point of view

This is a poem says things that many other parents have said before me. I am writing it anyway because it is new and mysterious and wonderful to me.  You think my hair is meant to help you pull in close. Your wet baby kisses extend my energy, my perseverance, far beyond the limits I thought I had. There's a look when you know you have all my attention I can't put a name to it but oh, how I hope you don't outgrow it anytime soon. Please, my Father, help me to look more like you. Please, my Father, help me to trust you like he does; expressing, unhindered by any thought that You might not want to hear, content, to know that You delight in me too.

turn off turn onto the gravel roads to wander to reach for a spray of the wildflowers, not as a taking of the fruit of another's possessions but as a recognizing welcoming the delight of sun, wind, sky mountain and plain to gather the glories in highlight their riotous worship. Yes, we see we join with the ringing, repeating song of praise! image source

Finding my voice again feels a little presumptuous What do I have to say? Only the unfinished Perhaps I'm no longer grieving, No longer longing as before Perhaps I don't dare to speak for fear the good will vaporize More likely I'm less alone these days There are two and the Lord who hear my heart these days I have become wife I have become mother Perhaps I don't dare to speak for fear of hurting those who long for these titles Perhaps I've heard some try to teach the how As if they knew it all I don't goodness, I don't. But I am learning new things I suppose we all are.

"Hormones." Kind of an ugly word to explain the flood of emotions, don't you think? So many different things to hold in my heart this twenty-eighth birthday. So many things have changed so quickly in the space between my twenty-sixth and twenty-eighth birthday - I hadn't even met the man who woke me singing "Happy Birthday" so I would hurry to open the gift he would use to make my morning coffee for me, while our child kicked his or her greeting inside me. My twenty-seventh birthday was just after our honeymoon. The newlywed stage is beautiful, but for all its thrills and despairs, treasured new things and bumbling adjustments, I don't wish to be back in that stage. How thankful I am for all we've learned, the trust we've built, the skills acquired for cheering each other on. How much more we have to learn. Each of us hold our everyday sorrows, together with the immense and humbling realizations of how much good we've been given. ...

Although I could write many things about my beautiful biological sister,  this is about one of my little sisters in the family of Christ.   My sister is strong. The others, when they start to act tough and they vow they'll never care about anything again you know they just can't handle it anymore. The others, they're so angry because this isn't right, this isn't the way it's supposed to be that they give up hope of learning what it IS supposed to be like. Somehow, my sister's not like that. Me, I haven't had a quarter of her hardship written into my story I, at her age, wasn't anywhere near so resilient. My sister still dreams. She is strong enough to love the way the winter branches kiss the sky She is strong enough to want to care for the more vulnerable She is strong enough to love the people who make life so difficult for her She is so strong, she still knows how to cry. My sister is a very special person....

This is a rather belated New Year's post, but I've been thinking about it for a while so I thought I would still go ahead and post it. For 2016 I chose to think on the word "Faithfulness", to try to keep in front of me how the Lord has been faithful to me and what I have in front of me to be faithful with. As I look back on my thoughts from last January I am humbled by the abundant grace and kindness the Lord has shown to me. To be honest, I entered 2016 with a predominant feeling of dread. How, I wondered, was I to soldier on through the limitations and difficulties of the life God has given me? I wasn't finding much to anticipate with any sense of joy, but I knew that the Lord would lead me and give me enough to survive whatever He had in store. And He was faithful. Faithful in the midst of a crazy work schedule + class + regular pain from a year-long dental issue that ended in oral surgery = more exhaustion than I've ever had to walk through, f...

like the moment during takeoff just before your ears pop the pressure of the quiet gets to me stillness is a song but silence is a tense hum waiting perhaps it's a struggle to catch up, to get ahead of the tick of the clock so that there's time to hear the music to pause, to observe the symphony between the lines to create the music that's already around there are riches in the drumming rain the pulsating surf the teeming streets riches waiting to be spoken but first, someone needs to pause and listen