Looking Back

One year ago today, I shut myself into our SUV and sobbed as we drove away from the dearest faces on earth. I followed the square yellow truck northwards, through sleepy Southern towns and flooding Georgia cities, through awe-inspiring mountain passes and quiet peaceful forests. And finally, Maryland. 

A year later, I'm back, and I'm so much richer than I was but one year ago. I've gained more dear, darling faces that I weep to leave. I've gained another home in the beautiful hills of Maryland. I've gained stories of my King's faithfulness and love in times of deepest struggle. I'm back, and I'm blessed. 

One song rings through my mind as I look back on the eighteenth year of my life, the hardest, most painful and the best, most beautiful year of my life. One song in particular that looks backward and marries the tears and the pain with the joy and the hope found only in God.

I never have and never will walk alone.

Standing on this mountaintop

Looking just how far we’ve come

Knowing that for every step

You were with us

Kneeling on this battle ground

Seeing just how much You’ve done

Knowing every victory

Was Your power in us

Scars and struggles on the way

But with joy our hearts can say

Yes, our hearts can say

Never once did we ever walk alone

Never once did You leave us on our own

You are faithful, God, You are faithful

Kneeling on this battle ground

Seeing just how much You’ve done

Knowing every victory

Was Your power in us

Scars and struggles on the way

But with joy our hearts can say

Never once did we ever walk alone

Carried by Your constant grace

Held within Your perfect peace

Never once, no, we never walk alone

Never once did we ever walk alone

Never once did You leave us on our own

You are faithful, God, You are faithful

Every step we are breathing in Your grace

Evermore we’ll be breathing out Your praise

You are faithful, God, You are faithful

You are faithful, God, You are faithful

(Never Once, Matt Redmon)

Happiness

From my notes today:

I heard a song today called "Happily Ever After." It felt so right for what I've been mulling over recently. As my future looms ahead, my future as a student away from home, as an adult, as a woman, I keep wondering what my life will look like in the next five years. So much promises to change. What will my story be?

I ask with the singer, "Will I be happy?"

But what has consumed my thoughts so much recently is the "what if" that hovers in the corner of the room -- what if I'm not? What if my little jar of hopes and dreams shatters before me and none of my dreams come true? I'll never be happy, right?

Wrong. My happiness is up to me. Why would I limit myself to happiness only if this? Only if I get this and that?

I will be happy, because happiness is a choice, one that I alone can make.

Everyday News

::    Here's a bit I just rediscovered . . . I'm not at all unorganized, *ahem*.     ::

There's nothing like that gloriously sweet, wafting scent of freshly cut grass. Sometimes I think cows are blessed little creatures to be able to eat something as sweetly, deliciously smelling as grass. . . .

How's that for a conversation starter? ;-)

This morning God woke me up again to His gloriously beautiful world as I drove along and good-morning-to-this-fair-assembly-ed my way along sweet country roads brimming over with freshly flowering tulips and cherry blossoms. I'm not a city girl. If I didn't know that before, seven months in a crowded D.C. suburb has convinced me of it. Small southern towns, or maybe even Yankee country ones, are much more my cuppa. As one of my favorite bloggers once expressed, without the greenspace, quiet, and yes, even the Southern humidity, I lose something very much a part of myself, and yet I always find another bit of Jane Ellen -- or is it another Jane Ellen entirely? -- whilst in the city.

All these little thoughts strolled their ways across my mind this morning as I drove home -- on a "completely intentional, I-totally-know-where-this-road-goes, senic route" -- after posting a package, and it occured to me that I have done a poor job at keeping you posted on my adventures during this odd year. I'm not very good at simple updates, for there is something of the actress in me always preferring a good soul out-pouring to a holiday snapshot rambling. But one day I'll wish I had documented daily life during P.C. And so here I am.

