God is Good

...Well, that's what my son meant to write when he drew this picture on the first Sunday of Advent. A few letter reversals are to be expected from a 1st grader!

What was most striking to me was not the reversal of his "d" and "b", but what he drew. At first glance it looks like your average Christmas picture drawn by a child during a church service. That's what I thought until he started explaining it to me.

Yes, there's the manger and the animals, and the wise men, and the baby Jesus with Mary and Joseph. There are also angels in the sky, and if you look carefully at the angel in the upper left hand corner you will see that he carries something in each of his hands. The angel is carrying a chalice full of wine in his left hand and the bread in his right. The angel on the right carries two crosses, one in each hand. I thought this was somewhat unusual for a nativity drawing, so I questioned my son about why he included these elements in his picture. He looked at me and said, "Mom, Jesus didn't just come to be born, he came to die for us. You have to tell the whole story!"

Indeed, son! He was born to die so that we might live.

In these moments I am profoundly grateful for the liturgical worship which shapes the thoughts, ideas, and feelings of my children. They see, hear, taste, and even sometimes smell (yeah for incense!) the presence of God. They experience the Gospel concretely every week. God is not merely an abstraction for them. He is Someone who is actually present and knowable in the liturgy. Every Sunday, before the Eucharist, they hear our priest utter the same words from the prayer book:

Holy and gracious Father: In your infinite love you made us for yourself; and, when we had fallen into sin and become subject to evil and death, you , in your mercy, sent Jesus Christ, your only and eternal Son, to share our human nature, to live and die as one of us, to reconcile us to you, the God and Father of all.


He stretched out his arms upon the cross, and offered himself, in obedience to your will, a perfect sacrifice for the whole world.

On the night he was handed over to suffering and death, our Lord Jesus Christ took bread; and when he had given thanks to you, he broke it, and gave it to his disciples, and said, "Take, eat: This is my Body, which is given for you. Do this for the remembrance of me."

After supper he took the cup of wine; and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, and said, "Drink this, all of you: This is my Blood of the new Covenant, which is shed for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins. Whenever you drink it, do this for the remembrance of me." (BCP, pp. 362-363)

For my children, these are not just rote words or meaningless repetition uttered by the priest before they take communion. Rather, they declare a spiritual reality which pierces deeply into their psyche and forms their very souls -- so much so that my six year-old son, sketching a picture during Mass, doesn't fail to include the story of Good Friday and Easter in his Christmas drawing.

Household Humor

We have had some interesting conversations in our household this evening. It started with an interaction between my husband and I after he arrived home from work.

Interaction #1:

J. had had a difficult day at work. Being an empathic wife :>), I listened to him when he called on the phone and then gave him some space when he came home. Finally, in an attempt to be supportive, I asked him, "What do you need, dear?" He looked at me and said, "Honey, if I knew what I needed I would be a woman."

Interaction #2:

We have family Bible reading and prayer after dinner in our home. This evening's reading were about Jacob wrestling with God and Jacob's subsequent reunion with his brother, Esau. We discussed with them what it meant to wrestle with God, and the significance of Jacob's name being changed. Then, we reminded them of why Jacob was nervous to meet Esau after all that had happened between them. My husband, hoping to draw some modern day parallels relevant to sibling relationships, asked the children what they had learned from the lesson. Our youngest, dear Miss B., piped up and said with a totally straight face, "I learned you shouldn't listen to your mother. After all, it was Jacob's mother who told him to dress like his brother and make the soup and steal the blessing."

Thank God for humor. In the midst of much stress and chaos it is surely welcome!

A Weekend in Downieville

My family ushered in the Fall by going camping this weekend in the Tahoe National Forest. Despite the intermittent rain, we spend a glorious 48 hours up in the mountains near Downieville (a mountain-bikers version of heaven -- just ask Uncle S!) reconnecting with each other.

Leaves beginning to turn colors

J. walking behind our camping area

We went hiking on the banks of the North Yuba River. Along the way my dear little B. found a lizard which she quickly made into a pet. It was only too willing to oblige her since her hand was the warmest surface around!

J., J., and B. walking along the Yuba River

B. with her "pet" lizard

We also ran across a few frogs. J. thought this was really cool and spent lots of time trying to catch them.

One of J's frog friends

We picked blackberries and climbed hills and went on hikes. And when it rained we hung out in our trailer and played cards games and dice games (5000 and 'Stack 'Em') and read books and rested.

B. hiking up the side of a small hill, trying to keep up with R. and J.

Our camping site

It was the most restful experience I have had in a long time! Thanks be to God for the mountains!

Living the Gospel

I spent a good bit of the past three days (Thursday-Saturday) at a large, nondenominational church in a town in the foothills half-way between Sacramento and Lake Tahoe. I was asked to come and teach the Lay Counseling Training Seminar that I do for other churches closer to my home.

I knew very little about this church, except that it was large church (ASA of about 2500). The woman in charge of this area of ministry in their church contacted me after being given my name by two different churches. I hadn't met her or any of the staff before I went up the hill on Thursday to start teaching. I was a little nervous about the job, not knowing them or the expectations they had for the training. And, come to find out, last week they got really nervous about me, realizing that they had hired me "blind", without the benefit of an audio tape or even seeing my written materials!

I met C. (the lady who hired me) at the church, even though the training was taking place at a different venue. I was introduced to some of the staff, one of whom was the senior pastor, though you would never have know it by his youthful appearance and casual dress. As I met more of the staff I was struck both with how friendly and how "at home" most of these people seemed to be in their own skin. There were very genuine and I found myself drawn to them.

