My Dad has had a very big 24 hours. I imagine on his first day in heaven he got to see his Mom, reunite with all the folks in the great cloud of witnesses that cheered him on during his 82 years here, see all the cats and dogs and horses and fish he dearly loved during his time on earth, and he got to experience the pure joy in His presence that we read about in Psalms. And if by chance there is a crew of pranksters in heaven, my Dad has undoubtedly already joined it.
Do you make New Year’s resolutions?
I never know the right age to divulge more information to the girls. Should I just say yes because they’re going to do it in school or should I really say what I think and practice? And most importantly, will my truth result in an email from a teacher who thinks I’m the craziest parent ever when one of my girls repeats something I’ve said?
I do not understand New Year’s resolutions. Once you’re a grownup, when you realize you need to do something differently you need to do something differently. Starting right then. Combine that with the fact that we abandon 80% of resolutions within 30 days, and I think we can deduce that the vast majority of the time the vast majority of us just don’t want to do the hard work to do or be better.
I found myself admitting to Audrey that I do not make New Year’s resolutions. However, I do end each year and begin each year by reflecting on three things:
(1) What are the ways that the past year’s word were fulfilled in my life?
(2) What is my word for the coming year?
(3) Is my list still good or do I need to make changes or additions?
I have a word each year. A point of focus that I talk to God about, journal about, research, look for signs of, speak out loud, and expect to make progress in. In the past few years, my words have been things like fruit and promise and I can easily name how God showed up in my life in those years in those ways. So my words are also a way to practice and stir up my faith. Because I don’t always feel so faith-filled, and maybe more often than not am a bit of a doubting Thomas.
My word for the coming year is freedom. Among dozens of other things on the topic of freedom, the Bible says we are called to freedom and that God responds to us and sets us free. There’s also the obvious the truth shall set us free. But the one nugget I like the most (so far) is that we are not to let ourselves be burdened again or to let go of our freedom. That implies that we already have freedom – and yet I don’t feel very free in several areas of my life. Perhaps this year will bring freedom from some negative thought patterns or the expectations of others, or maybe it will bring greater freedom in my mind and heart to dream bigger or simply to be silly more. It’s only day 2 and the possibilities are endless.
And then there’s my list. The list of things that I want to be true for Ella, Audrey and I. I started it long ago in my phone and it helps center my thoughts and prayers for us – and as we all get older and the world gets bigger, new things get added to the list. The old faithfuls are that we are healthy physically and spiritually and mentally, and that we are full of hope, givers of grace, brave. As we got further into the teen and tween years I made additions like we embrace helpers and help, we enjoy school and work, we are safe and trustworthy friends, and we make good choices. And now this year, as Ella in particular has big decisions coming up, that we seek God’s plan for us, that we are not enticed by distractions, that we are honest with ourselves.
I do have two constant resolutions: to put my girls first in all things and to be the best Mom I can be. On days when the house is tense because we’re all arguing about curfews or the length of shirts or how it’s OK to need help, I don’t feel like I’m doing a very good job. One of the things I need to be free of is the in-the-moment worry that their anger with me means they’ll act out or hate me. It’s on those days that the list reminds me of what’s really important and all the ways that things are going right.
When I was a teenager, I told a small group of girls a secret that ended up getting out. At the time it was earth-shattering because the secret was who I had a crush on. I was absolutely convinced that I knew who “told” and I was so angry at her. I came home ranting about it and my Dad said something that has always stuck with me – you don’t know it was her, and it’s probably the person you least expect.
Sometimes what we think is all wrong.
I’ve been thinking about this line all summer. At home. At work. As a mom. As a reader. As a voter. As a processor of data and information. As a girl. As a friend. As a consumer. As a Christian.
The earth is flat. Nope, turns out the earth is round.
At midnight on December 31, 1999, all computers will stop working! Wrong again, and much of the world drank champagne or slept through the big nothing that happened.
How about the beliefs (irrational fears) of southern parents in the 1980s? Kids wearing all black was a sign of something bad and hanging with the wrong crowd, maybe playing Dungeons and Dragons. Madonna, MTV and Garbage Pail Kids would all lead to sex or drugs or evil or all of the above. Our marriage to the idea that things that look and feel different are evil means we don’t easily recognize evil when it shows up wealthy and wearing a suit – presidents, justices, financiers. Or perhaps I just watched too much of the Smurfs and they made me a crazy communist.
