[Adapted from the Archives. I’ve written about disappointment and the journey beyond several times. Here is the search if you want to read more.]
But as for me, my prayer is to you, O LORD. At an acceptable time, O God, in the abundance of your steadfast love answer me in your saving faithfulness.– Psalm 69:13
Life is such a mix of experiences. All can either take us rapidly one or another direction, turning our emotions this way and that. Our circumstances change. Ups and downs. Hope and disappointment. Most importantly, God does not change.
a couple of friends of mine are in the thick of disappointment. Bewildered by losses they didn’t see coming and were not prepared for. Yet, as we who love them journey through this disorientation with them, we already see a reorientation: Hope is taking deeper root and peace begins to unfold, like a seedling in Spring. God will make a way.Photo Credit: Heartlight
We are not left floundering in our circumstances. God is working His purposes out even through the worst of scenarios life can throw at us. In death (of a vision, of a hope, of a dream), He still brings life, in the here-and-now, to those who believe.
After being tossed about by anger, grief, or disappointment, we can have hope again and peace…that God will show Himself mighty in this as He does in all things:
I’ve put together a playlist, sort of, on trusting (gleaned from some of the songs highlighted on past blogs). These songs bring me joy as I hope they will you.
Postscript: One of those friends just yesterday, in talking about the hard thing she experienced recently, still reeling from it in a way, ended up calling it “a pretty significant act of grace”. Wow! That’s God working in the heart of one of his children. So thankful.
[If you have “trusting God” songs that calm your heart and restore joy on hard days, would you place them in the Comments below?]
Happy weekend! Hope this finds you well and enjoying the many small miracles of life. I’m a bit behind on posting Friday Faves. Sometimes they are so excellent they still end up in my Friday Faves weeks later…some of these are like that, and others are as fresh as this weekend. These are all for you. Enjoy!
1) Romantic Flight on Classical Guitar – Anyone new to this blog will have the pleasure of experiencing Nathan Mills‘ music, maybe for the first time. He is a classical guitarist whose work is found under the brand Beyond the Guitar. He arranges and performs themes from movies, TV shows, and video games. A heart and body lift on sweet nostalgia. We probably all know the positive impact of music on our minds and bodies. I personally never cared for instrumental music before Nathan’s journey with classical guitar. Now, we always had music in our home. Always. My preference was anything vocal. The thing that’s interesting in Nathan’s music. It feels vocal. He makes the guitar speak to the heart. Maybe the nostalgic familiarity of the tunes is part of it, but there’s something in his expressive playing…just so heartening. Check him out with his latest arrangement: Romantic Flight from the film How to Train Your Dragon. #LikeSubscribeShare
2) Snow Days Turned to Spring – In Central Virginia, our snow days might be past us. Early Spring flowers are popping up and flowering trees are beginning to brighten the gray of our landscape here.
A friend pointed me to the poet Billy Collins and I’d like to present in contrast his “Snow Day” poem and his poem celebrating Spring entitled “Today”. The kids (above) are ours and the flowers (below) are in our yard/neighborhood.
If ever there were a spring day so perfect,
so uplifted by a warm intermittent breeze
that it made you want to throw
open all the windows in the house
and unlatch the door to the canary’s cage,
indeed, rip the little door from its jamb,
a day when the cool brick paths
and the garden bursting with peonies
seemed so etched in sunlight
that you felt like taking
a hammer to the glass paperweight
on the living room end table,
releasing the inhabitants
from their snow-covered cottage
so they could walk out,
holding hands and squinting
into this larger dome of blue and white,
well, today is just that kind of day.
3) Normal – What does that even mean? As we come up on a year physical distancing and wearing masks to keep COVID at bay, people don’t even talk anymore about a return to normal. Nor even about a new normal. We are reinventing normal. If we’re wise, we’re also looking “down the road” to where our choices today will lead.
One issue for me is my struggle with reckless eating. COVID restrictions have not been my friend in this area. I overeat for about every reason possible – for recreation, out of boredom, when under stress, and even when happy. Food is just such a lovely go-to. Until this last year’s isolation pushed me to the highest weight I’ve ever been…but that’s again in the past.
In October I started seriously looking “down the road” to a life possibly shortened by my casual over-eating. Started using the My Fitness Pal app and asked for a Fitbit for Christmas. The non-Premium app is free and we caught a sale on the Fitbit.
After four months, I’m way below the highest weight I’ve ever been.
Do I miss the reckless eating? Absolutely! I miss McDonald’s double-cheeseburgers and fries. I miss Waffle House. I miss eating all I want. I miss Shyndigz fresh fruit cake and Piccola Italy‘s feta cheese and sausage pizza. One day those things will come back in my life… maybe. What I don’t miss is the normal of too often getting short of breath climbing hills and struggling to get up off the floor after playing with our grands. Also what I hope to miss is a stroke or…(almost hard to write this scary thing) dying from COVID because I put myself at even greater risk.
