in the meantime

i'm sure i'm not the first person to think of it. how befitting is the phrase, in the meantime. i laugh.
i also tremble.

in the meantime? it's what we do when we are waiting. hoping. looking forward to something else. something more. sometimes it is something longed for, for such a long time. or other times, it is an answer we may not want to come, an event that we fear. this stretch, this span, these moments for us become mean when we feel them as cruel, miserly, unmerited. mean time.

we are a stubborn, persistent, demanding humanity who forgets this world is not ours. not forever. we forget Whom it is Who made time and lives wholly (holy) outside of time. we are a people who forget the promise:

"I know what I'm doing. I have it all planned out—plans to take care of you, not abandon you, plans to give you the future you hope for." (Jeremiah 29:11)

in actuality, it is only our capacity to wait that is mean - poor, limited, low - while Scripture teaches unapologetically that all of this life is a waiting. Read all of Romans 8!  Here's just a portion.

"All around us we observe a pregnant creation. The difficult times of pain throughout the world are simply birth pangs. But it's not only around us; it's within us. The Spirit of God is arousing us within. We're also feeling the birth pangs. These sterile and barren bodies of ours are yearning for full deliverance. That is why waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a pregnant mother. We are enlarged in the waiting. We, of course, don't see what is enlarging us. But the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy. Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God's Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don't know how or what to pray, it doesn't matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God. That's why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good." 

will we allow the waiting to make us mean?
and by that i mean humble enough to receive our future.

practice thanks & wash the glass

i finished reading my eighth or ninth book of this bed rest season: one thousand gifts.  (i do recommend.)  ann voskamp writes of the surprising and profound soul change that happened as she set out to record thanks, numbering one thousand.  somewhere in the middle of reading it, i began my own list, wanting to practice gratitude with a slightly different intentionality.  and to see what God may do.

when i realized bed rest would continue long past the first two weeks, one thing i moped over internally was missing out on gardening.  no planting of new perennials to fill out my flower beds.  no weeding to beautify.  no cheering up the front "yard" that practically sits on the sidewalk and greets every passerby.  even buying a few hanging plants for the porch seemed one thing too many for us to handle.

after two months on rest, i now have a better idea of my limitations.  i can use the stairs, a handful of times per day.  i can make a quick meal or bake an easy treat.  if i don't stand for the duration.  i can go on an errand, if there's an automatic cart to ride.  i can attend a social event, if there's guarantee of relaxation and shelter from the heat.  each of these requires a degree of help from someone else, and no one day can be filled with them.

if i am in a chair, i can even water my plants outside! though i had to let go of my first hopes for the yard, it's not hard to find other ways to enjoy it. and be thankful. this is the key to living fully, at all times, as voskamp teaches through personal story and poetic flare.  here's one picture she paints of this verbalizing of thanks:

      "i speak the unseen into seeing . . .  all the world is window. no material is opaque. if we are willing to see - people, circumstances, situations, relationships - all is transparent.  all of this globe is but glass to God." (emphasis mine)

      
and thanksgiving washes the glass, she says. thanksgiving washes the glass.

so i join countless others who have kept or are keeping gratitude journals and lists of blessings. moment to moment, they choose to set their eyes on the Giver and find more life.

i end with a few of the thanks from my yard:

126. newly molted cicada

 128. morning glories appearing

129. sun on my back

132. smile of girl on bike

181. low humidity

184. low, long reach of the elm over me
 218. a sandbox

219. imagination at work in the Littles

221. how play can be work and work can be play

where to find rest

since last fall, my journey's gone increasingly deeper into the realm of rest.  seems this season of physical stillness (bed rest) merely perfects the process!  i have wanted to speak specifically to certain graces given me, but sometimes you have no words of your own to tell of the fathomless truths you've found.  this is a song that has helped me lift up praise to the One whose showers are drenching my soul with Light and Love.

In You
 
I sing for joy
In my remorse
A well within prosperity’s curse
That drowns the mighty oak of pride
But feeds the root of God inside.

In You
I find my rest
In You
I find my death
In You
I find my all and my emptiness
Somehow it all makes sense

In You I’m rich
When I’ve been made poor
Comfort found when I mourn
The prideful one You see from afar
Drawing near to low, broken hearts.

In You
I find my rest
In You
I find my death
In You
I find my all and my emptiness
But it all makes sense

"This is what the Sovereign Lord, The Holy One of Israel, says:

In repentance and rest is your salvation,

in quietness and trust is your strength..."

Isaiah 30:15 

-----------------------

"In You" by Shane and Shane.  Released on Waiting Room Records 2007.

let my heart sing, my soul dance!

while i listened to Third Circle yesterday, one song hit me right where i am.  i must have left the song on repeat eight times. and though the lyrics ring out promise and the music is jubilant and light, i wept. and wept. every time it played, i wept.

there is plenty to mourn in this earthen existence, and a few of my past and present sorrows surfaced while the song washed through me. but it was the Answer to those sadnesses that made me cry so profusely. consider the verse: 

Lord, I cried out, I cried out to You

You answered me in Your mercy

Your anger was fleeting

And now I will dance in your favor all my life

my heart has been nurtured in the fold of God's people for more than three decades, yet it took a long time before i began to understand this standing that i have, this favor.  it's an unending favor before God only because of the sacrificial love of Jesus.  only Jesus.  when we are faced with pain or grief and our crying out becomes our (sometimes last) attempt at relief, he answers.  in mercy, he answers.  the circumstances may not change, he may not remove the pain, but his presence becomes unmistakable. 

the longer i live, choosing to believe in God's delight over me, the more times i find i'm able to dance through troubles and to sing despite my affliction.  hear me.  i do not pretend all is hunky-dory, put on a mask of happiness and stuff my truest feelings away in a cold corner of my soul.  no, no, please no. i am learning to cry out.  i am learning to accept that my brokenness, my failures, my hurts and my questions are no less important to my Father as my devotion, my triumphs and my personal growth.

this is how God turns our weeping into dancing - not by literally sweeping away the "bad" and promising nothing of sin or destruction will ever infect our lives again.  instead, he declares with promises never-ending, that all that he is is ours.  all of him.  we are chosen sons and daughters, from whom he will withhold no good thing! what better position for experiencing joy than in sad times?  what better way to find life but in the face of death? what better chance does light have to shine than in the darkest of all places? what other way can healing be possible than when there is a wound?

the flood of tears from my eyes was at once both a declaration of hurt, frustration and regret and a song of utter gratitude.  what joy it is to be free to release all of it to the skies!  i live every moment, in the fair and in the unfavorable, under a shower of Mercy and Love.

Let my heart sing for you

And not remain silent

Let my heart sing for you

Turn my weeping into a dance


So dance, dance my soul

There's no reason for you to weep

So dance, dance my soul, 

Make music to your King

------------------

"Dance, Dance" by Kate Hurley, Michelle Patterson.  Registered with CCLI.