You Are My Sunshine

February 20, 2015February 20, 20151 Comment

There was a time when I couldn’t sing the song, “You Are My Sunshine” without crying. Somewhere near the part about taking my sunshine away, the tears would begin to blanket my eyes, the tears wouldn’t fall but the blanketing tears were present, enough to blur my vision and remind me of grief.

With my oldest it as been difficult to sing the song so, for years, we have been exchanging phrases while I hoover over his bed…

you are my sunshine…

you are my daisy.

you are my warm summer day…

you are my giant ice cream cone.

For a long time, I haven’t been able to sing the words “you are my sunshine” to my oldest child. Too many blanketing tears would come to blur my vision.

Tonight was different, tonight, I made it through a whole diddy of you are my sunshine with my youngest son without the blanketing of tears. At the end I whispered to him, “you are my sunshine.” and I looked right at him with pure eyes and a happy heart. (In return my son half sleepily said, “you are my poopy butt diaper.” I giggle because in a strange way he is being affectionate and silly.)

But tonight, I made it though a whole diddy of “you are my sunshine.” That is progress for me and this is the moment where I can see the hope of moving on shining brighter than the dark nights of hovering phrases and blanketing tears. The time isn’t healing my wounds but Jesus is. He is binding them up ever so carefully and making me able to sing sweet songs to my kids over their beds in the darkness.

He is gentle with His love and He is patient with my grief.

“Love is patient, love is kind.”

I remember my mother singing that song to me. I can still hear her voice, her voice sounds just like the voice I have grown into as a woman and as a mother. It hurts my heart that she is not here and my kids can’t know her, but God is finally moving me to a different place in my grief. With Jesus binding the hurts and God renewing me, I can see that my kids knowing my mom simply comes from my kids knowing me.

My mom lives on in my songs.

My kids can know her through knowing me.

I am her sunshine, so my sun is beginning to shine bright in the darkness of grief.

Love Your Kids In Every Language

February 14, 2015Leave a comment

I tried to get in all the love languages this week as we celebrated the gift of love and Valentine’s Day.

Acts of Service:

Today, I made all their beds, laid out their clothes and I cleaned up their dishes for them instead of their normal routine of taking them to the sink. I would add, “Of course I will do that for you. I love you.”

Words of Affirmation:

During meals this week I tried to be very intentional to get everyone talking about what they loved or thought was special about each member of our family. We have started to do this on birthdays too. This is a great way to show love to those who love words to fill their love tank. “What do you love about ______?” is a simple way to start this around the dinner table.

Quality Time:

My grandma was kind enough to send books for Valentine’s Day this year so I spent quality time reading to each of them separately. We have four small kids so one-on-one time feels like winning the powerball lottery to some of my kids. My husband also tried to make time to spend quality time playing video games with the boys. My oldest two really value time with their parents. You can see me below reading with Asher, my second child.

Touch:

Most of my kids are lovey kids. I did my best to give extra hugs and kisses and snuggles on the couch during this cold winter day. My three year old loves me to “hold him and walk” so I know touch is important to him. Although he is over thirty pounds I tried to carry him a little more today. I want to communicate love to each of my four children in their language as best I can. I tried to tell him today, “You are my Valentine, and I love you, of course I will hold you and walk.”

Gifts:

Of course we did the gifts. I was thankful to find four different giant stuffed animals at Kroger for $9.00 a piece. We skipped cards and other things so the stuffed animals and a tiny box of chocolates was well within our Valentine’s Day budget. It was fun to watch their different reactions to the gifts.

And I’m watching…

Part of why I am trying to love my kids in every language is because I am trying to figure out what best expresses love to each of them. I’m always watching and observing, trying to figure out who smiles more at the words of affirmation and who sits and snuggles a little longer than the others. I want to know my kids through and through and know how they love is apart of knowing who they will become as people, as friends, husbands and wives.

I’m being intentional and watching because I want my kids to know and never doubt how much they are loved.

So we love in every language until we get it right.

And They Lived Happily Ever After (A Sequel)

February 4, 2015February 4, 2015Leave a comment

(an old post made new)

Oh Cinderella, how I love to watch you and you Prince Charming drive off in that royal carriage. And then ah! to see the words on the last page of your storybook, “and they lived happily ever after.” As a young child and even as a young woman the last pages of your story helped me write the beginning pages of my future love story.

I know there are sequels to Cinderella but I always stopped at the ending of Cinderella’s first story, which left this girl wondering, What is happily ever after?

For as long as I can remember I built the beginning of my real life love story on those happy ending words. Where Me, Mrs., and Him, Mr., mostly made googley eyes, packed our bags for romantic getaways and the two of us together had mind reading powers and effortless communication.