It was rather unusual for me to feel such a kindred spirit with people whom I hardly new. Part of the reason was the setting. I am not drawn to the "mega church" structure or mentality. Their worship center is a large auditorium with orange plastic chairs and a large stage, complete with drums and large speakers and more electronic equipment that I could name. As a liturgical Christian who loves to worship in my old, stained-glass filled church with an organ and choral music and weekly Eucharist, I thought,"I could attend a concert here, but I would find it difficult to worship here."

However, as I got to know the people over the course of the three days I found myself truly awe-struck by the ways in which these people lived the gospel. I taught a group of about 40 people, most of whom were leaders of some sort in the church (elders, pastors, and lay leaders). They seemed not at all interested in how to grow their church numbers, but, they were VERY interested in how to meet the real physical, emotional, and spiritual needs of the people in their surrounding community!

Most of their "programming" was geared toward helping others. They had over 20 ministries devoted to meeting the needs of hurting people, most of whom were not church going folk! I was blown away by the number of ministries they had and the way in which they appeared to integrate with ease people from any walk of life into their community. They seemed to incarnate the saying of St. Francis, "Preach the gospel at all time, if necessary, use words."

Before I left on Saturday, one of the ladies stood up and asked if the group could pray for me and for my church (the larger Episcopal Church and Anglican Communion). All 40 people in the room stood up and gathered around me to pray. I was literally brought to tears as these people prayed for me, for my parish back in the Central Valley, and for the issues of the larger Episcopal church. They prayed for unity, for repentance, and for healing in a denomination with which most of them were unfamiliar. It didn't matter. What mattered to them was that I (and the Episcopal church) was part of the body of Christ and we were hurting.

I met Jesus anew as I taught these people. I was both blessed and changed as a result of encountering them. May God bless this church and its people!

Anniversary Dinner

We were treated to a lovely anniversary dinner last night. R. and K. made chicken, spinach salad (they even made the dressing!), garlic bread, and a scrumptious chocolate raspberry cake for dessert!

Here are some pictures from the night:

The kids around the dinner table, waiting for the adults to join them!

R. and K. holding the cake they made. The red in the middle of the center heart says "14", indicating the number of years we have been married.

I'm almost back to blogland....oh, and Happy Anniversary to us!

No, I haven't dropped off the face of the earth, though many times during this past month it might have seemed an attractive option! No, instead I have either been ill or attending to ill members of my family for the past month. We set a new family record in August -- at least one out of the five of us was ill ever day ! Some days we hit four out of five! It was not pretty. It was actually depressing and miserable.

And, added to the stress of seemingly perpetual illness were other incidental stressors such as taking care of and potty training a very active puppy, starting up homeschooling with 4 kids, preparing for my September speaking engagements, and the duties associated with functioning as the vice-chairman of the search committee at church. It was enough to push me over the edge. I felt like I was hanging on by a thread, and that thread was God's sustaining grace. My mantra was "Lord, give me enough grace to do what I need to do in the next hour." It was, obviously, a mantra I had to repeat often!

Despite the chaos and stress of the last month, I actually have blog posts which are ready to be written. Frankly, I just haven't had the time to sit down and unpack them so that I can share them. They are coming though. I just need a chunk of time and space to be alone before I can write anything of substance. So, hopefully, within a week or so I will have something up.

On a completely different note.............

Today is my and JT's 14th wedding anniversary. I am thankful to God for the incredible man I married 14 years ago today. He, more than any other human being, has incarnated the love and grace of Jesus Christ to me. I am in large part the person I am today because of my relationship with him. I am truly thankful for my husband and my marriage.

Friends from So. Cal are visiting this week and their eldest daughter (and my goddaughter), K., and my eldest daughter, R., are busy (as I type this) cooking a surprise anniversary dinner, complete with dessert, for us this evening. They already cooked us breakfast this morning :)

It has been a good day, and I have much for which to be thankful.

Hello, Molly!

This is our new chocolate lab, Miss Molly Merlot. We named her Molly, which means "bittersweet". Her arrival is truly bittersweet for us, since the only reason we have a new dog is that our former chocolate lab, Gracie, died of cancer two weeks ago.

The children are already quite attached to this new member of the family. She is truly delightful and is proving to be good therapy for us. It is a nice change to have something to celebrate rather than something to grieve!

I am sure I will be blogging about Molly in the future. Having a puppy in the house usually means a good story or two or three...

So, here's Molly!

Saying Goodbye

These past few weeks have been littered with good-byes. We said goodbye to our dear chocolate lab, Gracie, who past away while we were in Minnesota. Although not unexpected, it was still hard. The children’s biggest regret: “We weren’t able to say goodbye.” I reminded them that we had been saying goodbye for weeks now, ever since April when she received the diagnosis of stage 5 lymphoma. It wasn’t much comfort to the kids. They wanted more closure. They wanted to have that concrete memory of saying goodbye “for the last time.”

Interestingly, our process with Gracie paralleled the grief process we were experiencing with losing our rector and his wife. We found out in early May that they were leaving our parish. Since that time we have been to numerous dinners and events, all to say “goodbye” to them. It was two long months of saying goodbye.

Being a psychologist, one would think that saying goodbye would be something I might do well. Alas, it has always been the hardest part of my job as a therapist and something which I prefer to avoid at a personal level. But, it is unavoidable. Life is filled with goodbyes, and these partings are usually painful.

Last night we said our final goodbyes to our rector and his wife. We had dinner, we laughed, and we swapped vacation stories. Someone looking in on that dinner from the outside probably wouldn’t have guessed that we were meeting one last time to say goodbye. It wasn’t sad, it wasn’t “heavy”, there were no tears shed. It just was.