For those of you unaware, "P.C." stands for Pastor's College, the whole reason for my living in Maryland. My dear father has been diligently slaving away at his books for the past seven months; we've dubbed him "the hermit" here because of his habit of sitting in one corner of his bedroom, back to the world, whole body hunched forward in a book or fingers tap-tapping away at a laptop. But unlike seminary or even university, Pastor's College is about more than theology and doctrine, more than professors and students, more than graduation and ordination. It truly is a whole family, whole life ordeal. Thrust into a circle of people all from different backgrounds but in similar situations, it's a time when God takes up his knitting needles and starts knit-purling heart strings together. (I pray none of you are offended by that metaphor -- what would Rachel Lynde say?)

There are twenty three family units here, twenty two dear, wonderful, friends-forever families and one unattached young man. I am the oldest P.C.K. -- Pastor's College kid, as we're referred to by . . . non-P.C.K.s . . . what is this fascination with abbreviations? -- living here with my family and one of the few above the age of ten. That makes for plenty of babysitting opportunities, let me tell you. But I couldn't be happier, really. Many of my mornings are spent encouraging young girls in their musical and scholarly pursuits; many of my evenings are whiled away playing house, acting charades, doling out stories, and holding sleepy babies. Actually, truth be told, the average age of my closest circle of friends in the P.C. is around four. (And, no, I'm not concerned about that.) :)

Other than playing with children, my time is happily passed with a high dose of simplicity. My senior year of high school is probably my easiest one since toddlerhood, and consequently I'm far more behind than I've ever been since, well,  probably toddlerhood. But spring fever's pumping through my veins this Holy Week and with it diligence. Hopefully I'll prove a trendsetter for myself. Next year looms ahead of me like Everest in my simple path, but even Everest in all its towering glory stirs up the dust of an adventurous soul.

::    Afterthought: I'm sure I had ample more details that I intended to share before this little post slipped through the cyber-cracks, but I've long since forgotten what they were. So now you can just jump to the conclusion, which I had already written, and you can get a picture of just how not-intuitively I dream up blog posts. Actually I think I had mentally composed the beginning and the end of this post and attempted to write something to glue the two together. Fail.    ::

I was driving north out of the bustle of the city to guard some sweet children in their slumber this evening. (That's my epic way of saying "babysitting," because doesn't that term just bother you, too? I mean think about it . . . ) And the setting sun was casting such warm golden light onto the maples, red with blooms, and her sister trees dripping with infantile leaflets. All around me was naught but warmth and fairy dust. But as I rounded the bend in the road, sleepy Apollo pierced down the roadway in all his last minute mustering. Indescribably golden, like the purest honey and the softest butter, that sunset demanded such reverence and awe yet incited impish desires. All I wanted to do was drive straight for that sun, into the sunset, and bask in all that amber goodness.

No, life in Maryland is far from bad.

*sigh*

Scribblings

Washington D.C. is a city brimful of unspoken words; the whole place dances to the rhythmic humming of the wind and the water, the paintings and the sculptures, the statues and the museums all whispering verses. To the composer it speaks themes and cadences, to the choreographer pirouettes and port de bras. To the creative, do not all persons, places, and things breathe life?

For this writer, at least, the metropolis I find myself living above never fails to proffer the stuff that creative dreams are made of. So enjoy a couple of virgin lines, hastily pinned to paper whilst walking from one monument or one painting to another.

The Adoration of the Shepherds,  by Giovanni Girolamo Savoldo,
housed in the National Gallery of Art; photograph credit to Katie

The Adoration of the Shepherds

April 27, 2012

Come, warm your hands

'round the Refining Fire.

Come, worship Him with

thy shepherd's lyre.

Behold, He comes,

God and Man as One.

Behold His face with 

hearts undone.

Wonder at the myst'ry

with aged mind.

Wonder, for the Lost

this Babe can find.

The World War II Memorial in Washington; photograph credit to Katie

World War II Memorial

April 27, 2012

Words engraved forever in stone.

Faces frozen forever in bronze.

Wreaths undying,

Eagles unflying

Only the water now whispers their names.

Thousands of stars shine night and day.

Thousands of bombs overpower their grace.

Oceans are battlefields

Islands are forts

But only the water remembers their names.

