Curiosity and Wonder Might Just Save Us All

“They’re acting like a$$es.”

 

This is what I told my husband in a quick, condemning whisper during the few seconds our four kids were more than an arm’s length away from us on the hiking trail. I’m not proud of my words, it’s not language I use often, especially in reference to my kids. But I want you to know just how bad it was.

 

Our long-awaited vacation had arrived, and I was ready for us to be happy, grateful and relaxed. I had bought into the cultural myth of the “happy family vacation” – the ones you see in pictures, where siblings with smiling faces stand with their arms carelessly cast around each other’s shoulders in front of a serenely setting sun. I’d forgotten how new spaces – even welcome, joyfully anticipated ones – unsettle carefully orchestrated family dynamics. I’d forgotten how anticipation often equals heightened expectations. I’d forgotten how hard family vacations can be.

 

And so, we found ourselves rumbling down a hiking trail like a gang of hangry bears. Kids fought, picked, and climbed on top of each other. They complained about the hike, the heat, their siblings. The words, “stop hanging on me,” “stop fighting,” “keep walking,” shot from my mouth on an endless loop. I believe, at one point, I announced, “If you don’t stop fighting, we’re going to walk the rest of the way single-file, in silence.”

Nothing worked.

 

That is, nothing worked until we jostled around a bend in the trail and noticed a doe standing in a clearing at the forest’s edge. “Look, a deer,” someone announced.

 

We turned and acknowledged the sight. Our walking and talking slowed. Someone noticed the flicker of a white tail just inside the forest’s shade. “There’s another deer in the woods. Look. See it?” One, by one, we paused and pointed, waiting for the flash of a white flag in the shaded forest’s deep green.

 

“Maybe it’s a fawn,” someone suggested.

 

Then, my husband added, “I bet, if we kneel down, it might come out.”

 

The six of us fell to our knees without argument or question. We knelt, facing the open field, crouched within arm’s reach of each other. Silence descended, save for a few whispered questions and observations. After a few minutes, the second deer tip-toed silently from the woods and we saw they were about the same size – likely a set of twins on their way to the lake for an evening drink.  

 

There was no arguing, no complaining, no pushing or shoving. The agitation of the heat, the bugs, the siblings vanished.  

 

“Maybe, if we’re quiet, they’ll come closer,” someone suggested.

 

We waited and watched the deer who waited and watched us. We spoke in whispers and the deer carried on their own conversation with flickering tails and cautious movements forward and back.

Those deer did what I could not do. Stirring up holy curiosity and wonder, they pulled us together and brought us to our knees. Divisions eradicated, we found ourselves stunned into a unity of awe. 

//

And so I pray for moments of curiosity and wonder to descend on our deeply divided world. That we would stop our fruitless chiding and bickering and fall to our knees. That we would learn to whisper questions and work in unison that the hope of the holy drawing near would be our unifying desire. 

Nothing else seems to be working.

Breathing Life

Our whole family gathers in the back yard, near the fence line and woodpile. It’s evening, and both the sun and temperature are dropping quickly. Several of us wear light coats. We’re all near-kneeling, our heads bent toward the ground in front of the two white beehives. We look like supplicants gathered for prayer. We  face the quiet hives and talk in whispers.

My husband kneels to pick up bees that lay curled, motionless, in the grass just outside the hives' entrances. He lifts them by their wings, one at a time, and drops them in our cupped, waiting hands. One for Isaiah, one for Levi, one for me.

The bee's weight barely registers in my hand. It lays curled on its side, with nothing to indicate it's anything but dead. Still, I look at it closely and worry about its stinger. Then, I curl my right hand over top of my left so my fingers and palms form a darkened cave, a tomb.

I raise my cupped hands to my face and form a seal over the darkened hollow of my hands. Then, I exhale long and slow, taking care to breathe in through my nose and out through my mouth. Each breath warms my hands, warms the bee.

Ten breaths, twenty. We whisper to each other, “Do you feel anything?”

"No."

“Keep breathing, try a little longer.”

Inhale and exhale, like a child warming winter-cold hands. Wait and breathe. Breathe and wait.

Opening my hands, I peek. The bee’s torso, once immobile now seems to throb lightly, as with breath, the yellow and black cone expanding and contracting with the slightest motion. Is it possible to see a bee breathe? I wonder. Maybe I’m imagining it.

Closing my hands again, I continue to breathe. Cold air in, warm air out, until I feel a small tickle, a bee’s foot brushing my palm. I open my hands and check, yes, a leg is moving. I close my hands and continue to breathe until the bee begins to right itself, crawling sleepily, calmly across my palm.

