The Goal

I have a close friend whose first child went off to college this fall. When he left she called me and was sobbing. If you've been there, like I have, you know how hard it is when one of your children leaves home. It's the end of an era. If you haven't been there, brace yourself. It's not that you're sad about where they are in their lives or that they are going to college, but it marks the end of childhood.

As she was crying on the phone to me she said, "When he was a cute little baby I never imagined this day would come so quickly or that it would be so hard to see him go." I told her that we have to remember the goal. The goal from the day our children are born is independence. We teach them to eat by themselves, to walk without assistance, then to drive, to take responsibility along the way, to make wise decisions, etc. Every little step has been toward compete independence when they would care for themselves and fly from our nest. The goal has always been independence.

As I was telling my friend this she stopped and said, "Oh my gosh, I forgot the goal!" She and I have laughed about that since then and talked about how easy it is to forget the goal. It's easy to think that these cute little babies are somehow for our pleasure and for us to enjoy and show off. We forget that we've only been given these precious souls for a time and then we send them into the world to make their own mark and find their own place in the world.

I've joined a group of women in memorizing Scripture and this is the verse we started memorizing a week ago:

"Do not love this world nor the things it offers you, for when you love the world, you do not have the love of the father in you. For the world offers only a craving for physical pleasure, a craving for everything we see, and pride in our achievements and possessions. These are not from the Father, but are from this world." 1 John 2:15-17

As I started memorizing those verses my heart began to ache as I realized that I so quickly start to crave what I see. I somehow begin to think that God owes me certain things and certain comforts. It's easy be proud of what I've done or what I have. It takes a lot of work not to veer towards being worldly. As I thought about that and looked at the state of my own heart I had to say to myself, "I have forgotten the goal!" How easy it is to forget the real goal and start to live for less than worthy goals.

So I sat down to remind myself of the goals for my life:

To glorify Christ in all that I do and say and even think

To never depend on my own understanding or wisdom but to completely trust God

To surrender every area of my life and let God have His way

To love Him, really love Him, and to love the people in my life like I have been loved by my Savior

To seek Him and all that is important to Him and to let the rest go

To be content with whatever He has provided for me and whatever He has allowed in my life, good or difficult.

It takes a lot of work to keep the goal in focus, to live for and be motivated by the right goal. God didn't give me precious children for my own pleasure and fulfillment, and He didn't put me on this earth to accumulate a lot of stuff and applause. I've got to keep my eye on the right goal!!

Broken Heart

The man's face still haunts me. I was sitting on the Paris metro right across from him. He was a middle aged man, nicely dressed and, except for the tears rolling down his cheek, looked like someone who had it all together.

I had just inherited an ipod from Melissa. I had no idea how it worked, so Jim downloaded some of my favorite music and a few podcast sermons for me. The next day I was taking the train and metro into Paris...the perfect chance to use my new ipod. Before I walked out the door though I had to get Rachel to show me how to turn it on and off!

I felt like a very modern woman with my headphones in my ears as I walked a long correspondence through the metro. I was listening to "Living Room Sessions" by Chris Rice, a CD of hymns played only on piano. As I walked past obscene billboards, a couple of homeless people still in their sleeping bags, and a sea of expressionless faces, I had "How Great Thou Art" ringing in my ears. I was suddenly overcome with a mixture of emotions. It was almost surreal to have my heart full of worship and so aware of how great God is and at the same time be looking at so much pain and so many faces with hopeless expressions. It reminded me of the war scene in Lord of the Rings when a terrible battle is being shown but the most beautiful song is being sung.

I finally got to my metro train and sat down. This is when I saw the man with tears rolling down his face. By this time Chris Rice was playing "Be Still My Soul"....and the words ran through my head, "Be still my soul, the Lord is on your side". I had an overwhelming urge to lean forward and say, "Excuse me sir, did you know that the God of all creation is on your side?" Alas, French etiquette would not allow me to speak to a stranger on the metro, especially one trying to cope with overflowing emotions. If he had been a woman I believe I would have risked being culturally insensitive and said it anyway.