Home

From my Journal
23 March 2012
1:22 am

I am constantly thinking to myself how much I want to go home. Nearly every other journal entry begins or ends with that confession. But the more I consider, the more I recognize that home is not there anymore. This home that I long for is a childhood memory with all the rosy hues of its kind. It's a place and a time forever enshrined in memory when hardship was a foreigner and tragedy restricted to the theater. My eyes and ears were young and innocent, unpolluted by cynicism, callousness, and pain.

Once a soul lives long enough he or she finds that a true home cannot exist on this earth, in this world -- not that I have resigned myself to some kind of chaotic, depressive world. No. This earth is still green, there is still beauty in the broken, and the Lamb is still on the throne, worthy of glory and honor and adoration and praise.

There is so much goodness in this land, and yet there is not enough to truly tie me to it, for I have tasted -- only just tasted -- true, unspoilt, desperately deep love. I tasted it at the cross and daily my mouth waters for more. It is only natural that I feel not at home here. I am evermore a foreigner in a strange place, a sojourner in a broken land. I'm an ambassador from a world I've never been to, but a city I'm a citizen of,  a home I will always be homesick for.

Favorite Heroines: Molly Gibson

for her trustworthiness and her constancy,

her diligence and modesty

In Search of Spring

In Search of Spring

A poem in honor of a childhood slipping onto the pages of history and a womanhood waiting to be written.

I come out in search of Spring today,
That ever bonny nymph,
The carefree sprite
Of color and life,
The dear companion of my youth.

She ever was my faithful friend,
Regardless of year or season,
Whatever they say,
Even winter days,
For spring lives in lands beyond reason.

For Spring, to me, was not bound by time,
As a wand'ring gypsy lives unconfined.
March until June,
And she must be through?
A more unthinkable thought was not harbored.

So dear, laughing, lovely Spring,
Imaginative, mischievous, playful Spring,
A bringer of life,
A killer of strife,
Wove round my heart like Irene's string.

But time must pass and youths must grow
And labor over words and sums,
So playtime wanes
And the heart does pang
For the sunny days of eternal Spring.

But today, I come to play again
And have a jolly springtime.
Yet though I call
And call and call
My childhood chum stays away.

Where has she turned her brilliant eyes?
And where are her tawny curls?
And her ivory hands?
And her ruby lips?
And her voice, the envy of birds?

Can it be that I -- I? even I? --
The eternal, hopeless elf-friend
Could have grown
Enough to be alone,
Forsaken by the elves and fairy dust?

"It cannot be," is my resolution,
So harder I resume my search.
And, lo, I see
Faint as can be
The evidence of my darling Spring.

She is not gone forever, no,
But eternally she is changed.
Or perhaps it is
I who lives
In a different way than before.

Perhaps children do grow and learn
And some forget the fairy folk.
But those like I,
Who'd rather die,
Remember them always when grown.

For Spring did return today,
Though she lives beyond my call.
She lives in the breeze,
In the waves of the sea;
Her dress virgin moss, grass, and flower.

Her voice echoes through my womanhood now
In the song of the bird and the shore.
Her body still warms,
In the sun's golden arms,
And the stars are still her jewels.

So I, like Wendy, now leave Neverland
To make room for my own dear child.
She will play
With Spring someday,
And I will bask in memories wild.

Dance in the Streetlight

I sat outside on the front porch this evening, swaddled like a babe 'against the chilled night air. Trying to imagine away the rushing current of cars driving past, I looked up at the stars in all their flaming glory and at a solitary wisp of cloud sailing along the black sea. Distant chimney smoke wafts across the lawn, and a lonely airplane, naught but a starry light, creeps across the sky. I know that up there in that aerial transport people, as large and living and breathing as I, eat, speak, and sleep. But somehow, from earthbound perspective, I just can't fathom that.

 The night is perfectly beautiful, marred by only two things: the traffic noise and a streetlight. Traffic noise can, with willpower and an imagination, be willed away. Yet that orangey hue cannot. It slashes it's way through my picturesque scene like a paper cut through my finger.