“It’s awake,” I whisper, “How do I get it into the hive?” 

My husband comes and helps me move it with the aid of a twig, transporting it gently to the door of the hive. Then, it disappears inside its own cave of warmth and safety and we return to scanning the grass, the clover, for half-dead bees to breathe back to life again.

Some Days, We Nap Together (What Tragedy Demands of Us)

Some days, after working in my office all morning and eating a quick lunch at my desk, my body grows heavy and slow and my thoughts turn to molasses.  With just an hour left before the first child arrives back home, before I leave to work an evening shift at the library, I close my laptop, grab my phone and head for my office door.  My dog, Coco, half-sleeping in her corner chair, lifts her head, then jumps down and follows me outside across the blacktop soaked with sunlight, up the back steps, and into the big house. 

Inside, I pause while we each get a drink of water – her at her metal bowl and me at the vintage water fountain near our kitchen door.  Then, I grab a blanket or beach towel – whichever is warm enough and near at hand – and head into the winter room where the wood stove sits heavy in the corner, squat and round, a cast iron Buddha.  Coco follows at my heels and watches patiently as I hunt one room, then another, in search of our sole throw pillow. 

Pillow in hand, I lay down in the same position, always.  Pressing the pillow into one end of our old, leather love seat, I lay down on my right side, curling my long legs to fit on the too-short sofa.  Coco watches with patience and focus as I spread the blanket or towel over myself, then stick my legs out straight off of the couch, offering a pathway to the pocket of empty space at the far end. 

I pat the leather with my hand, twice.  Coco pauses, very still, and looks me in the eye, double-checking her permission.  “Come on, Coco,” I say and up she jumps, then turns and settles in the corner.  I bend my legs again and tuck in around her, careful to keep from bumping her muzzle with my feet.  The warmth of her soft, sweet body adds to my own and we sleep, tucked together, her head resting on my ankles. 

Her presence, as I rest, is pure gift.  The gift of quiet, undemanding companionship; the gift of with-ness that cannot be measured save for the way it softens and steadies the human heart. 

She wakes, when I wake and shift.  Or, sometimes, too warm and close for comfort, she hops down before the nap gets under way.  Some days, if I'm lucky, our handsome black cat notices our napping nest and jumps down from his solitary leather chair and comes purring along into my arms.  On those days, the cat settles opposite the dog, in the space in front of my chest.  Together, we form a sort of yin-yang arrangement of fur and flesh, the cat in front of me, the dog behind.  

//

I experience a profound goodness during these naps, which may seem a small thing amidst all the world’s evils and sorrows, not to mention my own small entanglements.  But I am wondering whether tragedy really demands the trivializing of such moments of beauty, wonder, and grace – moments when the human soul stretches and softens, relaxed and at ease?

Perhaps tragedy and sorrow, worry and fear, require instead, that we linger and luxuriate in these moments.  Maybe Love itself invites us to spread them out wide for the world to see or to tuck them in somewhere safe, like a golden leaf in fall noticed, gathered, and pressed between the pages of a book where it can be rediscovered time and again in the long winter months ahead. 

I love these moments with the dog, the cat; they are precious to me and I cannot pass them off as something less than mercy and grace.  Evil is never defeat by casting what is precious aside.  Evil is defeated when we gently welcome, gather and share what is good and holy and true.  In this way light and life and love are born and borne and multiplied in our midst. 

The world is a heavy and troubled place.  It is also riddled through with mercy, grace and love.  In these days of naming darkness, let us remember also to gather and spread the Light we're given, casting it high and wide, like a million stars lighting up the night.

 Coco and I sharing a little pre-nap love. 

Where are you finding Mercy, Grace and Love these days??

Cooped Up (#SmallWonder Link-up)

(Painting, "Cooped Up" by Lawrence J. Davis)

They were closed in for almost a week.  The new flock, used to living free-range with their former owner, needed time to recognize their new home.  We didn’t want to risk them wandering off.  

“Keep them cooped for two weeks, at least,” a friend said.  “Three, even,” another added. 

So we shut them into the 10x20 room with the nesting boxes and roosting bars, with straw scattered on the concrete floor and food and water readily accessible.  I visited three, four times a day, checking for eggs, changing water, adding food and offering treats like orange slices, stale cereal and popcorn. 

“Peep, peep,” I said, opening the door, teaching them our “call” and to associate coming to me with reward. 