Now normal is weighing and logging food, eating less than I would before, listening to my brain when I’m actually full, and having only one cookie instead of 3…or 5. It all works out to a beautiful different…a new normal.
.
The change in eating is one thing. Way more challenging is how to be in people’s lives with the struggle of physical distancing and Zoom fatigue. That I am still figuring out…but one shot down and one to go and it will become less of a challenge hopefully. And a different normal will emerge.
[Sidebar: There was a time in the not too distant past when I went off sugar for over a year. It happened, there was benefit, but I don’t want to repeat it. As I get more fit, do I miss the chew of a French baquette or a perfect frie? Absolutely. Sugar though is still a part of my daily intake…and there will come a day when I will enjoy my daughter’s birthday cake again and MomMom’s refrigerator coconut cake. Many times over. For now: a Kathy Kaye popcorn ball is enough. Sorry for the long sidebar – like confessing in an Overeaters Anonymous group. 🙂 ]
4) Relief vs. Rescue – Words mean things. The 2020 CARES Act (Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act) and the 2021 American Rescue Plan Act reflect a difference in meaning and approach. I just want to focus on two words: relief vs. rescue. Relief communicates easing the pain or stress of someone in a difficult situation. Rescue communicates much more. Rescue is to come to the aid of someone who can’t help her/himself. Rescue is freeing or delivering someone from an impossible situation. Both describe a response but one is a greater response and a greater need. Can words be prescriptive? Making us think we have a greater need? Making us think we need a greater response? Making us think we are helpless without the intervention of government?
“There is something about words. In expert hands, manipulated deftly, they take you prisoner. Wind themselves around your limbs like spider silk, and when you are so enthralled you cannot move, they pierce your skin, enter your blood, numb your thoughts. Inside you they work their magic.” – Diane Setterfield
We can woo and cajole with words. We can speak with an authority that demands acquiescence. We can speak with such brilliance or passion that we must be believed.
Check out this little TikTok video below (forgive the thumbnail shot of the young woman; it’s the second woman, @thesavvy, you will see that brings the point). Now I haven’t done fact-checking, but she I believe. How about you?
“If you're gonna be a white savior, make sure you get a white hood to match”
Two educators I’ve discussed before also talk often on the power of words in our world. They are economics professor Glenn Loury and linguistics professor John McWhorter.Photo Credit: The Glenn Show; YouTube
We don’t agree on everything, BUT their authenticity and brilliance in calling out the use of words to move political agendas and change culture is super fascinating. See one of their videos linked below.
5) Carefully Taught– The food for thought on this fave of the week is the painfully exquisite song from the Rogers & Hammerstein’s South Pacific. Classic movie released in 1958. Remade in 2001. The song You’ve Got to Be Carefully Taught relates to an American military officer who has fallen in love with a young woman from the islands during WWII. He struggles with his own prejudice even in the face of his love for her. I saw the first movie sometime in my childhood. It was confusing for me then because I had not been raised to hate people different from me.
We are confronted right now with so much racism and presumed racism, it’s hard to know how to think critically on it or what to do definitively about it. Somehow we must separate the politics (driven to divide) from the persons (being used by those various platforms).
The song speaks to the incredible importance of parenting our children to choose love over hate; understanding over withdrawing. I do wonder if we are born with a bent toward racism…of choosing people who look like us, for whatever reason. Fortunately, if that’s the case, we don’t have to stay there. Parenting matters. Thankfully.
The most extraordinary quote I’ve just discovered:
The question is not whether the things that happen to you are chance things or God’s things because, of course, they are both at once. There is no chance thing through which God cannot speak—even the walk from the house to the garage that you have walked ten thousand times before, even the moments when you cannot believe there is a God who speaks at all anywhere. He speaks, I believe, and the words he speaks are incarnate in the flesh and blood of our selves and of our own footsore and sacred journeys. We cannot live our lives constantly looking back, listening back, lest we be turned to pillars of longing and regret, but to live without listening at all is to live deaf to the fullness of the music. Sometimes we avoid listening for fear of what we may hear, sometimes for fear that we may hear nothing at all but the empty rattle of our own feet on the pavement. But be not affeard, says Caliban, nor is he the only one to say it. “Be not afraid,” says another, “for lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.” He says he is with us on our journeys. He says he has been with us since each of our journeys began. Listen for him. Listen to the sweet and bitter airs of your present and your past for the sound of him. – Frederick Buechner, from The Sacred Journey and Listening to Your Life
Happy End of the Week! October has flown by, right? This weekend there is so much going on. Halloween or Reformation Day whichever way you’re inclined to celebrate. November 1 is the International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church. Daylight Savings Time ends so we have an extra hour of sleep to prepare for Sunday (do small children actually ever sleep longer?). Then in the US also, the countdown to our Election continues – praying for peace.
