last year, I had a garden...

...my first. It was wonderful. And suddenly, today, it is garden-season again, the brief 6-8 weeks this climate grudgingly gives for planting. All of a sudden, overnight, the snow melts, ground gives up warm, sweet breaths, weeks hang suspended in just the right weather for getting ready.

And instead of being outside in it, I’m inside writing about it.

We don’t have a home past June. This land just. does. not. belong. to us. Nowhere in the world do we own a bit of earth. And up until today, this exact spring day, I haven’t cared much. I’ve reveled in the free-wheeling, footloose, un-tied-down-ness of not owning property. Most days I have lived happily as a borrower; today I am full of ache.

Window gardens. That’s the answer, I think. Portability. And I fill plastic cups with earth and fertilizer and plant flower seeds to germinate in the dark. But I’m not fooling myself-- I’ve no green thumb, and half of them probably won’t sprout anyway. My one house-plant geranium has bloomed one solitary flower in the year it’s lived with me. The house is dark and cool; outside is where the life is. But I don’t own this outside. Past June, a scant eight weeks away, I have no more claim to this particular bit of earth.

I stumble outside, into the blinding 3:30 sun, tell my woes to a sweet neighbor just dropped by, discuss possibilities, options, other homes we could move to, feel the ache in my throat tighten, swell into a lump. She smiles and hugs me and says we can move in with them (not the first time she’s offered), says they’d love having small kids in the house, and I kiss her cheek and thank her, the lump brimming.

She’s pruning her trees and wants to borrow our heavy-duty secateurs, wants to get some outside work done, says her husband will be happy when he gets home. I open the garage, dig through dusty gardening tools… and I ache some more. I’m suspended, like the weather, between hot and cold, between knowing and unknowing, home and no-home.

But there is my son, for want of wind, making his own way to fly a kite. Spinning around, arms outstretched, a rainbow of color… “Mommy, look!” And then, standing stock-still with glazed eyes, “Oooh… I’m spinning around!” Spinning color and living in the moment and not worrying about anything at all. No wind for my kite? I’ll find another way to fly!

And suddenly I spin too, into the kitchen to grab my herb seeds, to the bedroom for my stack of new flower pots languishing empty, to the shed again for the spade… the lock won’t open, though it just did moments before. William, beside me, still spinning colors of faith: “Mommy, Jesus will help you!” And the next second, the key turns.

Rush to change my clothes (revive the old leopard-print gardening costume from last spring!), rush out to last year’s waiting earth. I vacillate: hopeless, hopeful. I dig panicked spadefuls of earth, filling pots with fists of dirt, a handful of fertilizer, another fistful of dirt. Sprinkle tiny herb seeds. Basil, oregano. Rosemary in one pot, cilantro in another. And even as I brush a bit of dirt over, dribble water, I sink down in despair. Will they really grow? I’m so ignorant, such a novice with no green thumb. Can I really grow anything from these tiny seeds inside my house? Can I really grow anything in this heart-garden of mine?

There.

There is the real question, the gnawing. It’s not until this moment, while typing those questions, that I realize my mistake. The question I’ve been asking is, Can I really grow anything? Am I really capable of changing myself? And the answer, of course, is: no.

No.

I cannot grow one single thing myself. It’s impossible! I am not the Author of growth, I have no power, I am helpless. I can do nothing on my own strength. Is that why I’m feeling so hopeless? Because I’m trying to make this gift-counting magic work myself? To force growth faster than the Great Gardener intended? Have I been trying to do the impossible?

Ben toddles around looking for worms. Will involves himself with my process; I’d nearly forgotten he’s there, occupied with my own dramas. My innovative kite-flyer faithfully pushes seeds down with little fingers, spreads dirt over, sprinkles water, carefully carefully. Full of faith that the same Jesus who helped Mommy open the garage lock in seconds will of course make these seeds grow. The thought never crosses his mind that they won’t sprout green and hopeful. He picks up on my discontent though, looking up, worried, watering can in hand.

