Simplifying… me

The above picture needs no explanation.  I probably don’t need to go into great detail about how I closed my eyes for my sixth grade school photo.  I’m sure you already figured that out.  I won’t even tell you how absolutely horrifying this was for me, or how I wanted to crawl under my desk and pull my woven sisal book bag over my head when my teacher handed me my picture packet.  The photo speaks for itself.

The bumpy, forty-five minute bus ride home was torture.  As the black exhaust from passing vehicles blew into the windows of our bus, I could feel tears pooling in the corners of my eyes.  I wanted to burst into sobs, rip my pictures to pieces, and never show my face at school again.  More than anything, I just wanted to be home.  I wanted to see my mom and fall into her arms.  I needed a good cry.

When my mom saw the image peering through the clear cellophane window of my packet, she didn’t even have to ask me how my day went.  She already knew.  After I cried, and wished I’d never been born, and begged to move to another country, and swore I’d never set foot in my school again, and wallowed in grief, my mom spoke up.  She didn’t pity me.  She didn’t stroke my hair and feed into the “woe-is-me” mood I was feeling.  Instead, she started brainstorming ways to smile about this catastrophe: “Amy, let’s make ‘em laugh.”  Honestly, I didn’t really see anything very funny about my life being ruined by sleepy eyes.  And I certainly wasn’t ready to start cutting out the wallet-size miniature reminders of those sleepy eyes to trade with my friends.  However, after listening to my mom’s pep talk, and her encouragement to stop taking myself so seriously, I slowly began to see the brighter side to the whole scenario.

We came up with some good one-liners for me to dish out the next day at school, too:

“I was feeling a little sleepy on picture day.”

“I like the way I look with my eyes closed.”

“It’s really the smile that counts, right?”

By the next day, I was armed with wit and ready to pass out my picture to all my friends.

Life is messy.  Life is unpredictable.  We start moving in one direction and then, unforeseen circumstances jump in the middle of our path, causing us to switch gears fast.  Before we know it, we are off on a detour and completely unprepared.  Are these circumstances avoidable?  Sometimes.  But not all the time.  Most of the time, life doesn’t care whether or not we’re prepared for unemployment, cancer, a sick child, an emergency root canal, a broken down car.  Life comes at us – the innocent and the not-so innocent alike.  And when life has left its mark, we are left to figure out what to do next.

I am a full supporter of being real with feelings.  When the messiness of life smacks me in the face, I have learned to give myself permission to feel whatever it is that I feel.  When we found out we were pregnant with Jackson (unplanned and unprepared for), I cried.  They were tears of fear.  I worried and fretted.  It took me a couple of days to process my emotions.  After I got all the crying out of my system, I realized, like the turning point with my sixth grade school picture, I was left with a choice.  Would I resent the pregnancy?  Would I spend the next 30 some weeks living in fear and distress rather than joy and elation?

At my first sonogram, six weeks along in the pregnancy, I chose to laugh about it.

Jackson was our surprise gift from God.  It took a conscious decision on my part, and Joel’s, to refocus and reset our plans.  Once we did, each moment in our pregnancy was filled with excitement, anticipation, and wonder.  We laughed about the future because we knew that God was in it.

I realize that an unexpected pregnancy is not nearly as hard to come to grips with as a home foreclosure, an untimely death, or spouse abandonment (all of which have afflicted friends of mine).  I realize that the detour of my life pales in comparison.  Still, God is in everything.  He’s in the winter of our lives, just as he is in the new beginnings of spring.  He grants us space to feel and express our pain, and then he offers us the opportunity to find joy in the detour.  He gives us the song, the smile, and the creativity to find laughter on our new path.

He holds us close and then gently invites us to “make ‘em laugh”.

Sydney came bounding into our room.  It was barely six o’clock in the morning, and she had so much to say already.  It was summertime, and the sun had broken through the clouds early (much too early for this mom who was still nursing a baby throughout the night).  Sydney was a brand new four-year-old, and was enjoying her newfound “maturity” and her first few days of vacation. 

On this slow morning as she burst through our bedroom door, there was something of particular interest that she was dying to share with us.  She explained that when she woke up and peeked out of her window, the sky was bright and pink.  “Pink!” she said, “The whole sky was pink…my favorite color!”  She went on, “Mommy, God was shining down on me this morning.  He shined down on me in pink.”

Profound words from such a young thing.  I affirmed to her that God was certainly shining down on her, and how marvelous that he did it in her favorite color.  He is the God of details.

Have you ever walked through a dark season of life?  You know- the kind of season that tests your faith, questions your trust, and breaks your heart?  I’ve been through a few of those.  In fact, I have been trudging through a sort of wilderness season on and off for about six years.  Sometimes the challenges – financial, relational, or spiritual – loom heavy, and so my heart is weighted down to the deep places.  Sometimes it’s simply maneuvering through parenting obstacles where I feel completely inadequate. 

Regardless of what kind of wilderness I’m facing, I find that I come to the end of myself quite frequently.  I need a drink of water or warm sunshine on my face – anything to revive and reignite the spirit to keep pressing on.  I’ll read the Word, put it to memory, pray (or more like wail before God).  There is nothing like a desert experience to remind us of just how much our bodies crave the Living Water.

Sometimes…when I’m tired, drained to the core, and feeling broken, I have asked what many others have asked, too: “God, are you really even there?”

Sometimes…He remains silent.  He doesn’t answer back the way I wish he would.  He withholds communication for a little while.  He doesn’t show up in the sermon on Sunday or the teaching at Bible study.  It appears as if he has turned his back.  And while I want to throw in the towel, surrender to the desert, and build a sand castle, I remember that God is in control. 

I press on. 

This is faith in action.

Yet…sometimes…God brings a little relief in the desert.  He leads us to springs where we can drink up peace and refreshment.  He answers a simple prayer or brings a comforting word at just the right moment.  He leans in a little closer and warms those places in our hearts that have, perhaps, grown cold.

Sometimes he shines down on us in rays of pink sunlight.

He shines down to remind us that we are not forgotten, he knows where we are, and he is with us.

Today I have felt the warmth of God’s hand on my life in a very powerful way.  Today God is shining down on me.  Today I am grateful for the spring in the desert that waters my soul. 

We wish we could define the desert.  We wish there was a way to outrun the wilderness.  We long to bypass it altogether.  However, God knows the purpose behind these seasons, and he is never far from us.  His love confounds.  His ways an eternal mystery.

And just when we think that the darkness will surely envelop us, he shines his light into our souls.  He lifts us up.  He satisfies our thirst.  He proves his faithfulness.

And we know we’ve been seen.  We know God is here.   

Psalm 145:13-19

The Lord is faithful to all His promises and loving toward all He has made.  The Lord upholds all those who fall and lifts up all who are bowed down.  The eyes of all look to you, and you give them their food at the proper time.  You open up your hand and satisfy the desires of every living thing.  The Lord is righteous in all His ways and loving toward all He has made.  The Lord is near to all who call on Him, to all who call on Him in truth.  He fulfills the desires of those who fear Him; He hears their cry and saves them.