We returned to their empty home, the moving van having driven away with the contents of their home right before we left for dinner, and we talked some more and took more pictures and gave more hugs. Slowly, more people started to stop by their home to say their final goodbyes. Within a half of an hour there were twelve of us crammed into the kitchen, hanging out and standing around the center island. Despite the repeated offer from Dearest Dragonfly to go outside and sit down on the porch, no one seemed to want to leave the comfortable and close confines of the kitchen. There we were, enjoying the gift of relationship just as we had done so many times over the last few years in this very same kitchen, and we didn’t want to move. It was as though we wanted to freeze time and preserve this kairos moment.

Eventually champagne was opened and poured and a toast was made “to friendship.” It was at that moment that God’s grace penetrated the sadness and grief I was feeling deep inside. I looked around, and I realized that the evening’s gathering, this small group of people hanging out in the kitchen, all bound by the common thread of love for Fr. C. and Dearest Dragonfly and love for the Lord Jesus, who made us one in Him, was a foreshadowing. This really wasn't the end, it was just a snapshot of what is ultimately true. It was a small, but glorious, taste of the heavenly banquet which is to come.

And in that moment I was thankful -- thankful that I had the privilege of knowing and loving Fr. C. and DD, thankful for the imprint that they made on my life and the life of my family, and thankful for the privilege of serving the Lord Jesus alongside all the people who were hanging out in that kitchen. The work of the Lord goes on, and I am His servant. We may no longer serve side by side with Fr. C. and DD, but in the end, we all get to gather at the same table, and this time, it's for eternity.

Thanks be to God.

"O the love of my Lord
Is the essence
Of all that I love here on earth.
All the beauty I see
He has given to me,
And His giving is gentle as silence."
- song from the Waymarks CD

On Vacation

Blogging will be minimal for the next two weeks. My family is currently in route to Minnesota to celebrate my in-law's 50th wedding anniversary.

Toward the beginning to middle of next week I may have pictures, and more than a few anecdotes, from the visit. If we have access to wireless at our hotel I will try to post something then.

Blessings!

An Unexpected Gift

As I was working on the computer this morning my 6 year-old twins burst in from outside yelling at me to "come and see R. and this bird she is singing to and holding in her hand." They proceeded to tell me, in their rapid, animated voices, the story about this bird, who was hanging out in their "fort" (an old walnut tree stump hidden by the shoots springing up all around the base of the trunk).

Apparently, R. saw the bird nestled in the branches while they were sitting on the stump playing "elf princess." Ever the romantic child, with visions of Snow White and Brian Jacques' Redwall characters in her mind, she started singing to it as she held out her open palm to him. The bird jumped into her hand!


I have to say that I was a bit skeptical. I thought that perhaps the twins, in all their excitement, were embellishing a little. Nevertheless, I followed them downstairs and took my camera outside to find R., confident that by this time I was not going to actually see her with a bird. But, I was willing to be with her in her excitement and listen to her story.


What I found when I made it outside was an 11 year-old girl singing Brahms' "Ladybug" and various Anglican hymns to this tiny bird perched in her hand. I couldn't believe my eyes. The bird was not attempting to fly away, but was sitting contentedly in her open palm. Every now and then the bird would chirp along with her as she sang. It was an incredible sight.

The kids were beyond delighted as they sang to and observed this small, unexpected gift of grace which had interrupted their morning play.

And I, as their mother, was thankful for the experience. I was thankful that they had the capacity to observe, wonder, and reflect on all the beauty that this moment held. I was also profoundly grateful to God for the reminder that His grace can sometimes be found in very unexpected places -- even among a young mockingbird with a penchant for Anglican hymns!

The Soul's Requirement

My three children, ages 11, 6, and 6, have a wonderful capacity to connect deeply with the significant people in their world. They desire to know and to be known by those with whom they interact on a consistent basis. As their mother, and as a clinical psychologist, I encourage this type of connection, and see it as a sign of healthy attachment.

They know that they were made for relationships. They have been hearing that said since they were old enough to talk – it’s sort of a mantra in our household: “You were made for relationship with God and for relationship with others.” My husband and I orient our lives and the lives of our children around the truth contained in that sentence. We believe that true health only comes through recognition of our dependence on God as our Source and acceptance of His gift of salvation for our redemption. In addition to that, health requires that we attempt to live in authentic connectedness with our fellow human beings – “to know and be known.” .

This weekend my kids found out that there is a down side to embracing this philosophy of their parents’: It is incredibly painful to have those we love leave us, even if they are doing so for appropriate and God-ordained reasons.

We had a farewell brunch at church after the Mass on Sunday for our rector and his wife, Father Dan and Brenda. We also had to say goodbye to one of the members of our youth group, delightful Miss L., who is leaving to attend college on the east coast later this week. All three of these individuals have been very influential in my children’s lives and hold special places in their hearts.

While all of my children are sad and grieving these losses, my six year-old son, J., who is cut from a rather deeply contemplative fabric, seems to be having the hardest time. Yesterday, when he was saying goodbye to Fr. Dan after the brunch, he went up and hugged Father and lingered there holding on to him. I was standing behind my son watching this interaction. I finally helped extricate Fr. Dan from my son’s embrace by assuring J. that this wasn’t the last time he would be seeing Fr. Dan and Brenda.

Last night, during our family prayer time, all three of the children chose to pray for Dan+ and Brenda. Our eldest daughter prayed for safety as they traveled to Indiana, our other daughter, J.’s twin and our social butterfly, prayed that God would help them find new friends in Indiana, but, J.’s prayer struck a different chord. J. prayed that Dan+ and Brenda wouldn’t forget us when they moved away.

I’m glad he can give a voice to his fears. It’s one of the primary things all of us fear with loss, really: Are we significant enough to be remembered and held in the hearts of those who are leaving (or those whom we are leaving)?