They seemed happy, secure and settling over the first several days. Then the rain set in and hopes of letting them out to wander the yard under a protective eye, vanished. 

The daily egg count dropped.  They broke out once, then again, when we didn’t latch the door securely. 

By day six, they looked pretty desperate.  The mood in the coop was tense and agitated.  When I approached the door one bird, always the same one, flew at the window.  I imagine she was hoping to escape, but it felt like she was flying at my face.  I was irrationally scared entering the coop, like they were a teaming mob ready to turn on me with a moment’s notice.    

They were “cooped up.” 

I thought of how often I’ve said that phrase with no real experience of its meaning.  I thought of the endless stream of snow days, the rainy days and weeks of summer when the kids and I are trapped together at home.  It often seems good and even refreshing at first.  Then, slowly, the atmosphere changes.  We grow tense, desperate.

Tending the chickens, I hear old words and phrases anew. 

I’ve seen a broody hen, how she looks thin and worn, refusing to leave the nest even if the eggs she sits on are unfertilized.  Now I know the word brooding - the way we sometimes worry ourselves sick over things that may never bear fruit - in a new way.  I watch them hunt and peck for grain and bugs in the grass and I see it is exactly the same pause, lunge, repeat method that new typists employ on an unfamiliar keyboard.  I see the marks left by their feet in the dirt and realize the accuracy of describing my oldest boy’s terrible handwriting as “chicken scratch.”   

Every one of these awakenings brings a ping of delight, “Ah-ha!  That’s what we mean.”    

This is what I love about doing new things - this recognition of the way the material world connects, is wedded to, the immaterial and how language spans that gap between the two.  Words strung like beads on a nearly invisible thread connect experiences into a cluster of meaning.  Finding that thread, fingering the beads that line it, is, for me, a source of endless joy and delight.   

P.S. Saturday we built a good sized outdoor "run" over green grass and the girls are no longer "cooped" except at night.  Since our run isn't terribly secure, I get a good bit of exercise chasing escaped birds morning, noon and night!

*   *   *   *

I'm super excited to be joining with Andi Cumbo-Floyd and Shawn Smucker to organize a weekend writer's retreat this summer at God's Whisper Farm in the beautiful mountains of Virginia.  Visit Andi's website for more info!

Welcome to the #SmallWonder link-up.  

What if we chose to deliberately look for small moments of wonder, the small sparks of presence, of delight or sorrow, of true humanity in which we meet God?  

That's my proposal - that we gather here each week to share one moment of Wonder from each of our days.  You're invited to link-up a brief post about a small moment of wonder.  Don't worry if your post is too long, too short, or not just right - you're welcome to come as you are.  

While you're here, please do take a look around and encourage at least one other blogger with a comment.   

The Social Mores of Gerbils and its Impact on Biblical Interpretation or Something Like That . . . (#SmallWonder)

Teaching is the closest I get to extroversion, which explains why I (a fierce introvert) bottom out after every class.  When it’s going well I have a sense of flow.  Connected to the materials I’m presenting, I start to scat a little like a jazz singer, making free-associations, building and linking ideas together.  Sometimes this involves funny stick figure drawings on the blackboard, other times not. 

One day the other week I was trying to explain the incredible social divides bridged by the early house churches.  Referencing I Thessalonians I listed, “prominent women, Greeks, Jews and Gentiles” on the chalkboard.  

“These people wouldn’t normally have anything to do with each other,” I said, drawing a circle around the list. 

The class of Sophomores stared back at me, listless, silent. 

I felt like Eugene Peterson describes in his bible study session that led, eventually, to his ground-breaking gift of The Message translation,

          Galatians, Paul’s angry, passionate, fiery letter that rescued

          his congregation from their regression into culture slavery,   

          was on the table and nobody was getting it.  Sweetly smiling,

          they were giving more attention to stirring sugar into [their]

          Styrofoam cups than to the spirit words that pulsed in Paul’s

          metaphor’s and syntax.  It was obvious they weren’t getting

          it. (in Eat This Book:a conversation in the art of spiritual

          reading, p. 133)

“Putting these groups together,” I said, “would be like filling a whole room with cats and dogs.” 

But no, that example wasn’t exactly right. 

Pausing, I looked off into the distance just above the tops of my student’s heads, as I listened, inspiration came winging and landed on the tip of my outstretched mind.