I’m robbing my son of joy in our seed-planting because I’ve got my fist tight-closed around my own joy. Can’t I keep this particular gift-- this house, this bit of earth-- a little longer, Lord? Clench. Control. Grit teeth. And my son suffers, watching me.

I carry filled pots into my house, “my” house, despairing of a sunny spot to put them, full of doom and gloom. When will I learn to just let go? Just give up and let Him take over? Why do I have to control everything all the time? I preach to myself. So what if we don’t have a house past June? We have a house today. So what if I don’t know whether I can plant a garden outside? I can plant a garden in pots. So what if I don’t understand my own soul? The One who made me does. He understands me perfectly. He is also growing me, and I can not, absolutely not, grow myself. It’s impossible.

It’s while I’m chopping chicken for dinner that it hits me. This. This is the hard eucharisteo. That hard word I’ve just learned how to say and need a lifetime to learn to live. This is my chance to give thanks. To choose to thank for even the hard gifts.

I leave the chicken sizzling in the wok and race back to the computer, catch thoughts, words flooding my mind:

I choose to say thank you... for the uncertainty itself.

Thank You for how uncertainty keeps me supple, flexible. Reminds me I’m a sojourner.

Thank You for the two years we’ve enjoyed this house, and all the - [tears brim] - precious people we’ve enjoyed here, the memories we’ve made.

Thank You for the how possibility of losing something heightens its sweetness, makes me thankful for each moment.

Thank You for William’s circular kite-flying, living out of the box, faith-filled spinning of colors.

Thank You for dirt, for seasons, for seeds, for little boys looking for worms.

Thank You for heart-dirt softening, for soul-seeds being planted, watered.

Thank You for those who’ve gone before, for Ann calling back instructions on how to live out this hard eucharisteo, this joy-offering, this love-sacrifice of thanksgiving.

Thank You for the humbling, for the realizing, for the prying open of this clenched fist of mine that destroys joy by clinging so desperately, hungering for control.

Thank You for grace, for growth.

Thank You for the grace to grow slowly, gradually, into new bloom.

This week I devoured Ann Voskamp's book One Thousand Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are. I read it too fast-- it felt like gulping down a roast beef dinner with chocolate mousse for dessert. It was delicious. So now I'm going right back to the beginning, to digest it slowly, learn how to live it. If you're interested in learning how to live out eucharisteo with Ann and I and so many others, or just interested in finding out what eucharisteo means (!), you're welcome to visit:

One Thousand Gifts

The Book Club

Ann's Daily Journal

unlooked-for grief

[I’ve just started a creative writing course which I hope will challenge, expand and hone my writing skills… Today’s exercise asked for 3 creative ideas, one idea expanded into 20 separate words, then those words formed into a poem of 16 lines or less, and then the same 20 words used in a short story of 300 words or less. The result?)

7 For there is hope for a tree,

if it be cut down, that it will sprout again,

and that its shoots will not cease.

8 Though its root grow old in the earth,

and its stump die in the soil,

9 yet at the scent of water it will bud

and put out branches like a young plant.

Job 14:7-9

I mourn

with unlooked-for agony.

Soared magnificent skyward,

testified truth with beauty,

my poplar friend

dead now

through thoughtless, shallow process.

Embarrassed:

am I overreacting?

Or does my anger

vindicate

creation’s intrinsic value?

Today I am in mourning.

This week I watched, helpless, as my magnificent friend across the street was dismembered limb by limb and hacked to the ground in [what I considered to be] a thoughtless, shallow process. I didn’t expect its death to cause such agony.

Since we moved to this house, that tree has been for me the epitome of beauty in this place. Branches soaring skyward in poplar glory, daily testimony to the truth of “all creation praises Him”, catching a window-glimpse my heart would invariably mount up in praise. In my mind, I sat on its branches, conversing with the pigeons and the cuckoo who loved to perch high above the street and gossip. I stared full minutes at the color of the sky between its leaves, marveling at the intricate pattern of blue and green.