Suddenly I am struck by how terrified I have been of those horrid street lights the past few years. They're not the pleasant lamposts one reads of in Narnia; they're the spine-chilling, heart-gripping sort just waiting for action heroes to race through or their nemeses to cower just beyond, gun loaded and cocked. I'd rather trust my (admittedly over-active) imagination to the pitch black than to those menacing lights. But then as I pondered such dismal thoughts -- and, I confess, felt the slightest tremblings within my gut -- a beautiful memory flooded my mind.

I was back in my hometown, in the heart of it, just off Palm Blvd., and I was young. A kindred spirit and I flitted about her front lawn. We were girls one minute and fairies the next. Of course Chloe was a dark fairy; nothing else would do. I was a mixed breed: earth fairy, to suit my infatuation with all things green; water fairy, to excuse my midnight swims; and light fairy, to appease Chloe's insistence that blond hair made it a foregone conclusion. And you now what I did? I danced in a streetlight.

One sat sentinel in the farthest corner of their property, and in my girlhood innocence, I filtered it into our game. I was a queen of the fairies with light exuding from every pore of my elven skin, as the moon in George Bailey's dream. And so the light fell on me and I danced like Tinuviel or Titania. Of course there was an enemy lurking in the shadows; Chloe always was in our fantasies.

As I relived that sliver of childhood with vim and vigor, I stared down that beaming pillar. I stared it down, and slowly all its Bourne-esque ambiance melted, and am eleven year old fairy queen danced before me. I cannot speak for all of humankind, but if one must let loose one's imagination on a lamplight, isn't it nicer to dance in its rays rather than dread its gaze?

Save the Libraries

Prompt: If you were given $5000, how would you use it to promote education in your community?

The cool, quiet of a building of books has never failed to cheer my spirits, to enliven my imagination, to broaden my horizons. Libraries are my favorite places under heaven, places like no others, but soon to be places of the past. On an extended vacation, I drove block after block searching for a public library, to no avail. Friends explained: libraries all over town had closed for renovations but never re-opened -- budget cuts and zero interest, the serial offenders.

As Cicero stated, “A room without a book is like a body without a soul,” so a community without books is soulless, lifeless, and ignorant. Libraries, the homes of books, are essential to education but are viewed today as luxuries, evidenced by the ruthless budget cuts. We strive to save the earth, the lost, the manatees, but who will rescue the libraries? With the proper funds and special events, libraries can woo citizens back: regular toddler’s story-times, children’s homework helps, modern resources for teens, book clubs for adults, family enrichment evenings, educational lectures, and book drives for charity. 

After a class, I zipped down the road and into the children’s corner, my favorite spot in my library, only to find it empty. Not a soul, not a sound inhabited that room -- only the walls, the shelves, and the books. With five thousand dollars, I hope to banish empty libraries in my community. May their memory be erased and libraries eternally be beacons of knowledge.

Scholarship applications are one facet of my life right now. ;-)

January 14, 2012

My meditation for the day has been Psalm 121: "I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come? My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth. He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. The LORD is your keeper; the LORD is your shade on your right hand. The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night. The LORD will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life. The LORD will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore."

A somber passage to be my January soul-song, my driving anthem for a new year. Yet this year of all years I am reminded that sin is present, that suffering is rampant, that hurt is acute. I am reminded that sadness, loneliness, bitterness, and tears are part of the package of a sojourner in this land. I am reminded that our plans, ideals, and desires really mean nothing in light of eternity. The fact of the matter is that we are a people who have wrecked havoc on this land through our selfishness and pride but that there is a God, and He reigns over all with a omnipotent, sovereign, yet merciful and loving hand.

So while sacrifice and pain and ridicule and fear will always be a way of life on Earth, while dreams dashed and plans gone awry will always be mingled with joy, while feelings and relationships will always be hurt, we have a promise of comfort.

In the midst of conflict, even I, with nothing to resent nor complain about, will shed tears and fear the future. Yet in this moment of darkest night, I have felt more comfort and un-alone than I have felt in months. For indeed, I realize now that trials are not necessarily to test our faith or to ensure the depth of it. This trial, at least, is giving me sight of the fruit of my faith. This evening as I sat on my bed, eyes dry and a-burning from tears and body exhausted from a day-like-eternity, I felt the presence of my God. I felt Him, I saw Him, I spoke to Him. He saw me, He embraced me, He spoke back.