In my happily ever after, I built up the image of the smiling and the kissing and the frolicking off into the sunset.

Now I’ve been married for almost nine years, which is not that long, but it is long enough to know my perceived happily ever after was as real as the story where I initially found the phrase.

My assumptions about what marriage could be like came from the pages of storybooks and off of the silver screens where the authors and screen writers seem to leave out the mundane everydayness of what happens in real marriage.

In When Sinners Say I Do, my favorite book on marriage, Dave Harvey writes about how every Jane Austen movie is the same.

The stories all end at the altar, just when reality is about to come knocking. Romance movies are about the dizzying tornado of romantic love picking you up in its whirling funnel and setting you down at the chapel doors all giddy and beautifully dressed.

(page 136)

Almost nine years of marriage and FOUR children later I have come to realize that my expectations for happily ever after were crazy and unreachable. Happily ever after was just a phrase, and I am no Cinderella and as much as I love my sweet husband, he is not a cliche character in a fairy tale.

My husband is a man, and I am a woman. We are both made in the image of God but at the same time our hearts are fallen, our desires are naturally bent to serve ourselves before we serve one another.

The true story about love that I should have been looking to all along was the story of Jesus and the rescued people who trust in Him for redemption.

Yes, fairytales and other media leave out the everydayness of marriage. But real marriage, two people choosing to come together in the not-so-theatrical moments is more romantic than those first giddy butterfly feelings. To choose love when you are a sleep deprived testy new parent is an everyday heroic gift you can give to your spouse. To choose dating which sometimes means dragging yourself away from crying toddlers is the mundane everydayness where you can find happily ever after.

It just doesn’t look as polished as I though it would. Marriage can have rough patches. And marriage just won’t work without looking to Jesus.

The Bible is a love story of God continually rescuing people and wooing them to Himself. In the Bible you find people who do not deserve love being loved and people being rescued even when they didn’t deserve the rescuing.

For a long time I let the world shape what I though marriage should be and I tried to cram myself and Michael into that hole. In the past and still sometimes today I drink from the “happily married” cistern.

I’ve written about cisterns before, they are a huge part of the story of how God is redeeming me personally. A cistern in the time of the Bible is a large jug that people used to hold water and give life and an end to thirst. Today some people call cisterns, idols. Normally cisterns or idols are good things. But they become all consuming when we worship the good gift more than the Giver of the gift.

“My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.”

(Jeremiah 2:13)

I drank from the “happily ever after marriage” cistern. Sometimes I still find myself doing it and then I am still left feeling empty and unsatisfied.

Marriage can be a good thing. Marriage is a gift. But no one should ever find themselves worshipping the gift more than the Giver. That is when the thirst comes.

There are times when I value the gift of marriage more than the Giver of marriage. In The Meaning of Marriage, Tim Keller writes,

If we look to our spouses to fill up our tanks in a way that only God can do, we are demanding an impossibility. (page 52)

At times, I have depended on my marriage to fill up my tank. I believed that if Michael and I could just be more happily ever after, if we could just try harder, we would be better.

All that working and spinning of the try harder wheels left me exhausted.

When we were first married and even still now, I lacked the eyes of the gospel. The eyes that see the Giver and the gift in the proper order. And the eyes of the gospel that see me, a woman and my husband, a man, two normal people needing, craving, seeking the grace of Jesus. Every moment of every day.

I see now that I was depending on a “happily ever after” marriage to fill up my tank and make me happy. And I know now that in my fallen sinful heart I still have the tendency to do this. With the eyes of the gospel I have found that happily ever after marriage is not meant to be perfect. Nothing on this side of heaven will ever be perfect except Jesus and how he is weaving our marriage story, unraveling the bad expectations and threading the new. In this life of a normal woman and a normal man living life together I have found that “happily ever after” marriage is perfecting when I stop looking to the gift alone to fill me up and see the Giver and his grace He has given to me in Jesus.

Only God is perfect, and as we pursue Him together He is perfecting us, even when neither of us deserved His love in the first place.

As Mr. and Mrs., Michael and I are both on a journey together of simply learning how to love one another better and most importantly reflect glory and dependance upon God to our watching children and the world.

We mess this up a lot. But we are thankful for the forgiveness and grace that is found in a marriage where two people depend on Jesus. Extending and receiving grace.

So I can now breathe. I can stop trying to cram myself and my husband into this thought up expectation of “happily ever after”.

I can stop trying and start depending.

I am thankful that I am married to a man that believes in extending grace. Oh Lord, the grace my husband extends me is like that extra long swifter duster extender that finds all the tough to reach places. I have so many tough to reach places.

Happily ever after is not frolicking in meadows, it is frolicking in grace.