1) Amazing Grace on Guitar – Nathan Mills (of Beyond the Guitar) surprised us this week with his arrangement of the great old hymn Amazing Grace. This hymn was written over 240 years ago by John Newton, a slave ship turned minister after he himself was captured and captivated by the amazing saving grace of Christ.
What Nathan does with this old standard (often rendered on bagpipes) will really touch your heart. He takes a melody often used to comfort the bereaved at funerals, and gradually moves it up-tempo to a march of triumph. Just beautiful!
2) Visual and Auditory Feasts – Sometimes our senses are just wowed from multiple simultaneous sources. Our memories of holiday meals, for instance, attach visual, auditory, and olfactory experiences with them. Concert performances (either in-person or online) van be an assault on our senses or a beautiful feast. I’ve had the pleasure of seeing/hearing For King & Country in concert. Their use of various instruments (especially their drums) is winsome and effective, and their light shows are spot on.
A few years ago, they introduced their own version of Little Drummer Boy. To be honest, until their version, I wasn’t a big fan of that little song. Now…if you haven’t heard it, prepare yourself for a feast!
Another video of the song from the 2019 CMA Country Christmas (I’m thinking their light show team also did the lighting for this one):
By the way, For King & Country’s latest album just released – A Drummer Boy Christmas – a much softer, worshipful album, but again…wow! Here’s the video of the title song.
“Can you recall being comforted as a child after a time of emotional distress?”
They continue to coach about comfort or the lack of it.
“We are looking for a time when you were significantly upset and a parent offered consolation and relief…Sometimes people who haven’t experienced real, soul-level comfort have trouble understanding what exactly it is.”
“Related to the comfort question is this: How was conflict handled in your family? If distressful feelings were soothed or problems were resolved when you were a child, you experienced comfort and relief.”
The Yerkovich’s offer three elements as essential parts of comfort:
Touch
Listening
Relief
“Comfort is not possible unless an emotional connection was made.”
[If you have no childhood memories of being comforted or you missed an emotional connection with your parents growing up,] “We’re not trying to turn you against your parents or give you a target at which you can shoot arrows of blame. Most of our parents did the best they could and were simply working with the tools they had.”
These quotes from the “How We Love” book launched the reader into a journey of discovery on how our experiences with being comforted have impact on how we comfort those we love. An excellent resource for married couples but also a help for extended family, friendships, and even coworker relationships.
I’m just digging in but really anticipating learning and growing.
4) Pumpkins – ‘Tis the season. Our church throws a pumpkin patch event every Fall for the enjoyment of our community and in support of a local ministry to homeless. This Fall, with COVID and all, we almost didn’t….but we rallied. Just a few pics celebrating the beauty and variety of pumpkins.
5) Gone Fishing – My husband loves fishing…being outside and on the water, hanging out with a friend or family member, improving his catch. It’s a joy for him. For me? It’s a once-a-year outing. I do however love nature…and time with him, of course. This Fall morning last week started with a thick fog that paled the color of everything but broke with the shimmering sun pushing through.
I did catch a fish (score!) and he caught many more…it was a beautiful day and I wanted to share it with you.
[OK, full disclosure: the sunset pic was taken by our son, Nathan, who took my place in the boat in the afternoon. He and his sweet son. It was a good day both in and out of the boat.]
Enjoy your weekend. Thanks for stopping by. By the next Friday Faves, we’ll know how the US elections went. Praying!
Bonuses:
Quote for Today:
“We are participating in the orderly transfer of administrative authority by the direction of the people. And this is the simple magic which makes a commonplace routine a near miracle to many of the worlds inhabitants: the continuing fact that the people, by democratic process, can delegate this power, yet retain custody of it.
Perhaps you and I have lived with this miracle too long to be properly appreciative. Freedom is a fragile thing and is never more than one generation away from extinction. It is not ours by inheritance; it must be fought for and defended constantly by each generation, for it comes only once to a people. Those who have known freedom and then lost it have never known it again.” – Ronald Reagan, Inaugural Address as Governor of California, 1967
Yard Visits – During COVID, drive-bys and yard visits have been so life-giving. We have been so blessed by planned and impromptu visits with friends. This week, our friend, Thiago, dropped by. He is an entrepreneur/film producer in California now…so such a visit is rare. And a complete joy.
Hey Everybody! Hope you’re faring well through these days of Coronavirus and social distancing. Many of you may be still going out to work, and we are grateful for all your essential services keeping us supported in our different living situations.
I didn’t post Friday Faves last week. So we have Friday Faves from two weeks today. Hope you’re finding joy in this odd journey of ours right now. We may be physically distanced, but we are together in this (that’s almost become cliche except for it’s still true).
1) Some Good News – We can find it, or create it if need be. Some good news. Actor John Krasinski has done just that. He is scripting and posting a weekly YouTube video entitled appropriately Some Good News. His first post focused on the 15th anniversary of the American TV show The Office. Below you will find Episodes 2 and 3.
Please share in the Comments your own brush with good news this week and any good news you made happen for others. Let’s safely crush this physical distancing experience!