Faith is a struggle, dear ones. Never will we sojourners come to a point in this foreign land when faith will be easy or constant. Faith is a fight, a fight 'gainst great beasts of the Enemy. But faith is a fight well worth the taking. For -- listen and believe, friends -- in times of need, our faith will be rewarded with peace, comfort, hope, and sight.

I do not understand everything;

I do not welcome every piece of my life.

But there is hope beyond understanding,

And there is peace to be found in strife.

Take heart, O downcast soul,

Take heart, again I say.

For tomorrow the dawn will come,

Tomorrow will be a new day.

There will be time for tears,

But there will be time for laughter.

If not in this life and world at present,

Then in the Promised Land ever after.

A Medley

the sleigh bells and silver bells

are ringing ding-a-dong,

so merrily on high,

and all the children are snuggling up in bed

dreaming of sugar plum fairies

and tannenbaums and white Christmases,

and the merry gentlemen are resting

in the hope of the babe, the son of Mary,

and thoughts are a-turning

to the little town of Bethlehem,

to that (not so) silent night,

to the the child away in a manger,

and the the herald angels are heard on high,

singing gloria! gloria! in excelsis deo! hark!

and the faithful, joyful, triumphant are gathering

on this night divine to sing hallelujah,

for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth.

Nativities and Pruning

(Gerrit van Honthorst, The Nativity)

Today I set up our nativity. As I unrolled each wooden figurine from its cozy cocoon of brown paper and fingered each familiar carved face, I mulled over all that God has done with me in the past year, specifically all the pruning the Gardener has done in my patch. As God has shed this Christmas of all its pleasant extras -- sparse decking of halls, few gifts to give and receive, next to no dear ones to share it with -- I realized how God has been shedding my soul of bonuses, too.

He's cut away so much legalism, all my man-made rules and self-sufficient "salvation"; he's cut away so much baggage from my relationships, the pent-up bitterness and distance from years of tension; he's even cut away much of my perception of self. I'm left with the bare-bones, glorious Gospel, the precious, worthy-to-be-cherished friendships, and the core of who I am by His creative power and through His redemptive blood.

Gone are the trappings and trimmings that I once thought were my faith, my friends, my self. Gone are they with the Christmas garlands and gifts and guests. Here to stay, forever on earth and through eternity, are the pure and simple truths of Scripture.

"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed usin the Beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.

"*In him* we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory. In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory.'

-Ephesians 1:3-14 (emphasis added)

"And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them."

Ephesians 2:1-10

"For to us a child is born,
to us a son is given;
and the government shall be upon his shoulder,
and his name shall be called
Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace."

- Isaiah 9:6

Merry Christmas.

Ramblings

If this is what being in love feels like, then, oh, I am ready! But no, being in love -- if the storytellers and the historians and the theologians and all people throughout history haven't been lying -- being in love must be, is, infinitely greater. For, as my mother says, it lasts much longer, a lifetime.

This feeling after finishing a book, completing a film, leaving a play, cadencing a symphony, or opening a letter. This feeling when the couples are united, when the good triumphs, when the journey ends happily. This feeling of such joy, when even my old soul and heavy body want to leap and dance and shout and sing. And all my face can do is contort into the brightest, broadest of beams that I think it will break altogether. Love must be a beautiful thing if it inspires more true joy, more giddy happiness than this.

Is it silly, naive, even coarse to compare true love, that which has been immortalized by author and poet, painter and sculptor, composer and musician alike for thousands of years to the ecstasy of happily ever after? I think not.

As a matter of fact, if I do say so myself, I think few things are more fitting or romantic. What could be more natural for a girl to dream? That knights of chivalry do come riding in, that good always prevails over evil in the end, that a soulmate truly lives and breathes and eats and sleeps and, perhaps, thinks of me, does exist -- what could be more fitting, more youthful, more beautiful for me to believe in?