“No,” I said, “you know what it’s like?”  Excitement grew in my voice.  “It’s like putting two gerbils in the same cage.  We got my son a gerbil for Christmas, then my daughter wanted one so badly we got her one too a few weeks after the first.  But, apparently, gerbils are highly territorial.  Introducing two gerbils from a different litter’s an incredibly complicated process.  So we built them a joint, but separated cage so they could get used to each other’s scent and share space without being able to fight.  But, the other day, one of the gerbils climbed over the divide and by the time we got there, the bigger gerbil had bitten off the smaller gerbil’s tail.  The little gerbil was running all around dragging her bloody stump behind her.”

“It was one of the grossest things I’ve ever seen,” I finished, with obvious delight.

The students were definitely listening now.  Many had their faces twisted, heads tipped to the side, in a questioning manner. 

“Well,” I added, backing off a little, “I guess the people in the early church weren’t biting each other, but . . .” then I paused again as a whole new wave of inspiration struck.

“Oh my gosh!” I added.  I was nearly shouting, “That’s exactly how Paul described it in one of the epistles.  ‘Stop biting and devouring one another,’ he tells them.  Yes, it IS like putting two gerbils in a cage.”

I remember memorizing that particular phrase from Paul’s letter to the Galatians as a high school bible quizzer, but a good twenty years passed between memorization and comprehension.  Those words floated in the cells of my brain like dandelion fluff, letters representing ideas until one day, in front of a classroom of thirty-three students, a concrete physical association caused them to take root and blossom into what Eugene Peterson describes as a “pop of delight.” 

Words took on flesh, ideas became image, a word picture was formed and I was so happy, so delighted.  We moved on then to the next topic at hand, but I carried that little “pop” of pleasure with me and feel it still today. 

May this joy – the joy of discovery, of unexpected connection and its accompanying wonder – be yours as you journey through each of your days.  No thing is too small, too trivial, too removed, to reach in and open the door of your heart.  

*   *   *

Welcome to the #SmallWonder link-up.

What if we chose to deliberately look for the small moments of wonder, the small sparks of presence, of delight or sorrow, of true humanity in which we meet God? 

That's my proposal - that we gather here each week to share one moment of Wonder from each of our days.  

You're invited to link-up a brief post about a small moment of wonder.  Don't worry if your post is too long, too short, or not just right - you're welcome to come as you are.  

While you're here, please do take a look around and encourage at least one other blogger with a comment.  

The Animals on Christmas Eve (#SmallWonder Link-up)

Legend claims 

at midnight 

Christmas Eve

animals received 

the gift of speech,

but I imagine 

it was the other way around

that first starlight night.  

Animals didn’t gain

but humans lost, 

for once, 

their words.

Speechless, 

they welcomed 

the Word in silence,

led by the animals 

in a chorus of mute wonder. 

*   *   *

Welcome to the #SmallWonder link-up.

What if we chose to deliberately look for the small moments of wonder, the small sparks of presence, of delight or sorrow, of true humanity in which we meet God? 

That's my proposal - that we gather here each week to share one moment of Wonder from each of our days.  

You're invited to link-up a brief post about a small moment of wonder.  Don't worry if your post is too long, too short, or not just right - you're welcome to come as you are.  

While you're here, please do take a look around and encourage at least one other blogger with a comment.  

Midnight Benediction

Half-awake,

deep under a layer of blankets,

I hear him cry out

in his dark, cold room

at the end of the hall. 

“Ya-Yuh?  Ya-yuh!” he calls,

pausing to wait for his brother’s reply. 

Answering silence is followed by thump, patter,

then the squeak of his door. 

Half-way down the hall

the word, “Mommy” slips from his lips. 

“What?” I call, still snuggled, waiting to hear

what will be required of me. 

A drink of water? 

A blanket straightened and tucked? 

A song or a hand held in the dark?

“I love you,” he calls, then turns,

hurrying back to his warm bed.

Now I am awake and thinking

of his voice splitting the night

like an angel choir, the words,

“I love you” falling like snow 

across an otherwise silent night. 

To See the Naked Trees (Advent Week 1)

Photo Credit

(Each week in December I hope to write at least one post reflecting on the lectionary texts from the Sunday before.  This week's readings include Jeremiah 33:14-16 and Luke 21:25-36.)

We flew along back roads surrounded by fields and forests on a gray day in late fall. 

“The trees are naked!” cried a little voice from the back of the van. 

“Yes,” I said, “they are.”

Naked is a big and delight-filled word for a four-year-old boy. 

To notice and accurately apply that word, I imagine, gave him nearly as much pleasure as running around naked does.