Why are we so tied to beliefs and someone else’s talking points that we’ve never really thought about or researched ourselves, while at the same time dependent on others to make progress by constantly questioning and learning? When we or someone we love gets a diagnosis, at least in part we look to medicine – filled with curious and constantly researching people who’ve asked themselves some version of what if what I think is all wrong? over and over and over again.
Why don’t we apply our belief that constant learning is good in one area to all areas of our lives? Is it that we’re afraid to admit we were wrong? Is it that we’re afraid to upset God?
When Ella was 5-ish, she came home from Sunday School questioning the teaching. Mommy, people don’t get swallowed by whales and live. I was horrified, and I’m also pretty sure I emphatically said we should not say those kinds of things while at Sunday School. When I anxiously talked to Pastor Chuck about how to talk to her about it and what to do, he laughed and wasn’t worried at all. Another way to look at it, he said, is that Ella is always going to know exactly what she believes and why, because she is really going to think about it – and that meant she would be able to explain it to others with something better than the likes of that’s what so-and-so taught me or that’s how I was raised.
I’ve always struggled with a feeling that it’s wrong to have doubts. That it’s wrong to question. Especially as it relates to God and faith. But how can we really know what we think unless we consider all angles? How can we really know what we think unless we read the Bible for ourselves and ask ourselves what if what I think is all wrong?
The more I think about it, the more I think there is nothing to fear on that path except that we may have to admit that we were wrong at some point.
What if I am operating out of fear, and giving the girls space to make some of their own decisions is the best way for them to learn?
What would I do differently if this process had 10 people instead of 5, or if the 5 had a better computer or program?
What if the dress that I think is a little too short for Ella makes her feel great about herself and is the boost she needs during a tough week?
What in the Bible definitively tells me God cares about health care? About women preaching? About abortion? And have I read it myself along with the content surrounding it so I have context?
Maybe instead of being wary of people who have changed what they think or who aren’t sure what they think, we should be wary of the people who are afraid to question or admit they have questions. More than halfway though this life, perhaps it’s more of a red flag if someone hasn’t had an experience that changed them and how they think. We’re not supposed to never be wrong; we’re supposed to do better when we know better.
June: in like a lion and out like a lamb, just like the weather in March.
Ella is at Appalachia Service Project, serving in Dickenson County. Teams like the one she’s with travel to Central Appalachia from around the U.S. to repair homes in some of the most beautiful country in our land.
She will never be the same – because of the opportunity to serve, because of the worship, because of the people and their stories, and because she’s never gone this long with limited cell service. I am so ridiculously proud of her.
Today, Audrey has been cancer-free for an entire decade. A decade. It was and is just an unbelievable glorious gigantic miraculous miracle.
About a week ago, one of Ella’s pals shared a moment she captured on Ring Dance night that she forgot to send, and it’s just *the* most adorable thing. It was a really windy evening and this picture captures that, along with the looks of happiness that young people have on their first big night as kind-of adults.
At the trampoline park, Audrey encouraged a room full of kids to line up boys against girls for dodgeball – and then talked serious 5th/6th grade trash. I loved every minute of it. Girls won.
I had my mammogram this month, in the month I hate to have doctor appointments. There’s no picture of this. The follow-up letter informed me my breasts were dense but fine. I’m not sure how I feel about them being called dense, but I’m considering it a win that I didn’t get something in writing that called them saggy.
My parents had their 50th wedding anniversary and we all celebrated under the big tree in my sister’s yard. I love that tree, and it’s lesson that deeply planted roots result in abundant life and growth.
Pancakes played Fortnite from the pink gaming chair that is Audrey’s throne. She loves when the girls are home to play all day, but she gets far fewer treats now that Audrey is here all day monitoring my every move. Cute cuddly things need treats!
Even the cats got along this month. While Henry Fonda always loves Katherine Hepburn, Kate rarely loves Henry and generally delights in bullying him.