I still await my soulmate, yes, but I know that if he never comes or if he does and I am not permitted to have him, I know that I will live on. And even be happy. How? For knights do exist, in the stories and legends and lore and life, yes, but also in the only knight who can bring perfect, whole satisfaction, joy, and peace. He has already been introduced to me. And Jesus is His name.

So, yes, I wait for my soulmate, for my best beloved, for my husband. I await the day I will "know" he's the one, the day he will begin to woo and win me, the day I will be won, the day we will be made one. Yes, I long for all of these things and for that girlish bursting of gladness and joy. Yet, I know that my Redeemer lives, that my Beloved is bringing a beautiful day and I get to spend all of eternity marveling and singing and dancing and shouting and jumping and beaming and loving Him.

"Arise, my love, my beautiful one,

and come away,

for behold, the winter is past;

the rain is over and gone.

The flowers appear on earth,

the time of singing has come,

and the voice of the turtledove

is heard in our land.

The fig tree ripens its figs,

and the vines are in blossom;

they give forth fragrance.

Arise, my love, my beautiful one,

and come away. . . .

let me see your face,

let me hear your voice,

for your voice is sweet,

and your face is lovely. . . .

My beloved is mine, and I am his; . . .

Make haste my beloved . . . "

Song of Solomon 2:10b-14, 16a & 8:14a

Take Them Captive

Bam!

A sudden pain bolted its way through my head, burning and searing whatever's in there as it went. Pained and angered and exhausted all at the same time, I threw down the vacuum handle and rushed out of the room, glaring icily at the assailant, a sharp shelf's corner. Holding my head in my hand, I dove into the coolness of my pillows and heaved a huge sigh. Then, down flooded the tears.

But it wasn't just the pain of a bruised brow that let loose the floodgates. As quickly as I ran retreated across the hallway to my bedroom, my mind ran over all the grievances it could possibly find, not just reaching back through the past day or week, but months and even years. No small injustice, no minor sorrow stayed behind from the conference called inside. They all flocked to the forefront of my mind, each shouting its pitiful sob story.

As the clamorous rampage in my mind continued, my weeping's volume increased. Soon, I was loudly sobbing and nearly convulsing from the anger and resentment, from the grief and the heartache, from the sharp and shooting pain.

From the other room, the vacuum cleaner and my little cleaning companion, Emmy Xiang, sat deserted. I heard her call, confused, to me, "Uh, did someone die in your game, or something?" Even one so enthralled in a pity party could smile at that, but I said nothing. Knowing that someone was listening, I only let loose greater sobs, holding nothing back as is my normal practice.

Finally I heard the pad-pad-pad of her feet coming toward me. She leaned against the bed, not sure whether touching me would invite an embrace or a shove. Finally, I rolled over to her, and she looked at me quizzically. We remained thus for a while, I piteously allowing tears to roll down my cheeks and she wondering what had caused and how to fix the mourning. At last she spoke:

"Why did you put them in there?"

"Um, what," was my confused reply?

"The sad thoughts -- why did you put them in your mind?"

I stared. She stared.

"Oh."

She was right. A simple clumsy knock on the head and I lay prostrate upon my bed weeping as if I had "married an unloveable man," as Emmy Xiang described me. That seven year old saw right into the depths of my heart. You look ridiculous. You hit your head on the shelf, and now you are replaying every sad or angering episode you've experienced in the past year. What is your problem?

"Finally, brothers and sisters,

whatever is true,

whatever is noble,

whatever is right,

whatever is pure,

whatever is lovely,

whatever is admirable,

if anything is excellent

or praiseworthy,

think about such things."

Philippians 4:8

Wish For Quiet

(The Bluebell Wood, Alfred Fontville de Breanski)

I lead a small life: eventful, trying at times, but small. And I know it is such because I love it that way. I am not a brave soul -- I am a quiet soul. And I am painfully aware of it when the sweet thrummings of the earth are constantly made war upon by machines in air, under water, and on land. As I wait for one airplane to pass, another advances. Every now and then a lawn mower, leaf blower, hedge trimmer, or some other such labor saving device wafts toward me. Then there is the ever coursing stream of cars, driven on by a busy, scattered people, and in the north at least, the constant "vroom-vroom" is accentuated by angry car horns. There is no serenity here.