2) Final Fantasy VII on Guitar – If the lilting music of the Final Fantasy videogame franchise has special meaning to you, then Nathan Mills of Beyond the Guitar gets it. The chief composer of the Final Fantasy themes is Nobuo Uematsu. Nathan’s latest arrangement from the franchise is Aerith’s Theme from Final Fantasy VII. Here it is:
3) Sound Thinking – One of my go-to Bible verses in scary situations is 2 Timothy 1:7 where the Apostle Paul states: “For God has not given us a spirit of fearfulness, but one of power, love, and sound judgment.”Some translations use sound mind or self-control for the phrase “sound judgment”.
Either way, there is such a thing as sound thinking, and it is worth determining whether we are pursuing and exercising that level of reason…or not. Otherwise, we will continue to keep passing each other in conversations, even good friends, shaking our heads when we disagree with ideologies. Preferring to discount, blame or revile, rather than understand each other’s take on something that matters to both of us. Especially in today’s super-charged political conversations and in our government’s decision-making.
In this chapter, Levinson offers Ten Blocks to Sound Thinking – with General Semantics “Correctives”. The blocks follow; read the succinct and incredible helpful correctives in this rapid read chapter. I would love an opportunity to sit around a circle with friends and associates of mine who think vastly differently than I do on a range of topics and sort out how we might come more to the center using these helps.
10 Blocks to Sound Thinking (Martin H. Levinson)
Allness Attitudes [communicating as if we know all there is to know about a subject]
“Knee-jerk Reactions
Either-or Thinking
Rigid Evaluations
Projection Problems [stating opinions as if they were facts]
“Useless” and Poorly Structured Questions
Elementalism [assuming there is only one cause of something]
Jumping to Wrong Conclusions
Relying on Common Sense [taking assumptions for granted]
Labeling and Category Errors
So much to consider. I will close this with a quote, measured and sound, from a friend of mine, Helen Phillips, on the topic of our country’s mediation of the Coronavirus pandemic:
“We’ll never know whether these drastic measures have spared us from a fate we cannot fathom with thousand or tens of thousands more people sick and dying, or not. If the stats tempt you to feel indignant, and a false sense of ‘perhaps the whole thing was a big fat overreaction’, how do you claim to know which is which? Who can be certain what’s ‘real’ and what’s successful mitigation through extreme precaution as intended. Everyone is speculating, everyone is claiming someone else is wrong, everyone has an opinion and a conspiracy theory from the cheap seats with no ‘skin in the game’.
At the end of the day, who among us bends under the burden of tremendous responsibility? Who among us truly believes they have solutions for the world’s problems? Who among us rarely sleeps, evaluating the deluge of evolving data? Who among us thinks they know what’s best for an organization, a state or a nation?
Perhaps instead of feeding the dragon of obsession and negativity, maybe we should do a little more soul searching, heart checking, gratitude evaluating, neighbor loving and realize the roots of our faith are growing deeper.”
4) Coronavirus Tips for Survival – Have we exhausted this subject yet? I can’t imagine we have. Fortunately, I have a good friend who is also a cancer nursing specialist. She helped me devise a survivorship plan after my bout with cancer. She is also the source of much of my plan for staying healthy and hopefully surviving COVID-19 should I contract it. First a little musical respite with DJ Brinson and Emily Gardenire:
I have listed several sources below with a wide range of viewpoints on keeping COVID-19 at bay or surviving it should you get hospitalized. The tips are just based on what I’ve read and what conclusions I’ve made. Not scientific, not tested, etc., etc., etc.
Pray, trusting God isn’t finished with me yet…or if my time is done on earth, then trusting Him for grace for me and for my family.
Be aware of what surfaces I’m touching (especially outside of my home environment) and wash my hands often and thoroughly. Hand sanitize regularly.
Keep my hands off my face.
Social distance. Stay 6 feet apart from those not in my “stay at home” environment. Only gather in very small groups with others abiding by same rules (family, close friends, colleagues when necessary).
Although social distancing, be creative and purposeful – serve others and stay in contact. Pray for those around you and far from you.
Learn to sleep on my abdomen and sides (this may be necessary if I end up hospitalized).
If hospitalized, up to being put on a ventilator, I want it all (oxygen, of course; hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin (if available); testing and treatment for cytokine storm syndrome; red blood cell and plasma infusions; whatever else is the latest and greatest.
5) Busting with Bonuses – I couldn’t decide on a fifth favorite so will leave you with these bonuses as the fifth. The Spring here is spectacular and I’m especially grateful having been “staying at home” for over a month now. Hope you’re doing well. Thanks for reading and keeping company with me.
Happy Weekend! Well, I should ask how was your weekend as Friday Faves posts on the Monday after. These Fridays come so fast! Anyway, if you have a minute, there’s a lot of Friday joy here for your Monday.