//

This week’s advent texts, in both Jeremiah and Luke, carry images of trees - a righteous branch, a fig tree in spring.  Scholars note how the bible itself begins and ends in a garden with trees.  In this week's readings Jeremiah and later Jesus use trees to tell their own separate but similar stories of waiting and noticing, of promises and their fulfillment.

Advent – the four weeks leading up to Christmas – marks the beginning of the church calendar and I can’t help but notice again that we begin, not with action, but with waiting.  Active waiting accompanied by a good many urgent appeals for us to Pay Attention! and Stay Awake! 

So frequent are the biblical reminders for us to “pay attention,” you would think the human condition is just one big post-Thanksgiving-meal fog.  It’s as though the bible recognizes our tendency to hit the snooze button, to slumber while driving along familiar roads. 

It may seem simple, but it takes a certain kind of attention to notice the state of the world around us, something like the ability of a four-year-old to see and name the nakedness of the trees. 

//

This week I hope to decorate an evergreen in our yard – a perfectly plump fir we affectionately refer to as “the Christmas tree.”  Last year we could neither afford nor did we have the energy to hang lights outside, but this year we’ve taken the plunge and crumpled icicle lights hang already around the front porch roof and the roof of the well house. 

Soon the kids will climb the Christmas tree with lights in tow and we’ll call out directions from the ground.  It will probably involve some yelling and end in a big tangled mess, but the tree, dressed in its winter greens, will have lights.  I don’t know whether the other trees in the yard – the naked ones – will look on with envy or relief. 

Later this month we’ll cut an overpriced evergreen and drag it into the house where it will become a hiding place for the kids and jungle-gym for the cats.  We’ll string it too with lights and tempers will probably flare between my husband and I and the kids who swarm in excited anticipation as the memory-making debacle unfolds.  

It’s tempting to think of all of those trees and lights as just another distraction.  Sometimes they are.  But I look forward to plugging them in at the end of the day, to watching the kids run off the bus in the early evening dusk toward a house wrapped round with light. 

We may not all have the attentiveness required to notice the “naked trees,” but surely we can learn to notice light.  

May the many lights of Christmas and the trees that bear them remind us of our tendency to snooze.  May they help us Stay Awake as we wait for the coming of the Light.   

  

*   *   *

Welcome to the #SmallWonder link-up.

What if we chose to deliberately look for the small moments of wonder, the small sparks of presence, of delight or sorrow, of true humanity in which we meet God? 

That's my proposal - that we gather here each week to share one moment of Wonder from each of our days.  

You're invited to link-up a brief post about a small moment of wonder.  Don't worry if your post is too long, too short, or not just right - you're welcome to come as you are.  

While you're here, please do take a look around and encourage at least one other blogger with a comment.  

Quiet Lights (Advent Wonder for Your In-box 2015)

 

(This post is a re-post, but the invitation to Quiet Lights continues this Advent - don't miss out.  Simply subscribe via the link below!)

Dinner time at our house is often, well, make that always, insane. 

But every once in awhile, when I've had it up-to-here with the volume and intensity, I set a few small candles in the center of the table and turn off the overhead lights.  The darkness brings a momentary quiet, which is no small feat with four young children gathered around.  

We all hear the striking of the match and watch as light bursts into being.  Lighting candles at dinner instills, for a few moments at least, a sense of awe and wonder in the middle of what's otherwise a hectic, frantic, free-for-all.
 
Walking through a store a few weeks ago, I found myself surrounded by the stuff of Christmas.  As I thought of the season ahead, I realized my deepest desire is to be present to this precious season - to slow down and be re-awakened to awe and wonder.
 
Maybe this is your desire too?
 
This Advent season I'd like to offer you a series of Quiet Lights in your inbox.  Think of these emails as me lighting a candle for you.  

Each email will contain a simple poem or quote as well as a few links to good reads from around the web aimed at deepening your capacity for presence, stillness and wonder during advent.  

This isn't one more thing to do, no one needs that this time of year, it's simply an opportunity to be - to be present, to be aware, to be awakened. 

These free emails will begin December 1st and continue through the Christmas season.  Interested?  Click on the link below to enter your email address and subscribe or visit the Field of Wild Flowers facebook page and send me a private message and I'll add you myself.  

I'd be grateful if you'd share this post (via facebook or email) with both your friends at large and two or three close friends who you believe would be blessed by receiving Quiet Lights in their inbox.  The more, the merrier!

Click here to subscribe to Quiet Lights.