Oh, the noise! That ever present distraction driving everyone to distraction. Even I, a self-diagnosed "quiet soul," being so accustomed to constant din, find silence discomforting. And if that be the case -- I shudder to think of the consequences for those who love the racket. If the Lord calls for solitude, for rest, for being still and knowing, we must quiet the noise.

I sit perched on a little bank in my Maryland neighborhood. Down where the rain water collects and drains has grown a patch of pinkish wildflowers. They are quiet; they are still.

Oh, to be a wildflower in a field of largest acreage, of broadest boundaries. We have so few fields, few forests, few green spaces anymore. When I leave the driveway, I am confined to a busy neighborhood surrounded on either side by crowded streets.

So I sit alone, wishing for quiet.

Choice

(Lazy Days, Margaret Collyer)

"The history of free men is never really written by chance but by choice -- their choice." - Dwight D. Eisenhower

I discovered this quotation in an Uncle Eric book, Ancient Rome: How It Affects You Today, by Richard J. Maybury (whose books I highly recommend, by the way). As you probably surmised from the title of his book, Mr. Maybury uses this single sentence with regards to the broad scope of history. However as I read it and the rest of the chapter, I couldn't help but reflect on the consistency of that idea on a smaller scale.

To use an example from my own life, this statement holds true when the alarm clock sounds or mealtime approaches. (Recently, I have been pulling weeds from the discipline bed in my garden, especially when it comes being disciplined with my body, the earthen-jar-turned-holy-temple, so such things have been on my mind.) Jolted from slumber, do I switch off the alarm and fall back into sleep, or do I rise up and begin my day? Craving all the "wrong things," do I fill myself with fleeting fancies, or do I nourish my body with necessities for functioning? Perhaps it seems a simple choice in the moment, but sleeping in and slipping treats will affect the rest of my day, if not my week, month, year, and life!

Almost everything I read is analyzed through the lenses of a girl hoping to be a wife and mother. Consequently, I considered the implications of Eisenhower's statement in just one generation. Even last night, my family conversed with another Pastor's College student about his conversion. In one evening he went from a drug addict destroying his own life to a gospel addict burning with a fiery passion for Jesus. Just one small choice reversed the course his life was taking. Actually, and here come my reformed roots, just one small choice of God's reversed the course his life was taking, the course my life was taking.

Thank God for the "small" choices He makes. May he impart the sobriety of the small choices to His children, for indeed, life is a never ending decision waiting to be made.

Morning Ramblings

The all-too-familiar alarm interjects its loud ringing into my warm slumbers, Tone 9 from my cheap, Wal Mart cell phone, the default alarm because I'm too lazy at 11 pm to change it. As always, my lighter sleeping sister throws her arm out to the red phone button, then rolls over and closes her eyes again. I stretch and then yank my worn quilt up to my chin. Even in August, a Floridian in Maryland can feel the weather differences.

Ah, that's better. Cozy and warm. I could just close my eyes for a minute...

Forcefully, I roll over and prop my chin up on the cold headboard, looking out the window in a half-hearted attempt to stay awake. As the pine trees wave their porcupine fingers at me, I smile; those pines lining the fence are a little bit of North Florida to greet me in the morning and shade me in the afternoon. I love to watch the trees and think of the sap pumping through their veins while the blood pumps through mine. They are so alive, the trees, unmovable and still as they seem.

My eyes then flit down to the little fish pond, where the stone cherub still soaks his feet after Irene shoved him from his station on the bank.

Winston? Henry? Other little, unnamed guy we just discovered? Humph... Too early for frogs and toads to take a swim, I guess.


The colors and textures are so vibrant in that little area, bursting in hues of green, purple and white: fuzzy petunias, wispy canary grass, fragrant lavender, pearly vincas, and other unknown lovelies. Flowers in the morning are unlike flowers at any other time. Surviving the chills and darkness of night, they glisten in the sun arrayed in dewdrop diamonds. But this morning, I catch a glimpse of something unnaturally yellow, reminiscent of a sharpie highlighter, gracing the flower bed. It's Mr. and Mrs. Goldfinch. They're shy little creatures, so keep still and hushed -- at the first sound those little winged friends are off to find more private quarters.