1) Star Wars Classical Guitar – We are Star Wars geeks around here. This movie franchise is part of our Christmas tradition through the years, going together to see the latest film coming out. Those of you who, like me, are fans of Nathan Mills at Beyond the Guitar, may remember his holiday mashup A Star Wars Christmas.
Thanks to Disney+, we have a Star Wars space western that we can stream between the big screen escapades. The Mandalorian. If you love Star Wars, you will love it. Here is Nathan’s rendition of the main theme:
2) Christmas Music – It’s been our jam since October, and still need more time to savor it all. From the ridiculous to the rapturous. Love most all of it. How about you? Do you have favorites to share? In Comments, please.
December is full of way too many music events to take them all in. Community sing-alongs of The Messiah, King College styled Lessons and Carols performances, spontaneous Christmas pageants, just to name a few. One of our family’s annual traditions is the VCU Holiday Gala. This Friday night, one of our littles also joined us. A next generation joy.
On a larger scale, the Christmas band for King & Country performs an amazing Little Drummer Boy. A drumming feast for the senses!
3) Adult Children – If we have grandchildren, then we have adult children. Loving them both in ways they understand is a crucial part of our life journey. This week I came across 3 very different but thought-provoking articles that were meaningful to me and you may also find them to be so for you (the adult children or you parents of same).
Alison Wright‘s The Death of the Family Gathering – We’re in a season when extended family gatherings only happen over a funeral or wedding. My birth family never did reunions but they always looked so fun. We would, from time to time, gather at grandparents at the same time, but it was never planned. Wright’s article touched my heart. Then a great-niece wrote a beautiful Facebook post about the same article… We work to make family dinners happen once a month and a family vacation each year. Worth the battle with busy schedules.
Daniel Kurt‘s Long-term Care Insurance – Is It the Right Move for My Aging Parents? This may seem an odd post for a Friday Fave, but for ever how much time long-term care insurance is still around, it is definitely a consideration for us to give ourselves and our adult children…or invest in a family compound of some sort where everyone cares for everyone else. Either way, it’s a chunk of change, but worth it.
4) Christmas Happenings – Beyond the Christmas music events, so much goes on in the month of December around here. Henrico Christmas Mother is a charitable venture that helps needy families, the elderly and the disabled of our county. I only minimally volunteer for this, but it is an incredible experience to see how people and organizations come together to help those less advantaged have a happy Christmas.
In Richmond, we have the Tacky Light Tour which makes driving around the city at night a shimmering, and sometimes silly, wonder.
Gatherings with friends and family or nights at home when overwhelmed or just needing a quiet place…all part of Christmas.
Then…then there are the platters, boxes, small bags full of Christmas cookies – made with love, shared.Photo Credit (last pic): Facebook.com – Cookies by Patricia Good Eckard
5) The Perks of Walking – So after all the Christmas cookies, I’ll close with this helpful piece on the perks of walking. We all know the perks actually, but we’ll be doing more walking come the New Year, for sure.
Have a great week! I have to tell you that sometime during the night I woke with the wonderful realization that we are still over 2 weeks away from Christmas. I went to bed thinking it was just 10 days away. When trying to squeeze all the glorious goodness of this special time of year, the days fairly fly. It was a pre-dawn gift to know that…there is still time.
Whatever you do, work at it with your whole being, for the Lord and not for people. – Colossians 3:23
He said to him, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and most important commandment. The second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. All the Law and the Prophets depend on these two commandments.” – Matthew 22:37-40
“For this purpose also I labor, striving according to His power, which mightily works within me.” – Colossians 1:29
Whew! We’ve just finished the protracted Christmas shopping push of Black Friday and Cyber Monday. Now, we sift through lists of what we still need to buy for those we love and to supply the various events that fill the days ahead. Three weeks until Christmas.
In celebrating the birth of Christ, our December fills to the brim. For those of us who struggle at this time of year and pull away from the crowding of the days, it is nearly impossible to stay clear of the insatiable noise of cultural Christmas.
We scurry around trying to buy and do for those closest to us…which is not a bad thing at all, but Christmas…for us…is most about Him. He deserves our best gifts… This is consummately freeing for us, His children.
What I love about this song is the crazy cumulative talent of the guys in this band! Drumming is something they do unlike any other music group I know. To translate that drumming into this little Christmas song made the lyrics even more meaningful.
Many of us have seen the 1968 animated film The Little Drummer Boy. That little movie tells a story of the journey of the wise men to see Jesus. A poor drummer boy forced to accompany them was then present as they presented their extravagant gifts to the baby king. He, too, wanted to give to Jesus…his best gift was his drumming.
What is our best for Him this Christmas? Maybe it is something different than we think. We can ask Him…in the quiet of our hearts, never mind the bustle of December days… He will receive what we offer Him…like a parent gladly receives the simple gift of a child.
As the Bible verses referenced above remind us, He empowers our giving. Whatever we give, however we serve, with Him and His purposes as our focus – He is at work in us and through us. Glory!
