Long Time, No Talk (or...Write)

Wordy Friends!

It has been a while.  While there are always thoughts, ideas, plans, and prayers flowing through my head, there is not always time to commit them all to paper!

This is Bizzy season at our house!  

We have baseball tournaments almost every weekend, practices during the week, homework, awards programs and ceremonies, orientations, parties, and the list goes on!  Not to mention STAAR/EOC testing...

It's also birthday season--one of my favorite times of the year!  My baby boy turned 14 on March 30.  My baby girl turns 15 on Friday!  How did this happen?  They are turning into such interesting,  remarkable individuals with great sensitivity and strength.

I always find myself reflective this time of year, not only because of our two babies--2 miracles I treasure remembering, but because of a very dear friend.  A dear friend who unselfishly hoped my baby came before hers.  A friend who cheered me on as a friend and as a parent.  A friend who became a mother just 4 days after me!  A friend who lived and died with faith, grace, and love.  Every year, around the birthdays of my 2 and her 2, I also feel a twinge, a tear slips quietly down, and many memories are quietly treasured.  I miss her!  I always will!  I also know she will be in my cloud, and I will hear her angel voice again.

Reminiscing on birthdays, 

a treasured friend, 

and the years and tears and laughter 

that have passed are a special story.  

The Story of Who We Are

This is not a story I could have ever written or created--in my wildest dreams or my darkest nightmares.  

Most of all, it is a story of true friendship, unconditional love, resiliency and how God works in all of it.  That is what keeps this mama going. I may not see the light every day, or lose sight of the end of the tunnel, but I know we are not in this alone.

And we have a story to tell.

There are many pieces to this story, just a few of which I have related in my blog.

As we continue in our journey in this life, I continue to see the resiliency and strength that has grown in us.  The last 3 years have been the hardest in our lives collectively and individually.  Yet, here we are.  A strong, loving family.  We do not doubt each other for a second. We don't have to agree, even on matters as big as faith and spirituality, but we know love and we do love, without conditions. 

 Love that does not leave, hide, shame, or condemn. 

A decision.

We have walked together a road no one could really walk with us at the time, nor were some willing to walk it with us.  And that, too, is part of our story and how we know what helps and what hurts.  

We use the pain with the joy to illumine the path for someone else. 

Using our story and allowing our story help others does not include sugar-coating, or over-looking, or ignoring the uglier, messier, hurtful parts.  And now, we have a witness, a track record, and we can walk with others.  Over and over that is being affirmed as we have had many opportunities outside of social media to cry with, hug, hold onto, text, and stand up for--families, individuals, and couples who wouldn't have known who to call or where to go for help. But we have, we will, and we're glad to make the way easier for someone else.

That is my moment of reflection on this day.

And because I know you need to hear encouragement, I want you to know that you need to hang in there.  Life is hard, damn hard. It will not always feel as hard as it does right now.  Life will get better.  And it will get hard again.  Yet, better again after that.  And some of us are going to need to hear your story.

I also want to share an article and a prayer that both ministered to me today, words I did not pen, words someone else needs to hear, too.

First some advice on what to NOT say to someone who has been hurt by a church or church people.  The article uses the term "spiritual abuse."  Don't let that throw you, and don't let it keep you from digging deeper.  It's a hard term to use. It's an even harder reality to live. But hang on.  Keep searching.  There will be a place that will care well for your soul, and I'm thankful to have found mine now after a string of hurtful church experiences.

www.relevantmagazine.com/god/church/what-not-say-someone-who-has-been-hurt-church#SGJpLuVBBY5QpPjs.99


And to close this post and this day, a prayer from Momastery's Glennon Melton:

A Prayer For All Of Us Today

"May God bless us with a restless discomfort about easy answers, half truths and superficial relationships - so that we may seek truth boldly and love deep with our hearts.

May God bless us with holy anger at injustice, oppression, and exploitation of people - so that we may tirelessly work for justice, freedom, and peace among all people.

May God bless us with the gift of tears to shed with those who suffer from pain, rejection, starvation, or the loss of all that they cherish - so that we may reach out our hand to comfort them and transform that pain to joy.

May God bless us with enough foolishness to believe that we really CAN make a difference in this world - so that we are able, with God's grace, to do what others claim cannot be done."- The Benedictines

YES, PLEASE. Send us discomfort, holy anger, tears and enough foolishness to use it all as fuel to heal the world.

Let us pray for Nepal and Baltimore and all those hurting but while we pray let us also MOVE OUR FEET AND REACH OUT OUR HANDS. After we have learned enough, let us get off the couch, turn off the tv, stop lamenting that we can't heal the whole world and GO OUTSIDE AND HEAL THE WORLD WITHIN OUR REACH.

Let us do for one what we wish we could do for the world. Small things today. Small things with great love.

Amen.