J.’s process is quite normal for a six year-old experiencing his first taste of significant loss. He hasn’t lived long enough to know what is on the other side: The making of new relationships, connections, and memories with another priest, youth member, etc. whom he can also love. It is not that these new relationships will replace Dan+ and Brenda, or Miss L. But, he will learn that he has a larger capacity for connectedness than he realizes, and that this enlarged capacity does not diminish the very real love and connection that he still maintains with these others in his heart and memory. He can have both. When this hits him (in a few years) he will also realize that people he loves like Dan+, Brenda, and Miss L. can have both too, and that he is still held in their memory because they, too, have loved him.

But right now we are living in the moment, on the precipice of this great loss, and J. is still only six. The only thing he can see is that Mom and Dad think connection is a great thing, but he sees, and he now knows experientially, that connection hurts when it is lost or about to be lost. To him there is something intrinsically wrong with this. And he is right. If we were made for connection, how can we bear separation?

There is really only one answer that ultimately satisfies, and it is the answer of the Cross: We can bear the separation because we know that because of the cross it is only temporary. We can bear the separation because the One who made us also holds us all in His hands, and has connected us into one Body through his Son. We can bear the separation because the same Holy Spirit living in us lives in them and can touch them even when we can’t.

That is our hope. That is what makes these upcoming separations bearable.

So, how do we convey this to our son in a way that is meaningful?

First, we help him acknowledge his feelings of sadness and loss. Those feelings are very real and very strong right now, and, he’s not the only one who is feeling them! It has been one wild weekend of emotion, both at the church and in our home! Next, we use this opportunity to teach him about the Holy Spirit and about our fundamental interconnectedness in Christ. In other words, we teach him to pray for the people he is missing. When he (or one of his sisters) is sad about these upcoming losses, we are present with him in that sadness and then pray with him right then and ask the Holy Spirit both to comfort us and to bless Fr. Dan and Brenda and Miss L. We use those feelings which tell us “something is wrong” as cues to direct him back to his Source, back to Jesus, and back into the state for which he was created: Dependence on God.

May God use this time of pain and loss to transform our souls, and to conform us into the likeness His Son.


"Learning is the soul's requirement, and suffering its most persuasive teacher" - Stephen Lawhead

The Cost of Discipleship

Ah...the project I have been working on for the past week is finally completed and I now have room to come up for air and think about other things I have been keeping on the back burner.

One of the things I have been holding onto is a comment made by my younger daughter in church last Sunday. The reading from the gospel of Luke dealt with discipleship and its cost. As Father C. was preaching and relating Jesus' words to would-be followers who had things to do before they followed Jesus, B. reached over and tapped my arm. I bent my head down to her level and she whispered in my ear, "Boy mom, it sure must be hard to get disciples!."

At first I laughed. But then, the profundity of what she said sunk in, and it hit me: She's right!

What my younger daughter "catches" is that it costs something to follow Jesus. She also understands intuitively that the demands of Christian discipleship are not particularly popular in modern culture. We tend to want the benefits, but not the cost of discipleship.

The word disciple comes from the Latin discipulus, i, which means "student(s)." To be a disciple of Jesus means that we are committed to learning how, with God's help, to live as Jesus would want us to live. We commit to being a student of Jesus Christ. We study what he said and attempt to do what he did in order to be like Him. It involves a process of dying to self that is often painful and definitely counter-cultural.

So yes, my darling B., it is hard to be a disciple. But it is in that very process of dying to self that we learn how to become more like our Lord. Discipleship to Jesus Christ is not necessarily easy, but it is the most rewarding way to live. It is truly the only way to really live. It is my earnest prayer that you and your brother and sister spend your lives learning how to delight in and live for the Lord Jesus.

Lack of Posts

I haven't had the time or energy to generate new posts recently because I am working on a project which is taking up most of my free time. The project itself is a delight, but it is very time consuming and emotionally draining. It is currently occupying the "internal space" from which my blog entries are generated.

So, I will be back, but probably not for another week!

Too Busy!

I have a new litmus test for whether or not I am too busy: Do I have time to reflect sufficiently about the events in my life such that I could compose a blog entry about something that happened?

The obvious answer for the last week has been, "No." I haven't written on the blog in over a week. When I realized this I though about the last week, and determined that I have been running from appointment, to event, to project almost constantly. Yikes! I hate it when I slide into that mode of operating.

It is not a good way to live.

When I am this busy I lose the ability to see with the "eyes of my heart." Instead, I shift into an efficiency mode that makes me border on the tyrannical with my kids and husband. I become singularly focused -- it's all about "getting things done." I hate it when I do that. Yet I, like the apostle Paul, continue to do "that which I hate."

My younger daughter brought me back to reality yesterday. We were at church, and she was looking at one of the many beautiful stained glass windows which adorn our parish. She looked up at one of the windows which portrays Jesus carrying a lamb over his shoulders and said confidently to me, "Mom, you see that picture? That's Jesus, and he's carrying me. I'm His lamb" Then she bopped off to look at something else with her brother.

The simplicity of her statement and her confidence that the Lord Jesus is with her and carries her through her daily life hit me right between the eyes. The message to me was clear: "Slow down, and let me carry you. "

Message received, at least for now.

A Father's Day Tribute - My Dad

This weekend we are celebrating fathers. There have been many men in my life who have been influential, so I thought it would be edifying to talk this week about three fathers who, up to this point, have had the biggest impact on my life.

The first is, of course, my own father. My dad is a great man. He was a good father, and he is a fantastic grandfather. Family was and still is very important to him. He turned down jobs in which he would have earned a lot more money and gained a lot more prestige than the job he settled into. Why? - Because it required travel and moving his family around the country. He grew up moving from town to town and state to state, and didn’t like it. He didn’t think that kind of a lifestyle would be good for his family.