Sometimes the most important thing in a whole day
is the rest we take between two deep breaths,
or the turning inwards in prayer
for five short minutes.
—Etty Hillesum

Twins, Terrorists and Vulnerability (#SmallWonder Link-Up)

        When the twins were first born they both fit in one single stroller and routinely fell asleep tangled together.  

They sit side-by-side on the paper covered exam table, ready for their annual pediatric well-visit.  Clothed only in their Super Hero tightie-whities, they're “skin-skin-skin” everywhere.  Impossibly long legs dangle, long arms stretch, and bright little-boys faces gone round and full again in a growth spurt, shine.  They're barrel chested, broad shouldered men-in-the-making at four-years-old. 

Levi asks about the narrow extension at the head of the table.  “Is it for your head when you lay down?  Will it hold me up?” 

“It’s the plank,” I say, invoking the image of a pirate ship.  “If you’re bad the Doctor makes you walk it.” 

His face shines with delighted disbelief. 

“Is that true?” he demands.

When the doctor comes in she begins by asking them questions and they jostle and jockey between themselves to be the first to reply, the one to give the most detailed answer.  Part way through the questions Levi pipes up out of turn.

“Wait!  If she’s just talking to us, why do we have our pants off!”   

My husband and I laugh, he’s right.  The doctor assures them an exam will follow.  

While they talk the boys, first seated at separate ends of the table so the nurse would be sure not to confuse them, shift closer together.  Levi skootches the length of the paper sheet until he’s snuggled in at Isaiah’s side, nearly knocking his brother off the table.  Half-naked they huddle there, skin to skin intuitively finding comfort in each other in the midst of their vulnerability.   

Watching, I am reminded it has always been this way.

First home from the hospital (and for months to come) we laid the twins to sleep together in a bassinet or crib.  Unable to roll, to move really at all, like every newborn, we were careful to place them swaddled a foot or so apart, worried they would somehow suffocate each other.  

Returning to check on them in the night, though, we almost always found them tucked close together, their heads turned into the familiar scent and warmth of the other.  Unable to move hardly at all, unable really even to see, they each somehow shifted until their faces touched, their warm, milk-scented baby breath mingled together. 

This morning I am sitting with the wonder of these boys, the way they allow vulnerability to draw them closer together rather than push them apart.  In the wake of this weekend's terrorist attacks, in the light of so much fear and struggling world round and in our very own hearts, I am left with some simple questions . . . 

What will I do with my vulnerability?  

What will we do with our vulnerability?  

Will we allow it to draw us closer together or push us further apart?    

*   *   *

Welcome to the #SmallWonder link-up.

What if we chose to deliberately look for the small moments of wonder, the small sparks of presence, of delight or sorrow, of true humanity in which we meet God? 

That's my proposal - that we gather here each week to share one moment of Wonder from each of our days.  

You're invited to link-up a brief post about a small moment of wonder.  Don't worry if your post is too long, too short, or not just right - you're welcome to come as you are.  

While you're here, please do take a look around and encourage at least one other blogger with a comment.  

Vacation (#SmallWonder Link-up)

We're officially on vacation this week in sunny Florida.  We drove down Saturday in one long haul.  Our kids did amazingly well and my husband drove for long stretches like a champ.  I kept myself awake, driving while he slept, by carving baby carrots into little totem poles with my teeth (whatever works, right?).  

The reward for our efforts came yesterday when the kids ran into the Gulf of Mexico and smiles spread as they discovered the fun of riding the waves.  We dug and dug in the sand and shells, hunting for shark's teeth and came away with a healthy haul of black bone triangles.  

Standing at the ocean's edge as the waves rolled in, I realized they would not end.  Each follows one after the other in a never-ending stream of rise and fall, crest and crash.  Watching, I heard the words of one of my favorite hymns in a new light,

O the deep, deep love of Jesus, vast, unmeasured, boundless, free!
Rolling as a mighty ocean in its fullness over me!
Underneath me, all around me, is the current of Thy love
Leading onward, leading homeward, to Thy glorious rest above!

This - these waves, spacious, incessant, without end - this is what the love of God is like.  

Samuel Trevor Francis' hymn makes prolific use of exclamation points throughout.  Standing at the ocean's edge, I can understand why.  

Do you have a favorite image that speaks to you about the love of God?  I'd love to hear about it!

*   *   *

Welcome to the #SmallWonder link-up.

What if we chose to deliberately look for the small moments of wonder, the small sparks of presence, of delight or sorrow, of true humanity in which we meet God? 

That's my proposal - that we gather here each week to share one moment of Wonder from each of our days.  