Come they told me, pa rum pum pum pum
A newborn King to see, pa rum pum pum pum
Our finest gifts we bring, pa rum pum pum pum
To lay before the King, pa rum pum pum pum,
Rum pum pum pum, rum pum pum pum
So to honor Him, pa rum pum pum pum
When we come
Little Baby, pa rum pum pum pum
I am a poor boy too, pa rum pum pum pum
I have no gifts to bring, pa rum pum pum pum
That’s fit to give a King, pa rum pum pum pum,
Rum pum pum pum, rum pum pum pum
Shall I play for you, pa rum pum pum pum,
On my drum?
Mary nodded, pa rum pum pum pum
The ox and lamb kept time, pa rum pum pum pum
I played my drum for Him, pa rum pum pum pum
I played my best for Him, pa rum pum pum pum,
Rum pum pum pum, rum pum pum pum,
Then He smiled at me, pa rum pum pum pum
Me and my drum*
Seek the LORD and his strength; seek his face always. Remember the wondrous works he has done, his wonders, and the judgments he has pronounced. – Psalm 105:4-5
Therefore I will always remind you about these things, even though you know them and are established in the truth you now have. I think it is right, as long as I am in this bodily tent, to wake you up with a reminder, since I know that I will soon lay aside my tent, as our Lord Jesus Christ has indeed made clear to me. And I will also make every effort so that you are able to recall these things at any time after my departure. – 2 Peter 1:12-15
Some weeks are packed with distractions – both lovely and loathsome. This week we’ve had to face conflict and disease in the family. It happens. It’s part of life. It usually resolves.
Then there is the political and civil (uncivil) realm. We had a state election this week, and it went very differently than I thought it would. The ramifications regarding issues deep in my heart are huge.
Thoughts whirling around in my head have been dizzying. Finally, in the darkness of the situations, a light came on…and brightened even the blackest of my fears and worries.Photo Credit: Heartlight, Dwight L. Moody
I remembered God.
In our community group this week, we talked a bit about Psalm 105 (the text at Movement Church this past Sunday). These verses popped out at me:
Seek the LORD and his strength; seek his face always. Remember the wondrous works he has done, his wonders, and the judgments he has pronounced. – Psalm 105:4-5
Remember.
During group, I told everyone of the struggle I’d had. Forgetting that God is still about His purposes. Then His gentle reminder earlier in the day and again during group. My heart was so comforted that it seemed fitting to begin a discipline of writing down remembrances of what God has done throughout history (as He brings them to mind) and what He is doing in our lives and those around us. So here goes…
To top all this off, I’m a part of Community Bible Study in 1 and 2 Peter. We just finished 2 Peter 1. The Apostle Peter, in these two letters, was encouraging the New Testament church that had suffered much and longed for the return of Christ. God had already revealed Peter was not long for this world. In his deep sense of urgency, he wanted to remind these believers…and all of the rest of us reading his words through the ages…to hold on to the truth.
Remembering What Not to Forget
Remember the reality of your salvation.
Remember the riches of your salvation.
Remember your responsibility to add to your faith.
So I’m on my way journaling both what God is teaching in the Bible study above, but also the remembrances of His provision for our family through the years, including the nearness of Himself through every trial.
Singer/songwriter Lauren Daigle has written and performed a beautiful song to take us to worship in remembering God in all things. Its title? Remember.
In the darkest hour when I cannot breathe
Fear is on my chest, the weight of the world on me
Everything’s crashing down, everything I have known
When I wonder if I’m all alone
I remember, I remember
You have always been faithful to me
I remember, I remember
Even when my own eyes could not see
You were there, always there
I will lift my eyes even in the pain
Above all the lies, I know You can make a way
I’ve seen giants fall, I’ve seen mountains move
I’ve seen waters part because of You
I remember, I remember
You have always been faithful to me
I remember, I remember
Even when my own eyes could not see
You were there, always there
I can’t stop thinking about
I can’t stop thinking about
I can’t stop thinking about
Your goodness, goodness
I can’t stop thinking about
I can’t stop thinking about
I can’t stop thinking about
Your goodness, goodness
I can’t stop thinking about
I can’t stop thinking about
I can’t stop thinking about
Your goodness, goodness
I can’t stop thinking about
I can’t stop thinking about
I can’t stop thinking about
Your goodness, goodness
I remember, I remember
You have always been faithful to me
I remember, I remember
Even when my own eyes could not see
You were there, always there
With me*
“May you never get that call. I did on October 24, 2010. Worst day of my life. I was lucky…he survived………..so many don’t…….These people are someone’s daughters, sons, mothers, fathers, friends…….Don’t judge. Listen to their stories. We need change. Many people need help and there is not always help out there.” – Jeanne Barney
“National Overdose Awareness Day! It still surprises me on how many people I talk to seem oblivious to this epidemic in our country and throughout the world. In 2017 the official number of deaths was over 72,000 people [in the US]. More in 2018. These 72,000 people were Mothers and Fathers, Daughters and Sons. Aunts and Uncles. Just think about how many peoples lives were affected by 72,000 deaths. Addiction is real……..Addiction kills……..Lets all get together and find ways to talk about this beast that kills more people than car accidents, guns, breast cancer, The Vietnam War. I pray that my Facebook friends never have to be touched in anyway by the Overdose of a loved one. Unfortunately, the math says …………..you more than likely will.” – Jeanne Barney
2) Quiet Influencers – We have all had them in our lives: these quiet influencers. People who gave us their best without needing to be center stage themselves. People who helped us to mature into people of influence ourselves…for some even, people of significant power or renown. These quiet influencers could be our parents. Or peers who saw in us maybe someone we couldn’t imagine ourselves.