One of my earliest memories of my dad is from the age of about two. I remember curling up on his chest after my nightly bath, suited in my footy-pajamas, and listening to the beating of his heart as he patted my back. It was a moment which personified how I felt when I was with my dad: wanted, protected, and loved. That is a grid which I was fortunate enough to have from the time I was very little. This sense of feeling wanted and loved, particularly by my father, formed an expectation in my two year-old mind that God was similar to my father. As a result, I have never really doubted whether or not I was wanted and loved by God. That is a gift I have always had, and for that I thank my dad.

As I continued to grow and develop into a young lady, my dad was a steady presence. He was there to cheer me on as I participated in school plays, basketball and soccer games and other activities with which I managed to get involved. It was remarkable to me how few fathers attended these events, but mine always seemed to be there. During my senior year in high school, when I was captain of the girl’s soccer team, he arranged his schedule at work so he could be present at my afternoon games. I don’t think he missed one game. I can still see him standing there on the side-lines with my mother, cheering me on as I played.

I can remember numerous occasions on which he told me he loved me, and that he was proud of me. I thought it was normal for parents to say such things to their kids. It was only when I was much older that I realized that not all parents, and particularly not all fathers, were verbal with their children about the affection and pride they may have felt toward them.

After graduating with my Ph.D., my dad asked for a copy of my dissertation. He actually stayed up one night and read it! I think he is probably the only person besides the members of my dissertation committee who actually read my research. The performance of Asian and Hispanic American college students on the Supplementary Scales of the MMPI-2 is not exactly riveting reading! (Trust me on this – I have never felt compelled to re-read my dissertation.)

To know what a truly remarkable man he is, you also have to know that my dad did not have a father who modeled any of these traits for him. My grandfather, may he rest in peace, was not a good husband or a good father the first time he attempted to fill the roles. As a matter of fact, he was quite the opposite. My dad had to consciously decide to be different from what he knew a “father” to be. And he succeeded marvelously.

Was he perfect? No. No one is. We had our issues, particularly in adolescence. But we worked through them, and ultimately stayed connected. Our connection is stronger now because of those hard times.

What I respect most about my dad is the conscious decision he made to not be like his father. It would have been easy for him to do what he knew, and to behave like his father behaved. Statistically, I should have had a very different childhood from the one I had. Most men who grow up in homes like the one my dad grew up in turn out very differently. But, my dad made a choice; he wasn’t going to be like that. And he wasn’t.

He and my mother will have been married 42 years this summer. Both of his children and all three of his grandchildren love him and are in relationship with him. Truth be told, all of us would do anything we could for him.

The legacy he leaves is substantially different from the one his father left.

Thanks be to God for my dad.

A Week Revisited

This has been a difficult and discouraging week. Events alluded to here have snowballed, and my husband and I are spending a lot of time reminding each other that our job is to obey and be faithful to God with our lives; it is His job to take care of the stressful events that we find ourselves in the middle of right now.

All of this by way of introduction to say that I have had very little time to ponder things that I could actually blog about. I have a few blogs which are half written, but, I seem to have lost my inspiration to finish them, at least for the time being. Maybe next week will be a better week...

As I am writing this my 11 year-old daughter (Mini-me), who makes it a habit to read my blog, bops in and reads the above paragraphs. She looks at me and says admonishingly, "Mom, when I am having a hard time you always encourage me to look at the things in my life that are good, and give thanks to God for how He's blessed me. Maybe you should do that and you'll have a better week, or at least a better outlook!"

*sigh* I hate it when my own words are preached back to me by my eldest child. But, I believe she's right. I suppose I should practice what I preach!

So, what happened this week for which I can give thanks?

* Good friends called, e-mailed, got together for coffee to talk with me. I am thankful for the gift of friendship.

* My mother celebrated her __ birthday. I am thankful that I have a wonderful extended family living near us, all of whom are very involved in our lives and supportive of us as a family.

* One of the youth from our church's youth group (which I lead) graduated from high school. We went to her graduation party. I am thankful for her and for the ways in which she has touched my life.

* I spent an hour Friday evening on my riding lawn mower with my younger daughter. We had a delightful time talking about the birds and the trees and how we really shouldn't run over daddy's sprinklers :)

* My husband and I were able to spend time sitting outside drinking a glass of Merlot before dinner last night.

* The kids put on a musical "production" last night, with R. on the piano, and J. and B. acting out various dramatic scenes. It was both hilarious and touching, depending on the song. We really do enjoy our children!

I think I feel better already!

A Prayer for my Children and Godchildren

Almighty God, heavenly Father, you have blessed us with the joy and care of children: Give us calm strength and patient wisdom as we bring them up, that we may teach them to love whatever is just and true and good, following the example of our Savior Jesus Christ. Amen

and...

God our Father, you see your children growing up in an unsteady and confusing world: Show them that your ways give more life than the ways of the world, and that following you is better than chasing after selfish goals. Help them to take failure, not as a measure of their worth, but as a chance for a new start. Give them strength to hold their faith in you, and to keep alive their joy in your creation; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen

BCP, 829

May the Lord bless and keep you, dear children (R.,J.,R.,K.,C.,A.,A.,Z., M., and V.) and may you always hearken to the voice of the One who knows you and loves you best!

My love and prayers for you all this day,
your mother and godmother

Retro Satana!