Embarrassed by my own grief, I ask myself, am I overreacting? Or is this unlooked-for anger its own self-vindication? Is the very fact that I feel anger at its murder proof of the tree’s own intrinsic value?

And suddenly I am grieving something else: I mourn a culture with a poverty level that forces firewood to take urgent precedence over aesthetics, where Maslov’s hierarchy of needs dictates that while homes need to be heated, hearts cannot stop to ponder the beauty of branches whispering grace.

22 Thus says the Lord GOD: “I myself will take

a sprig from the lofty top of the cedar and will set it out.

I will break off from the topmost of its young twigs

a tender one, and I myself will plant it on a high and lofty mountain.

23 “On the mountain height of Israel will I plant it,

that it may bear branches and produce fruit

and become a noble cedar.

And under it will dwell every kind of bird;

in the shade of its branches birds of every sort will nest.

24 “And all the trees of the field shall know

that I am the LORD;

I bring low the high tree,

and make high the low tree,

dry up the green tree,

and make the dry tree flourish.

I am the LORD;

I have spoken,

and I will do it.”

Ez. 17:22-24

my March Challenge… to be continued!

The conclusion of my March Challenge: grace, grace, grace!

I'm so proud of myself! And proud of every one of you who tried this with me (or your own version of the same thing)-- the last half of March I have been more consistent with getting up by six-- about 5/7 days every week. And I’ve greatly benefited from having a clear head and joyful, focused heart by the time the boys hit the deck raring to go. My mornings have been so much more grace-filled and less cranky!

BUT, I’m tired. I haven’t kept to my promise of getting to bed on time (averaging 10:00-10:30pm, several 11:00pm-s and one 1:00am!), and I’ve been skipping naps to do creative projects, which rest and refresh a different part of me, but don’t do anything for my sleep quotient!

So… heading forward, I’m still resolved to do my best to get to bed by 9pm so I can read for half an hour to unwind before lights out at 9:30. And I’m still resolved to get up by 6, moving it up eventually to 5:30, so I can have time to connect with Jesus, exercise my body, journal out my thoughts, and organize my day before it starts.

I am so thankful for grace, lately growing even sweeter as I notice it in the holy, mundane, daily rising and setting of my life.

how to be Mary and Martha at the same time

Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men,

knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward.

You are serving the Lord Christ.

Col. 3:23-24

Stumbling into my kitchen this morning, bleary-eyed and achy-boned, I am confronted by an enormous silver basin dominating my kitchen table. Great stacks of plates covered in smears of cream, cake crumbs and oily traces of vingared carrots, lurching towers of gilded tea bowls, chunks of mashed potatoes and apricot glaze, heaping handfuls of greasy silverware. But I am humming to myself as I begin sudsing and scrubbing and wiping and rinsing. My heart is replete. I am content. I am learning how to be Martha and Mary at the same time.

Jesus could have eaten off these plates. In fact, in a way, He actually did.

The ten ladies with names like flowers who sat around my table last night left as hungry as they came. None of the salads or fruit or meat or bread or cake or candy could satisfy their aching insides, and the music they heard was just a taste of what could fill their empty hearts.

Fascinated, they listened to a song I wrote about following Jesus wherever He leads, and then a song in their own language about God’s mercy and care, the same sweet, immanent God Whose presence filled the room as I sang. Chills on their arms, they said. Sweetness in their hearts. Oh, that they would ask: Who is this God?

The chai was a success. And among those hearts sat one, at least, who would know more, who wants to sate her hunger for True Bread and Living Water. She, who faithfully came hours early to help me chop salads and arrange fruit and lay the table, she who is my mother and older sister combined in one loving heart, who encourages all my cultural efforts and praises my American cooking. Would there were more like her-- that this whole group of women would say, Let’s study together. Let’s make this once-a-month party a time of learning, of praise. Let’s seek Him together, in this community, in this safe place.