You're invited to link-up a brief post about a small moment of wonder.  Don't worry if your post is too long, too short, or not just right - you're welcome to come as you are.  

While you're here, please do take a look around and encourage at least one other blogger with a comment.  

Growing Season (#SmallWonder Link-up)

(The field of soybeans coming in across the street from our house.)

Late, I arrived at a recent Pastoral Development Day on the tail-end of opening worship.  I slipped quietly into a single stuffed chair down low in the back of the room, curling my legs and feet up tight beneath me.  I was never once late when I returned to work five weeks after my daughter, my oldest, was born.  Waking at 4:30 in the morning I nursed, then showered and drove the hour to work with her in the car seat, then nursed again in a bathroom before joining the rest of the staff with my infant in tow at 8:00.  That was nine years ago and I was not late once the whole summer that I worked with her at my side. 

This Thursday, though, was her field day at school and just as the bus pulled up we realized her lunch – the packed one she needed – was sitting still inside on the kitchen counter.  “Go,” I said, “I’ll bring it to school.”

After the babysitter came early so I could be on time, I gathered my things and hers and made the out-of-the-way trip to her school.  I got there just as the buses were loading and watched her walk out with her class. 

I was late that morning and frazzled, but happy too.  As I described it later to a friend, “My daughter forgot her lunch and I had to drop it off at school,” then, pumping my fist in the air I added, “Mommy, for the WIN!”

When the singing ended a friend of mine invited me to take his seat closer to the middle of the room – he would stand.  I gathered my things and moved for a few minutes, but eventually I turned and whispered, “I need to sit in the back to unwind.”  Then I got up and returned again to my single chair way down low in the back of the room. 

It’s been a year or two since I attended a Pastoral Development day put on by my local denominational conference and even longer since I resigned my pastoral position.  In the past I’ve felt the need and desire – the pressure – to mingle and fit in at these gatherings, to be both visible and vocal.  But this past Thursday I listened to my own heart, which was jangled and tired from rushing out the door and performing the emergency lunch delivery.  I needed to sit in the back and unwind and so I did. 

Seated in the back I watched several pastors working on their phones during the presentation or getting up and leaving the room to field phone calls.  This was one of the hardest things for me to give up when I left the pastorate – the feeling of importance.  It used to be routine for me to receive upwards of twenty emails a day and now I’m lucky to receive three or so a week other than twitter updates and notifications from my kids’ schools. 

Watching them I heard my spirit say, “I’m so grateful to be unimportant.”  It was such an unexpected thought that I wrote it down.  Having struggled so much with feeling unimportant,  I never expected to find myself grateful for it.  I thought immediately of John the Baptist’s words, “He must increase, but I must decrease (John 3:30)” and understood them in a new light. 

The initial presenter shared his story of incredible success followed by a stripping of all he valued as God called him back to his “first love,” back to the relationship at the heart of all things.  Much of what he said resonated with me – the invitation to love, the unknowingness of God’s leading – and the fact that he spoke from a time and place in his story that is as yet unresolved were all encouraging. 

I could have told his story, as it is also my own, except for the great success part.  God has kept me from that – a fact over which I am often frustrated, bordering on bitter.  It’s one thing to have great success and be called away from it – it is another altogether to never have arrived.  And yet, listening, I felt my spirit say, “God loves me very much.”  This also, I wrote down. 

In that moment the love of God sank down from head to heart, from abstract idea to incarnate reality as I pondered my life and the word-made-flesh love of God within it.  Who knew that the sorrow of my own professional stuck-ness could also hold within it a revelation of such joy – “God loves me very much.”

This all took place on Thursday and, halfway through Friday I pulled a muscle in my back while trying to maneuver a free coffee table into the back of the van.  I knew it was bad, but I’d promised my son I would attend his field day so, without resting, I made lunch and showered up before carting myself and the twins over to the park. 

By the time we got home I was in excruciating pain, the likes of which I haven’t known in a long time.  I could barely get myself onto the floor and sitting filled my core with sharp spasms.  With the pain came fear – laying on the floor, helpless, reminded me of last summer’s panic attacks and the tension caused anxiety to rise within me until I felt close to drowning. 

I loaded up on pain medicine, ice and restricted myself to the floor.  Relaxing, I felt a sense of peace and gratitude wash over me.  My back still hurt, as it does also today, but in the midst of the pain I knew also that it will get better.  The reality of the pain was inescapable, yet I now know that the reality of change is also inescapable.  Nothing in life is stagnant, no one fear or hurt has the power to cancel out the possibility of change and healing in the future. 