My daughter (R.) and I were studying Latin together today. (That is one of the perks of homeschooling - I get to learn things along with her). The Latin program we use combines grammar, vocabulary and Latin sayings into each week's lesson. Well, the Latin saying for this week is "Retro Satana!", or "get thee behind me, Satan!" R. and I laughed out loud at the choice of this particular saying, and had fun using it throughout the day, in appropriately humorous ways, on each other. For example, when I reminded her to finish her Latin homework, she responded with "Retro Satana!", and a wink.

The saying is an abbreviation of Jesus' words taken out of Mark and John, and, according to our Latin program, is to be taken as an admonition to avoid and stand strong against temptation.

These were words I needed to hear today.

It is easy for me, at this particular time in my life, to get into an emotional "funk." My dog is still in the process dying, my rector and his wife are still leaving our parish, and the winds of change continue to blow hard in my neck of the woods right now. There is not a lot that feels solid and constant. As a result, it is hard for me not to give in to anxiety and despair over the state of current events, particularly when others in my environment are bathing, not to say drowning, in these two emotions.

Change is hard. I have never liked it. I would rather know what is going to happen in my life, how it is going to happen, and be prepared. That, of course, puts me squarely in the driver's seat and removes any room for trust and faith in God. In my humanness, I crave this kind of god-like control. It allows me to hold on to the illusion that I, by doing something, can manipulate my environment and make everything all right.

But, it is an illusion. Self-sufficiency is an illusion. I belong to God. My very existence depends upon His sustaining grace. He is not unaware of or disinterested in the happenings in my life, nor is He allowing the events to unfold in ways that will be ultimately injurious to my spiritual health. But the process might hurt. It might feel (DOES FEEL!) out of control and scary.

It is in these moments that I have a choice to make: Do I give in to the fear and need for control, or do I fall back into the arms of my loving Savior, trusting in Him to work in these events for my good? The temptation to seize control, and make myself "feel better" by doing something, is great.

So, at this moment, as events in my life seem out of control, I utter "Retro Satana!", and pray that I have the faith to trust in God and not give way to anxiety and despair.

Reflections on a Journey

In the Fall of 2003 my husband and I made a decision which drastically changed our lives and the lives of our children: we joined an Anglican (not to say, Episcopalian, :D) church. This was, admittedly, a rather odd time for a Bible-believing Christian family to join an Episcopal church. The consecration of an openly partnered gay bishop in the state of New Hampshire had just occurred, and the Episcopal church was making headlines in both the secular and religious media.

Quite frankly, many people thought we were nuts! Both my husband and I had impeccable evangelical credentials. That we would even entertain such a move was beyond belief. I spent a lot of time explaining how the parish we were considering joining was not that kind of Episcopal church. I took pains assuring both friends and family members that the bishop of the diocese and the rector of the parish actually believed the creeds of the church and believed that the Bible was the Word of God; to be followed as our rule of life, not merely as a book of culturally-dated suggestions. (It helped that our rector was a former Baptist who had attended an evangelical college in Southern California :D)

Our journey into the Anglican church did not occur quickly or easily. We visited the church, on and off, for over a year. I met with the rector privately, we prayed and talked through our process with our friends and family, and we read books written by and about people who had made a similar journey before we made the decision to commit to our current parish. It was both an exhilarating and frightening change for us. It was clear that the Spirit was leading us here, but scary to venture into a tradition which was so different from what we had previously known.

I come from a Baptist background. My mother and her father before her were Baptists. I was raised, "catechized", and baptized in a Southern Baptist church not five miles from our current parish. I left home and attended an evangelical university, and my husband and I attended evangelical churches in Southern California after we married. When we moved back to the Central Valley we chose to worship at the large Baptist church my parents attended.

But, for reasons I couldn't describe well back in 2003, I needed something more than my experience of worship in the Baptist church. Something was missing. Even though my husband and I went to church with our children every Sunday, even though I taught Sunday school and used my gifts as a psychologist to give seminars, to speak at the women's retreat, and to talk to MOPS groups, my soul felt as though it was withering. I couldn't explain what was happening to me, but I had a different spiritual experience when I visited St. John's.

In an attempt to "sit on the fence" and experience the best of both worlds, I would often run downtown to our current parish and attend the 10:30 mass after the early service at the Baptist church was over. I would slip in and sit near the back. As the mass began I could feel myself being swept up into a larger drama that the church catholic has been reenacting since its inception. I knew I was both observing and participating in something that was so much larger than me and my existence at this particular point in time. I knew that for that moment, I was, quite literally, joining with "angels and archangels, and all the company of heaven." It was the first time I had truly experienced myself as part of the larger body of Christ.

During the mass I was repeatedly touched by the Holy Spirit in ways I can't even begin to describe. Every visit, as the procession of the mass started, the people bowed in reverence at the cross as it was being carried by the crucifer past their pew, and I shivered. These people, with bodies bent, were showing respect for, and giving deference to, the cross of Jesus Christ and all it represented -- not the gold, not the literal piece of metal on a pole, but the sign, the symbol of the very reason by which we are able to even approach the altar of God.

Involuntarily, the tears would well up in my eyes and start to trickle slowly down my face. And then, as it was time for communion, and I observed people from every walk of life line up to accept the body and blood of the Lord Jesus, offered for their sins and mine, the tears would come more freely. By the time I knelt at the altar and crossed my open palms to receive personally "the Body of Christ, the Bread of Heaven", I was weeping.

I experienced the presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist in ways I had never experienced Him before. I found Christ literally present, not merely symbolically recalled. I found myself, with the other members of the congregation, entering into and sharing in the paschal mystery of Christ. We, as a body, were joined with Him as the perfect sacrifice, made acceptable in the sight of the Father.

What I discovered at St. John's was the necessity of liturgy, or, literally, "the work of the people." My work; indeed, my duty, is to offer myself and my praise to the Living God, in the only way I can - through the sacrifice of His Son.