As you think about love this month, think about how things from stories and movies may bring unrealistic expectations into marriage and consider getting rid of the unachievable expectations and finding deep breaths in Jesus.

Please pass this on too.

Always dancing in this gospel dance with you.

Kara Tippetts: A Treasure Of Hope For My Bruised Heart

January 21, 2015January 21, 20151 Comment

I didn’t want to read her book.

I have a hard time reading her words and even viewing her beautiful face and smile in the pictures spread across the pages of her story, my heart can’t help but see my own mother. Kara’s story takes me back to being a teenager and all the memories of watching my own mother die to cancer.

Her words make me weep. Big ugly chest heaving tears.

I was afraid to go there. I was afraid to cry.

I’ve always believed these weeping tears were a sign of my weakness. For as long as I can remember I have tried to muster up the strength to dry my tears, pull up my boot straps and carry on. I’m the firstborn and in my unbelief and independence I, as the firstborn did not give myself permission to shed many tears when my mother died.

My heart has been bruised from hiding my tears; like all those saved up tears have gathered up and damaged my heart somehow; maybe even calloused my heart too. But Kara, her story, her bravery and her relentless hope; I have found a treasure in her words through rolling tears and my swollen face.

Kara writes about tears in one of her latest blog posts:

Tears ~ the essence of the best life

Kara writes,

“So weep, count your tears, look at your swollen face and know it is the fruit of love. It hurts like hell, but that pain from love- well it may be beauty at it’s purest.”

These words have turned my former thoughts about tears upside down and inside out.

Tears are not weakness at all.

Her words bring healing to my soul. The tears are the fruit of love for my mother. It hurts like hell but the crying is the fruit of the love for my mother. I could cry everyday and know that shedding a tear is not weak, the tears are beautiful and proof of a never ending love for my mother. I am able to meet her in my tears.

Kara’s words move me to see Jesus holding the broken.

“In your shattered state, do you see how Jesus sees every broken shard?” -Kara Tippetts

I was afraid to let myself cry over her book. I was afraid to be weak and be broken over her story. If I would have lived in fear of the tears I would have missed an amazing treasure. A treasure of grace and healing for my bruised heart of pent up tears.

Pick up her book now. Today. Let the tears come. You will find a treasure for your heart too.

Buy The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace In The Midst Of Life’s Hard

Follow more of Kara’s story here:

http://www.mundanefaithfulness.com

The Thing About A Three Year Old

December 20, 2014December 20, 2014Leave a comment

Sometimes it is easier to see what is bad about the phase of a child. It is easier to scream and complain about the awful and the challenging. Some people write it down and when it is attached with cynicism others seem to applaud. Others gravitate toward the negative that is masked with cynicism. The challenging things go viral while the redeeming qualities of a phase stay in the background.

No one applauds the praiseworthy traits because everyone huddles around the ugly ones.

I know children go through challenging phases. I have four young children and I have experienced most of the awful and all of the challenging. I could tell you all the stories. The poop stories, the tantrum stories, the flat out ridiculous embarrassing moments at Target and the times my children ran into a parking lot without the helping hand of a responsible adult.

I think the praiseworthy moments deserve an applause. There is a world out there reminding us of the awful and through the noise, sometimes it is hard to stay joyful in the dog-days of parenting young children.

The thing about a three year old is there is a loyal, independent, teachable child behind those stubborn eyes.

I do not think there is a day that goes by that my three year old does not stomp his foot down and tell me, “I want to do it by myself!” BUT there also is not a day when he does not take me by my hand and say, “Mommy, you are my best friend.”

There is not a day when he does not begin to cry if his blanket is just right, BUT there also is not a day when he doesn’t want to smooth my hair out of my face and tell me I am beautiful.

The thing about a three year old is they are your best friend beneath all the challenging yuck.

They are loyal to you, you are still their best friend because peers are still of little importance.

Three year olds can dress themselves.

Three year olds can use the toilet.

Three year olds can put on there own shoes.

Three year olds can play in the snow for longer than it took you to dress them in their snow gear.

Three year olds get birthdays. They get Christmas.

Three year olds truly love their siblings: they look up to the big ones and care for the little ones.

Three year olds can set the table and match socks.

There are so many praiseworthy things about a three year old. Don’t hear the bad and embrace cynicism. Embrace the praiseworthy. I promise when you search for the praiseworthy you will find the joy in the dog days.

There are so many lovely things about a three year old. Find them. Write them down. Hang them on the fridge.

The world wants you to see a three year old through the eyes of cynicism but God wants you to see them differently. As His children, the thing about a three year old is they significant and important to Him, no matter the challenging and the yuck.

Strive to see the praiseworthy. “Whatever is praiseworthy about a three year old, think on these things.” Philippians 4:8