June was good. The angsty minefield month is finished, and it was really, really good. I am ridiculously blessed, and thankful to Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that I ask or think.
I don’t love the month of June. It always brings the chaotic last two weeks of school, which seems fun but really means standardized tests, World War III because of a dwindling supply of the good lunch box treats, and someone telling me at 4:46 pm that by 6 we have to be dressed and at a very important ceremony I’ve never heard of.
June also is a month of anniversaries, and while most of them are good the ones that aren’t good are so overwhelmingly not good that my body and mind still have a physical reaction every time I turn the calendar and see June 1. I struggle to sleep, I struggle to concentrate, and my heart races or I break out in a sweat at the slightest disruption in schedule or routine. Eleven years ago in June, the world just exploded when one doctor appointment after another revealed that Audrey would be born with cancer, then needed surgery, and then and then and then. And even though I know that the story has a happy ending, June is filled with trepidation for me. A minefield I have to carefully navigate each year.
This morning I got dressed up for church even though I really wanted to wear black joggers and my Nikes. I was hoping the perpetual pit in my stomach might wane if I could feel “together” and be in a place of worship. I have been reminding myself that it’s National Cancer Survivors Day and I should be celebrating the miracle of Audrey, but I didn’t remember that it’s Pentecost until I arrived at church.
On Pentecost we remember the day the disciples received the Holy Spirit. It’s a day for tongues of fire and baptisms and new experiences. In children’s church today, the kids all blew on their hands to experience and be able to easily remember that you while can’t see the spirit you can know it’s there because you feel it or felt it. And it struck me that my experience with a voice and a feeling over a decade ago is what I really need to remember as I go through this month.
When Audrey was just three months old, some of her test results came back with concerning indicators. Her oncologist asked that she come in the next day for full scans and bone marrow testing, and the pit in my stomach seemed bigger than it had ever been. That night, after she’d received her injection in preparation for the next day’s scans, I was sitting in my favorite chair in the family room and I heard a quiet male voice say you can trust me. I looked up expecting to see my Dad – I thought maybe he was still at our house and had not left to go home. But no one was there. I wondered for a minute about what had just happened and if I really was losing it, but I also realized in the moment that I was suddenly and unexplainably completely calm and at peace.
I remember the voice vividly in really hard moments, when I need it most I guess. But day to day as life happens, with all sorts of little frustrating moments or anxieties, I don’t think about it as much. I guess the truth is I rely on myself for as long as I can possibly stand it and then I really only rely on God when I fail miserably. Not good.
At the time, I told just a couple of people – in part because I didn’t want to seem crazy (she’s hearing voices now!), in part because not everyone around me believed in the God who I thought might be sending me a message, and in part – mostly – because I just couldn’t believe that someone as awful as me was worthy of a message. When the chips are really down, it’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking that what’s happening is your punishment or that God only loves and communicates with perfect people.
This June is a bit of an additional challenge because a couple weeks ago in my frustration with myself for still feeling unease about June, I decided that the way to cure that was to overexpose myself to scary things all month. For the first time in over a decade, I threw superstitious caution to the wind and scheduled doctor appointments and even my regular mammogram for this month. My Dad would call that ignorance gone to seed, but I’m calling it a long overdue and necessary trial by fire. (I’m only calling it that because I still don’t like it when my Dad is right and I am wrong.)
Perhaps if I rely on Him more, in all things whether big or small, I wouldn’t spend June in such a state of unease each year. Perhaps if I firmly resolve to focus on the outcome instead of the obstacle, I wouldn’t spend June in such a state of unease each year. Perhaps if I stop hiding pieces of me and just embrace that I am a mix of good and bad and all sorts of contradictions but God loves me anyway, I wouldn’t suffer in silence and spend June in such a state of unease each year.
I think one of the lessons of Pentecost is that the church is filled with believers that are human, people who’ve lied or doubted or panicked. People with imperfections. None of us is a surprise to God – He knows exactly who we are. It’s we that don’t fully understand who He is and how He works. As lights, as the church, perhaps we are at our best and most effective when we are honest with God and others about all the things that make us human and about all the experiences we have that are just unbelievable.
Brave, Anyway 