Writer Rachel Pieh Jones urges us to capture the stories of our quiet influencers:
Power resides not only in the obvious leaders, the loudest voices, or the wealthiest donors, but also in the quiet influencers.
Search out these leaders, collaborate with them, use their own words, be wise in the details emphasized, and be mindful of how the story will be heard. Pass the mic to these influencers and do your part to elevate their voices. – Rachel Pieh Jones
I personally am so thankful for the many quiet influencers in my life and work. They are many and they are “just a little lower than the angels” (Psalm 8:5).
Thanks to Jones, I am feeling the need to capture some of their stories…so hopefully you’ll read about them here. How about you? Please comment about your quiet influencers in the Comments below. It’s a good start.Photo Credit: Facebook, Julie McGowan
3) Primary Physicians – You know you’re getting some age on when your doctor retires…especially when he is not so old, or so it seems.
Not everyone in the world has the privilege of having a family doctor. One who both cares for you and possibly your own adult children.
For over 10 years, we have had Dr. Bill Harrington as our primary physician. He’s been with us through all sorts of life transitions…as well as quite a few medical scares. I won’t go into the details here, but a physician who can get a hunch and follow it through – to discover cancer or a potentially life-threatening cardiac malfunction – is a tremendous asset. That is the kind of person Dr. Harrington has been to us. Wise, funny, thoughtful, and intuitive. We will miss him.
I’m counting on him still writing the poetry we have gotten to read – which he began writing just a short time ago. Definitely models for his patients how good life can be around every corner. Retirement blessings, Dr. H. Well-done!
4) Habits of Purpose – I’ve written about Justin Whitmel Earley. He is a very successful attorney who is now also a writer, speaker, and life coach.
Earley’s website has lots of free helps on it and now he has produced a video series (also free) to help us move our lives more toward purpose. I’m hoping to gather a group of friends to have weekly evenings of watching the short video and talking about how we might incorporate those ideas into our lives. Good stuff!
My daughter, grandchildren, and I visited the garden earlier today. It was a marvel, as always!
As we were leaving, I commented what a privilege it was to be able to afford a membership to such a beautiful place. It was then my daughter told me about the Museums for All program.
It flows out of an initiative of the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) based in Washington, D.C. For anyone who has an EBT card (for supplemental food assistance), that person can buy and individual annual membership for a museum for $1 or a family membership for $5. That is an incredible benefit for those in our city who couldn’t afford a membership otherwise. So, yay for Museums for All!
That’s it for this week. Although we still have days in the 90s, with the start of school and the small but clear changes in the environment around us, Fall is coming! I will leave you with a few images we all look forward to. Have a sweet weekend peopled with those you love.
On slavery in North America 400 years ago this August and slavery in the world today:
From what I've studied of the Atlantic slave trade, this animation is accurate. But many would have us believe America was the only nation to have African slaves. RT This haunting animation maps the journeys of 15,790 slave ships in two minutes: https://t.co/eEnQnDHJj5 via @slate
“Dieticians say that #orthorexia — an obsession with eating healthy food or food that sufferers feel is “correct” for them — is a growing problem thanks to the promotion of clean eating and wellness on sites such as Instagram.” https://t.co/x92NY3AevB
Rejoice in hope; be patient in affliction; be persistent in prayer. – Romans 12:12
Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you believe so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.– Romans 15:13
Who’s heard this strange and woeful adage: “The world is going to hell in a hand basket.”? It’s a saying that’s been around a long time, and I’m thinking it originated around a holiday family dinner table.
This Christmas we were having one of those conversations about the mess the world is in…we were a multi-generational family gathering of teens to our eighty-somethings. All beloved by each other.
As our conversation spiraled down, I looked around the table at these precious young ones. This was more their world we were talking about than our own. This was the world we were handing them.
Then the realization washed over us all again as our conversation turned. This world pales in comparison to some of the other eras in history…and survived. This world is not beyond the care of God…not beyond His reach…not beyond His ability to save.
We may not take joy in the political chaos we see nor the hardships that surround us, but we can always take joy in knowing that what we see is not the whole story.
The Lord has come! He comes every day into this beautiful, messy world. He created it in perfection, and we have had our sinful way with it. Still, He comes. He shows up every single day in our lives and in the circumstances of the peoples and governments of this world.