Looks like an intruder is already coming closer. A coal black, from beak to toe, bird hops from round stone to round stone. Quickly, the finches scurry off, leaving the two blackbirds to explore the pond and surrounding area. One pecks at the canary grass, another flits about the deck. The crickets shout their monotonous tunes and crescendo all at once.

I roll back over and stand, not able to spectate any longer. Watching the beautiful world from a two story window is just not enough. Something so alive must be felt, must be joined.

Good morning, world.

Memory and Time

Memories we share together, moments no one else can know.

I will keep them close to me, never let them go.

Ten years have passed since my arrival in this wonderful place I call home. In those ten years I have gained such invaluable friendships, treasured such beautiful moments, and fallen in such deep love. For some, ten years is but another decade in this inevitable cycle we call life, but these ten years have been crucial, are irreplaceable, and will never be forgotten. 

Of all horrid things, leave-taking is the worst.

Good-bye is so hard -- but I'm not saying, "Good-bye." I'm saying, "See you later!"

It's just ten months... Then, I'll be home.

Home.

No place like it.

Tragic Moral Choice

My beloved friend sent out a query to a few friends this evening, and I wanted a place to store my response, as I intend to develop it into an essay of sorts. So, here it is, beginning with my friend's question, for those interested:

I'm writing a paper on tragic moral choice. Let me know your thoughts... 

There is a pounding on the door. Suddenly, the door gives way and the room is filled with armed Gestapo. Pointing their guns at the Christians inside, they harshly demand, "Where are the Jews?" 

What is the Christian to do? Yes, the Jews are hidden in the attic; but to admit this would mean certain death of the innocent women and children hidden there, while to deny that there are Jews hidden there would be a lie, a breaking of God's commandment. To lie or to submit the innocent to death, which should the Christian choose?

My response:

Hmm... I have struggled with this many a time, my friend. 

The immediate thought for me would be to lie and protect the innocent in my care. After all, the Egyptian midwives were blessed by the Lord after lying to Pharaoh just as Rahab was spared by hiding the Israelite spies. 

But at the same time, our Father declares that He will never, ever place His precious children in temptation without also providing a way of escape. To me, the interpretation of that verse indicates that God never places us in circumstances in which our only option is to sin. 

Then, I also consider the experiences we read of other than those outlined in the Bible. Corrie Ten Boom's The Hiding Place comes to mind. Both Corrie and her sister, Nollie, were called to hide hunted Jews in their homes; however, Corrie refused to admit that Jews were living behind her bedroom wall, while Nollie and her children refused to lie. And the Lord blessed them both in their endeavors! 

*sigh* What to do? Given the situation you described, perhaps I would simply refuse to answer the question. Whatever the circumstances, I constantly pray that, when called upon to undergo such interrogation, the Lord would pour out His favor and that the Spirit would fill my lips with the words He deems fit. I think that this is the only way to ensure that we properly honor the Lord in the moment. 

Well, that's my two cents worth for right now... 

Love you so much!
Jane Ellen 

P.S. Don't you like how I effortlessly outlined the two differing sides of the argument and yet never cast my lot with either one? Call me a temporary fence-sitter, but I have yet to make up my mind on this question, though I've pondered it many an hour.

Thoughts, anyone?

Today's Meditations

Every lash of the whip

Every stroke of the hammer upon

Every nail

Every insult You bore

Every minute You hung

Between heaven and hell

Every thorn in Your crown

Every tear on Your back

Every drop of Your blood

Was for me

Oh it was all for me

Oh glory to Your holy name

For the distance that you came

To bear my guilt and take my blame to save me

From heaven to the cross of pain

Oh! the distance that you came

So I will love you without shame

You saved me, You saved me

Choruses of "For Me" and "Across the Great Divide" by Sovereign Grace Music and Nap Records