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I took joy in meeting my daughter's needs where once I felt such great pressure to conform her needs to my own.

I tended to my own need to unwind in a spacious place rather than seeking to fit in with the expectations of others.

I felt gratitude in my un-importance where once I envied the importance of others.

I felt the love of God in what has not been given me, rather than resentment.

I felt pain, but also knew peace at the possibility of its passing. 

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I read a children’s book by Ruth Krauss not long ago called “The Growing Story.” In it, a young boy puts away his winter clothes only to find that by next season they are too small.  Trying on the now-too-little clothes he exclaims in wonder, “I’m growing too!”

This is the wonder I want to share with you this week – the grace that time passes and we change.  Time away from my ministry context formed these changes in me and in returning I am able to see them and celebrate.  Like the little boy, this post is my own shout of wonder, “I’m growing too!” and I am so very grateful.

There is one last thing I wrote down on Thursday, which is this - “It is all gift.” 

May you be blessed, friends, with grace and wonder in each and every one of your growing seasons.   

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Welcome to the #SmallWonder link-up.

What if we chose to deliberately look for the small moments of wonder, the small sparks of presence, of delight or sorrow, of true humanity in which we meet God? 

That's my proposal - that we gather here each week to share one moment of Wonder from each of our days.  

You're invited to link-up a brief post about a small moment of wonder.  Don't worry if your post is too long, too short, or not just right - you're welcome to come as you are. 

While you're here, please do take a look around and encourage at least one other blogger with a comment.      

God is a Lover (A Winter Miracle)

(I wrote this post back when winter was still slowly fading, not long after we decided to rehome the first dog we adopted, but I'm just getting around to posting it now.  Hopefully next week I'll finish up a piece about our new dog, Coco, who's proven to be a much better fit.)

The old snow in the yard shrank back from the crisp coat of ice on top and the kids and I walked along tapping down lacy caves with our feet as we waited for the bus. 

We all seemed lighter, having decided to re-home our new dog Jaxon. 

After they left on the bus, Jaxon and I headed out to the back field and I was sad.  Although I framed it as a gift for my husband and kids, I now know that I was the one who needed a dog this winter.  Having him here gave me something to focus on, some deep joy and a reason to get outside.  Without that dog, I wouldn’t have known the birds were singing, that winter, though posing still as fierce, was waning.

 

But Jaxon was scared of our older kids, scared of older kids in general and growled and snapped at them on occasion.  He needed a quieter home where he could feel more secure, less threatened.  And we needed a dog our kids could love freely without fear.  It wasn’t an easy decision to make, but three weeks in we decided Jaxon should be re-homed.    

While posting Jaxon on Craigslist, it occurred to me to contact his original owners to fill them in on the situation – I didn’t want them to see him up for adoption and wonder what had happened.  We got him from a family with two young children – a two-year-old and a newborn who was ill and in need of surgery.  They were overwhelmed and needed one less thing to manage. 

That’s what struck me as I stood in the crunchy field and Jaxon sniffed all along the fence line.  I was tempted to feel regret, to tell and believe a story of impulsive decision-making on our part, a story of failure.  That’s one possible story, but standing in that spacious place, I sensed another story too, a story running just beneath the surface, one filled with grace and mysterious mercy. 

When I texted the original owners they replied immediately, “Bring him back, we can make it work.”  It seemed they had turned a corner.  “Our daughter will get better, spring will come and we can take him out more,” they said. 

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There was a family who needed help with a dog they loved. 

There also was a family (or more clearly, a woman) who needed something new, some loving bit of softness and joy to nurture for a while.  By the mercy of God (and Craigslist) the two became connected and the needs and abilities matched up for a few brief weeks. 

I don’t believe God is a matchmaker – a meddling force stitching together lives with neat precision – but I am beginning to understand God is a lover.  This is the lens through which God sees the world – sees you.  God stitches lives together, hearts together, to multiply love (which God IS) and thereby God multiplies God’s own presence among us.

God’s creative love knows no bounds.

This is the great God of scripture, leaning down into the world, seeing, hearing, knowing the cries of his people.  God sending.  God arriving.  Leading, loving. 

This and this alone is the story that runs beneath the surface of all our lives - God’s grace, God’s mercy, God’s love.

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God sees two weary women, two towns apart.  

One has a dog she cannot bear, another needs a dog to love.  

God’s fingers twitch, eyes twinkle and love is born and multiplied in our midst.

Every miracle, at its heart, comes down to this - God is love.