For King & Country, one of my favorite Christian bands, has taken the Christmas standard Joy to the World and reminded us of this very truth…Christ has come, and nothing will ever be the same again.
Worship with me on the new beginning of another year…who knows what God will do? Joy…
Joy to the world the Lord is come
Let Earth receive her King
Let every heart prepare him roomAnd heaven and nature sing
And heaven and nature sing
And heaven, and heaven and nature singJoy to the world the Saviour reigns
Let men their songs employ
While fields and floods, rocks, hills, and plains
Repeat the sounding joy
Repeat the sounding joy
Repeat, repeat the sounding joyHe rules the world with truth and grace
And makes the nations prove
The glories of His righteousness
And wonders of His love
And wonders of His love
And wonders, wonders of His love
It’s remarkable isn’t it? As Luke said that this baby boy No family of promotion No city of impressive nature Just a manger No social media campaigns No presidential campaigns No private aeroplanes But he rose up with twelve ragamuffins And He turned B. C into A. D. Flipped the world on its head He’s the most famous name around the globe The most read book ever written
And the most beautiful news the world has ever known is this That He reconnected us to heaven He offered us redemption, a fresh start Freedom, so that we can hold our heads high And march through this life knowing, My friends, that we are never alone And that’s the greatest news the world has ever known So let’s stand to our feet tonight And let’s sing this like we mean it Joy to the world the Lord has come
Joy to the world the Lord is come
Let Earth receive her King
Let every heart prepare him room
And heaven and nature sing
And heaven and nature sing
And heaven, and heaven and nature sing
And heaven and heaven and nature sing*
“When pain is to be born, a little courage helps more than much knowledge, a little human sympathy more than much courage, and the least tincture of the love of God more than all.” – C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain
Quiet week…but the faves keep coming. Here are five:
1) Maxwell House – Maxwell House is known for its coffee…“good to the last drop”. It’s been around a long time (over 100 years). I have friends who have never wavered from their loyalty to Maxwell House, despite all the trend-setting coffees of late. This Labor Day, Maxwell House popped up on my Twitter feed with a #LaboronLaborDay contest. All we had to do was follow the company on Twitter, take a picture of ourselves working on Labor Day, and post it with a comment. The grand prize winner (1000 total) would receive the equivalent of a paid day off in gratitude from Maxwell House. I was one of the 1000. A pre-paid Visa card of $150 came in the mail yesterday. If you follow this company on Twitter or Instagram you will see a core value of care for hard workers and for those neighbors in dire straits. I was surprised to receive the card but even more surprised at a company that clearly majors on honoring others…an uncommon courtesy in these times.
2) Christmas Traditions – Part of the joy of Christmas is those traditions we look forward to, year after year. They change as family grows and when life and work take us far from each other. Still, Christmas traditions are deep in our hearts. Rather than grieve when we don’t get to continue them, we tweak them and flex when need be. The joy still comes if we don’t hold too tightly to the what once was. What are some of your Christmas traditions? For us, family get-togethers, meet-ups with friends, Christmas Eve candlelight service, carol singing, frosted cookies and favorite finger foods, Christmas light drive-arounds, movies and TV specials (A Charlie Brown Christmas)…and what else? Quiet times…reading and reflecting on the astonishing account of God coming so close to us through the birth of Jesus.
3) For King & Country – I LOVE this band. Musically mesmerizing. Their concerts are personal and electrifying. Their Christmas Tour 2018 is done and they will start an intense touring schedule in 2019 (including a world tour). If you’ve never seen them play, make it happen. Here’s an hour of For King & Country from their Christmas Tour:
4) Parenting Well – In this information age, there is just so much advice on how to parent. So much. I’ve given my share as well… because we love those little people AND their parents. We learn from each other. We can also learn from the very public lives of British royalty even – Prince William and Kate Middleton. Here’s a bit of wisdom that comes from their parenting values. It should encourage and reinforce what you parents of littles are already doing…without an audience.
5) New Year’s Resolutions –What do we have? 3 more days in 2018 of reckless eating, not enough sleep, routines all turned topsy-turvy. Then…resolved. Right? Actually New Year’s resolutions are an excellent device to help us get off to a strong start into the next year, or month or week. Some of my family and friends treat resolutions with disdain…they never work; they never last. Photo Credit: DavidLose.net
For me, some do. One, in particular, from this year has sustained me through the whole of 2018. I had resolved that God’s voice would be the first I would tune to each morning. Through prayer; through meditation on His Word. Through listening. Cell phone and computer left off…for that bit of early morning. It’s been a very good thing. How about you? Any resolutions you have simmering in your thoughts? Give them a try…you never know when one will stick.[My resolutions for 2018 – revisiting them for 2019.]
Photo Credit: Pixabay
Photo Credit: Heartlight
Photo Credit: Faith Spilling Over, Betsy de Cruz
