Moments in Grace

Every December it happens.     This monumental, earth shattering strain that is the Christmas season in America.   The activities multiply, the rushing intensifies, the pressure of gifts to buy and events to attend, decorations to put up and food to cook, family to visit, and houses to clean, and as a woman, as a mother, the person who has to plan and orchrestrate the Christmas chaos for a family (in my case, a family with seven children) it can almost put you over the edge.   But as Christians somehow we know that this is wrong.   We know that Christmas is intended to be something other than this stress-inducing, materialistic, month long period of psychosis. This season that was meant to bring us the deepest peace, often brings us the most stress. This time that was meant to shine so much love in our hearts often makes us the most angry. These days that were meant to fill us with so much joy so often bring us pain. Ask me how I know. I have been known

It happened the day before Thanksgiving.     The day my world spun me a little farther off course, sent my faith flying like some planet hurling into the cosmos, sheathed in blackness. I should have been thankful.   I wasn’t very.   I was rocked, spinning, without a compass. Maybe you’ve been there? It was the day the pregnancy test came back positive, announcing the impending arrival of baby number seven into our family and all I could see ahead was suffering. I don’t have easy pregnancies.   They come with pain, months of vomiting and nausea, sometimes heart problems, sometimes high blood pressure, exhaustion, and the last time, I almost died. With my fourth baby I had to wear a heart monitor because my heart just wouldn’t keep up on me.   It raced out of control.   I couldn’t breathe and eat at the same time without difficulty.   I was in a constant state of exhaustion.   Baby number five was almost the same except this time my midwife p

Standing at the sink, soap suds filling my hands I hear a voice behind me.   “Mom, I feel like I don’t have a purpose.   I mean, I can’t do anything well.   I’m not really good at anything, I don’t have any talents or whatever.   Why am I even here?” I know this question all too well, precious child.   In a world that manufactures idols out of ordinary people every day, where people make idols out of themselves, where movies, t.v. and social media continually tempt us to self-aggrandize and self-publicize, and where all it takes is one glance at another person’s facebook page to make you feel that all of life is a competition to be won and you are clearly the biggest loser that there ever was, yes, my child it can be hard to feel like you matter. But I need to tell you something. You matter to God. You are important to God. Because God, the eternal Creator of all things, does not make trash.   He does not make mistakes.   And He

The path through the woods meanders back in the dusky light.   I’m not quite sure where it leads to. I see it almost every morning as I walk and I pass it but this morning it captivates, beckons mysteriously.   I don’t always like mysterious paths.   I like paths that make sense, paths that I understand, paths that I can clearly see where they are leading. God’s paths are not like that. They wind through sometimes dark woods.   These paths go uphill, often climbing steeply through rough terrain and most of the time I cannot tell where they are exactly heading. Sitting with a friend recently, in a coffee shop we swapped God stories next to a quiet fire and caught up on each other’s journeys.   My single friend told me of her work and the small group that she leads and the women she is discipling and the beautiful things God is doing in her life.   And it was plain to me, as clear as the blue October sky that God was making her fruitful right where she was on her path.   Thi

The path around the lake was a thing of beauty, blue sky blazing overhead in the crisp fall air. And I almost missed this.   In fact I have missed this over and over again for so many years. But not this time. The kids and I walk, hunters of beauty birthing, curious wanderings. We handle our field guides and nature notebooks like the novices we are but this glory can’t be missed even by the most ineffectual of us.   “Look! Look! A tree frog!” In Ohio, this is not a common sight and we stare in wonder. “Look at that caterpillar! It’s all white and fuzzy!” “Let’s identify that tree over there,” I say.   We walk, drinking in the splendor and I think, when was it that I had stopped believing this was possible? Faith is always the first step to joy. And it has been my doubt, my worries that have kept me wearied and burdened for far too long. “Can your worries add a single moment to your life?” Matthew 6:27

The sun was shining into my windshield like glory flashes as I made the commute down to the University.   I was on my way to the Bible study for international moms and this was week two.   And I was trying to pray.   My mind was wandering over last week’s lesson, our first group, and my baptism by fire.   I had been asked to lead the study the very first week of the group and I had, but I was feeling in a word, inadequate.     The group is made up of mothers from all over the world, some brand new to our country, most only here for a year or two at most.   About half to three-fourths are believers and the rest are seekers, women who want to understand the Bible and who God is but who have little to no spiritual experience with Christianity.   And these women ask difficult questions.   The kind that make you want to hide under a rock because you are not sure that you can possibly explain what they are asking in a cross cultural and relevant way.