It is for this I was made.

And so, to my rich evangelical heritage my new-found Anglican faith adds a crucial component: an emphasis on Eucharist to go with my already well-developed emphasis on God's Word.

Thanks be to God for them both!

The End of the Day

O gracious Light,
pure brightness of the everliving Father in heaven,
O Jesus Christ, holy and blessed!

Now as we come to the setting of the sun,

and our eyes behold the vesper light,

We sing your praises, O God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,

You are worthy at all times to be praised by happy voices,
O Son of God, O Giver of life,
and to be glorified through all the worlds.

BCP, 112

Tractor Therapy

This has been a hard week. I was sick, my two younger kids were sick, my husband was away for two days to attend meetings for work, my neighbor was being a jerk (later blog!), and life was just generally very busy. As a result, I had little time to contemplate on all the goings-on in my life.

Luckily, Saturday was lawn-mowing day! This meant I got to hop on my John-Deere riding lawn mower for about two hours and ride up and down and around our two-acre property. There were no phones ringing that I "had" to answer, no delightful children yelling, "Mom" (at least that I could hear!), no other activity in which I could, or "should", be engaged - just me and my mower.

I have found mowing to be a very contemplative activity. I know the task well, and have done it so often, that I don't have to think about what I am doing. To which my husband now adds, "That's why you run over so many sprinklers with the mower!" I think he is being sarcastic, not enlightened, so I will choose to ignore him right now and continue with my contemplative musings...

This Saturday morning, with every lap of the mower, I could feel my head clearing. Stuff that had been waiting to be emotionally and spiritually unpacked was finding its way into my consciousness, and into relationship with the One who made me. Eventually, the hum of the lawn mower engine was drowned out by the deep sense of calm and peace that I found in communing with God and inviting Him in to investigate the deep spaces of my soul.

What I found was that my perspective on things changed when I had time and space to filter the week's experiences, and my reactions to them, through the grid of prayer and relationship with the Lord Jesus. I find that God is a great mirror; a gentle and loving, but also painfully accurate mirror. It is with Him that I see myself most clearly and experience myself most honestly. So, as I was sitting upon my bright green and yellow tractor, I found that my irritation with others softened; I could see my own sin in the happenings of the week more clearly (not always an easy task for me). Gratitude for the important people and things in my life came back to the center, and I repented of my impatience and self-centeredness which I displayed numerous times throughout the week, particularly with those closest to me.

So, after two hours I hopped off my tractor a somewhat different person than when I hopped on. Hopefully some of that change has stuck, and I am a little bit more like the Lord Jesus today than I was yesterday.

I guess I'll find out next Saturday...

Twin Musings

I love watching my children's relationship with God blossom and unfold. One of my greatest delights as a mother is to witness their internal response as they sense the movement of the Holy Spirit in their lives. In the past couple of weeks I have been able to observe or participate in a couple of such interactions.

During the church service on Mother's Day my six-year old son was sitting on his father's lap listening to the reading from the epistle appointed for the day. It happened to be the passage out of Revelation 21:10, 22- 22:5

"And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me the holy city, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God,...And the city has no need of the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God has illumined it, and its lamp is the lamb..."

As the lector was reading this passage I happened to glance over at my son. I noticed that he was staring intently at the stained glass window located above the southern entrance of our church (pictured above). I watched as he began tapping his dad excitedly on the arm, but, my husband, who was listening to the reading, ignored him. J. looked up again at the window, then back to his father. Finally, I saw him take his hand and gently put it on his father's cheek in order to move his face into a position in which he, too, could view the stained glass. It was as though he was saying, "Dad, you don't just have to listen to him read about it, you can actually SEE it. LOOK, isn't it beautiful!?"

He was excited that he had made a connection between the window he was seeing and the Scripture he was hearing read aloud in church. I was excited because I could see in him an attunement to spiritual things and an internal "yes" response to the Lord Jesus. May it ever be so!

The second event occurred just two days ago. My six year-old daughter brought me a picture she had made for her older sister. She wanted to tell me about the picture she had drawn of Jesus' crucifixion. Apparently Holy Week made quite an impression on her this year!

She proceeded to tell me, as a good classical education student should, a narrative about the picture I was seeing.

It went something like this:

B: "This is Jesus on the cross. He is very sad. He is saying the words to that song that daddy sang after Fr. Dan washed your feet and all the lights went out. You know, the one about God leaving him."

Me: "You mean "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" from Psalm 22 that the choir sang on Maundy Thursday?"

B: "Yes, that one. See how his mouth is open and he is saying that?"

Me: "Yes, I do. You did a nice job. Who are the two people there by the cross?"

B: "Mary and John, of course." (Becca likes to use the words, "of course" a lot!)

Me: "What are they doing?"

B: "Mom! (indignantly) They are crying. Wouldn't you be crying if your only son or your best friend was dying on a cross for all the sins of the world?"

She gets it! Praise God!

Enough said.

Lessons From An Icon

Since becoming a liturgical Christian, I have loved celebrating the fact that Easter is not just a day, it's a season. It is 50 days of “Alleluias” and remembrances of the reality that is the foundation of our faith. Because of this, the knowledge that the Lord is risen, and sits at the right hand of the Father at this present moment, has taken on a new meaning for me. Death, and all that it entails, has been conquered. “Christ is risen from the dead! Trampling down death by death! And upon those in the tomb, bestowing Life!” There is now a remedy for the deep rift that exists within my soul, the rift of being an eternal creature damned in a temporal existence, separated from God by my own sin and the reality of the Fall.


