God, buckled down, and did my best to be that gentle, long-suffering wife the Bible behooves. The result: a saved husband, and in the decade that followed, the life I'd always dreamed of.
"Don't get a divorce," I've passionately told brothers and sisters. When they do split, I look down on them.
Not long ago I was ranting to God about these other Christians giving Jesus a bad name. "Why on earth would people on the outside looking in want to come to church? Look at these church people divorcing right and left, raising broken kids who fit right into our broken world. The only difference between Christians and non-Christians these days is that the non-Christians are more honest about why they are divorcing and raising broken kids!"
I told you I was ranting.
The Lord answered me with a smile on his face. "I'm a big God, Paula. I don't need you to defend my name."
"Give me some tables to turn over! Let me clear your temple," I carried on.
"Do you really want to throw these stones? Are you without sin my beloved?"
Can you smell the stench of slammed brakes?
My sin was not the sin of divorce. It was the sin of judgement. I had become the older brother throwing his little temper fit over his father killing the fatten calf for the prodigal son. You can read this story in Luke chapter 15:11.
My sad plight is that I had mistaken spiritual audacity for spiritual legality. I can almost hear Jesus saying, "Sheath your sword. Those who live by the sword, die by the sword and those who live by the law, die by the law.
In other words, blessed are the merciful for they will be shown mercy.
I'm not saying divorce is a freedom in Christ. Read Malachi chapter 2:13-15.
This isn't about divorce. This is about the audacity to believe that we can be like Christ on this earth. That we can achieve great things for Him. That we can turn over the right tables in the temple and boldly proclaim, "Christ in us the hope of glory!"

THE ALMOND BRANCH

2010-03-01T07:01:00.000-08:00

Yesterday my family took a walk through Oma and Opa's almond orchard. Our teenage girls did cartwheels across the blossom-covered ground. Our little boys raced through the rows of white trees barefoot, though yesterday was still February. Cool in California with spring still around the corner and the grass damp from recent rain. I wish I could say I was there for this, but I wasn't. My husband showed me the video of the kids on his iPhone. I had remained in the house to write because I get a lot done on weekends.
That is my problem, I am a get-er-done girl even on Sundays. Even when we are visiting my parents.
This morning I miss the girl who, like my children, used to cartwheel and run through the blooming almond orchards. This is my hometown: almond trees. To reach the house where I grew up (Oma and Opa's), you drive through miles of almond farms. Because I married Scott, my military man, I've lived all over the world. Let me tell you there is no place like home for me in February when the almonds bloom. Sweetness fills the air, the bees sing, and a sea of the prettiest trees you have ever seen flower white with a hint of pink.
But this February I hardly noticed the almonds. Something else has ripened in me. I'm pursuing a life-long dream of becoming a novelist.
Recently, I read that you must pay for your dreams. Even Jesus said count the cost before you continue. This morning I'm wondering if I can afford to be an author.
The Lord has really been working on me about selfish ambition and vain conceit, and love and obedience as well. My life is not my own, I was bought with a price, the blood of Jesus. God owns this get-er-done girl.
And here is where almond blossoms and God intersect for me. "And the word of the Lord came to me, saying "Jeremiah, what do you see?" And I said, "I see an almond branch." Then the LORD said to me, "You have seen well, for I am watching over my word to perform it" Jeremiah 1:11.
Almonds are the first trees to bloom in the spring. In speaking to Jeremiah, God used the almond branch in the Bible to signify His people. The judgement of the Lord always hits God's people initially and then fans out to foreigners. Each February as the almonds bloom, God reminds me of this.
My response is always the same as Beth Moore's, "I want my whuppin' first."