They stay until almost midnight, talking, laughing, eating chocolate cake with whipped cream and cinnamon, wiping their plates clean like children. The detritus left behind in their wake is considerable.

But, as I wash dishes this morning, mulling the evening over in my mind, the basin is already more than half empty before I realize: This task is not burdensome. Not burdensome! I actually looked forward to tackling my mountain of dishes, because I knew it would give me time to sing and pray. Jesus is here, now. Here, with me, in my kitchen. Turning it holy. Singing with me while I wash and dry.

Suddenly, like turning a surprising corner, mundane jobs have become for me doorways into His Presence. Martha, with suds on her hands, is discovering her Mary heart.

“You are serving the Lord Christ.”

When it’s Jesus I’m washing plates for-- and with-- there is only unspeakable joy.

out of the mouths of babes

[I’ve been memorizing Colossians In A Year, Two Verses a Week….]

It’s naptime. The house is quiet. Having traded actual sleep in favor of a much-needed processing session with my journal, I’m stretched out under my quilt attempting to relax for the last half hour or so before the boys wake up.

My mind is mulling over Colossians 1:21-22, and I get stuck in orbit here:

“Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior.” (Col. 1:21)

How does evil behavior create enmity with God in my mind? Apparently, my actions affect the state of my mind toward God. Evil actions equals mental enmity. So then is the reverse also true? Can holy behavior, holy habits, create mental intimacy with God?

Maybe this is the beginning of the answer to my current, two-fold question for myself:

1. How do I really, actually “practice the presence of God” throughout my day? How do I actually remember to count His gifts, to stay constantly aware of grace?

and

2. How do I live fully authentic, fully alive, in this life, with these responsibilities, these demands on my time? How do I create art of any kind within these limits? How can mundane acts of service-- laundry, dishes, cooking-- translate into creative opportunities?

So much of my day consists of mundane activities I accomplish on auto-pilot while my mind is elsewhere. Could these activities actually be a doorway through which my mind could receive creative inspiration from the Holy Spirit? Does completing mundane acts of service for my family out of love for Jesus actually give Him the chance to love me back by feeding my creativity while I fold or wash or peel potatoes?

Can I increase my intimacy with God by intentionally choosing the state of my mind while I serve?

If Paul’s formula is true (and it’s in the Bible, so it must be), then serving my family with a willing, loving spirit, as if doing it for Jesus, can produce intimacy with God in my mind and heart. So... if my hands wash dishes with a grateful, loving attitude, as if Jesus Himself had eaten a meal off of them, then He can come near and gift me with creative inspiration? If I serve my family lovingly, willingly, as though each of them were Jesus Himself, He can use my faithful behavior to bring my mind (and then my heart as well) into communion with Himself?

A story comes to mind, something Will said to me on our U.S. trip last year. One crisp fall day, while we were staying at my aunt and uncle’s house in Pennsylvania, I wandered down to a peaceful spot at the bottom of their garden where there is a weathered wooden swing hanging from a branch. I needed a few minutes with Jesus. Will had been riding a little car around in the driveway, but he followed me down there, and quietly climbed up next to me on the swing. He sat still for about 10 seconds, and then hopped off and said, “Come on, Mom, yet’s go!”

I said, “You go ahead, I’m just going to sit here and talk to Jesus for a few minutes.”

“Ok, Mom.” He backed away and started off up the hill toward the house, but he quickly turned around when he didn’t hear me saying anything.

“Go ‘head Mom, talk to Him!”

“I am talking to Him, in my heart,” I explained.

Very emphatically, at the top of his lungs, he insisted:

“No Mom, talk to Him with your YIFE!”

I sat there, stunned. I was so sure he was going to say “mouth” or “yips”-- but this. This. Out of the mouths of babes.

I want to talk to Jesus with my life.

Will you explore this with me, you other moms with young kids, desperate for intimacy with Jesus throughout your day, and maybe longing for space and time to practice creativity? Will you try talking to Jesus with, through, in your “yife” too?

[All photos taken by me at my aunt’s house in PA, used by permission.]