My favorite icon is called “The Harrowing of Hell." It sits in the corner of our dining room, in a position which allows me and my family to view it whenever we sit down at the table to eat, do crafts, or homeschool. This means that it is within my view, and therefore available for my contemplation, for a good part of any given day. It depicts Jesus standing over the broken gates of Hell, perched on two coffin lids configured in the shape of a cross, pulling out Adam and Eve, holding each by the hand and bringing them up, out of Hell, to be with Him. Standing by, watching in the background as witnesses to this long sought-after event, are many of the Old Testament saints ranging from Moses to Jesus’ forerunner, John the Baptist.

I find this icon especially comforting when I am faced with the realities of grief and loss in my own life. It reminds me that the story is not over. The endings I have experiences do not constitute all of reality. What I see as an ending, is, in reality, a beginning, and a continuation of “Reality” for those whom I have lost to death or geographical distance.

Since Easter Sunday of this year I have either experienced personally, or been made aware of much personal grief and loss. In mid-April our delightful 2 year-old chocolate lab, Gracie, was diagnosed by the vets at UC Davis with cancer. She was given about 4-6 weeks to live. This came as quite a shock to our family. We love this dog. She is truly a beautiful Labrador Retriever and her personality is as equally impressive as her appearance. She is the faithful companion one always envisions when thinking about getting a dog. I realize that she is “just a dog.” At present, thank God, I am not losing my husband, children, parents, close friends, or my own life to cancer. I am losing “just a dog.” But, I am also losing part of me. I have loved this dog, and loved her well. I have exercised my care-taking role as an heir of Adam and Eve and have nurtured this small part of God’s creation. I find that I am more myself because of it.

I realized about a week after her diagnosis that the hard part of this for me was staying connected to Gracie during the dying process. I admit, to my shame, that it would have been easier for me if she had died soon after finding out that she had cancer. It is hard to continue to care for her, love her, and relate to her when you are cognizant of an imminent “death date.” Now, I know in reality, we all have a “death date.” We just don’t always know the day or the hour, and so we don't focus on our mortality. Knowing that she, animal though she is, is going to die soon has been a challenge for me. How do I love her and pour myself into her when I know she is going to die at anytime, and certainly within the next few weeks? How do I stay in and embrace the tension between life and death that I am faced with here in the present moment?

Since her diagnosis I have often asked the Lord what I am supposed to learn from this time. As I sit to type this she is lying in the room next to me. She is sleeping and her breathing is somewhat labored due to the cancer and the steroid she is on to slow the cancer growth. Well, when one asks God a question, one should at least be willing to hear the answer. Last week he gave me a small part of that answer...

On Thursday I stopped into our church office to pick up a check for our upcoming Youth Group activity. As I was speaking to our parish administrator, our rector, who happens to be the man who introduced me to the beauty of Anglican worship and piety, the priest who baptized my children and taught my catechism class prior to my confirmation, and who heard my first and most recent confession; this man, whom I consider a friend, pulled me into his office and asked me to shut the door. I knew this was not a good sign...

He proceeded to tell me that he had accepted a call from another parish, and would be leaving our church in mid July. It was one of those moments when time almost feels frozen, and all I could do initially was feel. I could hear my heart pounding in my head and I had to remind myself to breathe. For a brief second the sadness felt overwhelming. There is was again, that gut-wrenching, familiar feeling of grief and loss; familiar, yet so unexpected and out-of-the-blue on this sunny May afternoon. It served as another poignant reminder that I am a creature and not omnipotent. I am not the one in charge; it is not “my will” that is to be done.

Now, it’s not that this news was totally unexpected. God, in his great mercy, had given me some warning. But despite “knowing” at some level that this was a possibility, the reality of losing both he and his delightful and indescribably talented wife, still generates profound pain and a reaction from deep inside me which says, “No, this is not right!”

But what is it that is “not right?” It certainly is not his call to leave. As I listened to him talk about his process and reasons for leaving it was more than clear that God’s hand was in this decision and had given both he and his wife clarity about His will in the matter. That this will be for their ultimate good and the welfare of His church, I have no doubt. For that I am thankful.

What is “not right” about this is the reality that I will be separated from people I love dearly; separated from people whose hands have, quite literally, shaped and molded much of my current piety. When I look at my family and our spiritual formation, Dan+ and Brenda's fingerprints are everywhere.

God did not fashion our souls for separation; connection was woven into the very fabric of our being. It is part of what it means to be made in the Imago Dei. No, separation is an unnatural state which we are forced to accept while we live this side of eternity. But I don't have to like it. Indeed, I shouldn't like it, for it reminds me that I was not made for this world, but for eternity.

So, for now, when I look out into the back of our property to the grave we have dug in preparation for Gracie's death, and when I am tempted to count down the days till July 15th when Fr. Dan and Brenda leave our parish for Indiana, I look at my icon. And, when I look, I am reminded that because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, separation, no matter how long it may be, is not permanent. Someday we all (yes, Fr. Dan, even the dog - see C.S. Lewis in The Problem of Pain, Chpt 8) will be united again. And until that day, "...all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well."

An Experiment Begins

I never thought I would start a blog!

However, recent life events have convinced me that it was time to start journaling about some of my thoughts, feelings, and experiences before my life passes by and I fail to "process" or meditate upon the message that these life events, and my reactions to them, have for my maturation and growth in holiness.

I am, as the blog title suggests, an introvert. I need space and time to reflect upon my world and my experience of it. I need solitude with God and quiet time in order to "refuel" myself. In the reality that is my world, time restrictions often mean I don't often take time to reflect upon, much less write about, what I learn in my quiet spaces.

Since I already spend a good deal of time on my computer during any given day, I am hoping that this blog will be a venue in which I can capture and reflect upon some of the "whisperings" of my soul as I contemplate life's journey and my part in it.

So, my experiment begins!