As I got off of my train, I turned Chris Rice off. I just couldn't take anymore. I could no longer celebrate my salvation and my joy as my mind kept showing me the man crying on the train. It's painful to catch a glimpse of God's heart for the lost and the hurting. He too has barriers that He doesn't cross. He sees every tear and knows every heartache, yet He respects each person's free will and will allow them to live far from Him if they choose to. I can only imagine how His heart must break.

I then had lunch with a fairly new Christian who had decided to see a mystic/fortune teller for her problems. I couldn't seem to convince her that Jesus is all she needs. She had transferred her hope and trust into the idols this man has given her. Again I felt like my heart would break. "Lord, how do you bear it?"

As I headed home, I looked on my ipod for something besides worship or Christian music. I just wanted to escape. I was hoping to find James Taylor's Greatest Hits or something fun and neutral, but all I could find was Blues Clues and Veggie Tales (which I'm assuming Jim put on there so that I can let Michael listen to it from time to time!).

In the end I went back to Chris Rice. Before I pushed play, I asked God to continue to break my heart for the lost, as painful as that can be. I promised Him that I would resist the temptation to simply turn on Blues Clues or James Taylor or bury my head in a book or to bury myself in activities or even church work....and avoid the pain and hopelessness all around me. I don't want to close my eyes to the pain and suffering that is all around me, while I lose myself in beautiful music or in my own little world.

Life would be so much easier and less messy if I could just fill my live with activities I enjoy, concentrate on my family and close friends, and close my heart to the lost. I asked God to never let me be content with my own salvation and joy of belonging to Him to the point that I ignore those around me who don't yet have the assurance of an eternal life with Him or know His peace or simply that He is for them and on their side.

The man's tear stained face on the metro will probably be with me forever, or at least I hope it will.

(By the way, I learned another important lesson that day: You're singing louder than you think when you sing along with your ipod!)

Dance

My daughter, Melissa, is a dance major in college. Recently she shared a paper with me that she had to write about her philosophy of dance. It was beatiful and expressed more than just what dance is to her. I felt like it expressed my feelings as a parent, especially being the parent of a handicapped child. Then I realized that it expresses whatever it is in each of our lives that we pour ourselves into (whether it is what we chose to pour ourselves into or not). With her permission I'm attaching a part of that paper with you!!

The thing that is most precious to me about dance is that it has been in the context of the studio – learning, stretching, strengthening, daring, insisting, pushing – that I have become who I am. Somehow the journey I have experienced as a dancer can no longer be separated with the journey I have experienced thus far as a human being. Not because I was “made to dance” or “dance is my life,” but because it has been the substance of my life for a long time now. It has been a focus, a context in which God has worked on my heart, my mind, and every inch of me. I feel more than anything that God has used dance as a tool to shape me. I have never felt defined as a “dancer” very easily. Dance was one way…there were millions of others. But what a beautiful way it has been!

I was thinking about it tonight, and it struck me that I have, for the most part, felt that I have poured into dance and have been constantly giving of myself, and yet it has occurred to me recently that somehow in the midst of all that dance began to give to me. I began to be filled up by what I had once emptied myself for.

So, I guess dance is important to me because it has been the context within which I have found courage, the place that I have learned to work hard and be disciplined and to understand what it means to fail, and to achieve; it has been the tool with which to express, but also a way to give, help and serve.

Dance is so much more than just the body moving through space. It is always the whole person, their past, their fears, and all their hopes and dreams, inside their skin, saying something, and in the process becoming something different.

Dance, to me, is about being a human. It is not about being anything other than human; it is about being beautifully human.

What a beautiful thought that as we are being stretched, strengthened, challenged, pushed at times beyond our limits; we are becoming beautifully human. And at some point we see that the thing we've been giving ourselves to is actually the thing that gives back to us, it is the tool that God is using to shape us.

So let's dance, maybe not physically like Melissa does (although I have a blast dancing around my kitchen when no one is looking except the dog), but let's dance and celebrate in our hearts. We were not made for a thing or for a task, we were created to be in relationship with God our Father. As we seek Him and grow through whatever circumstances we are in, we are becoming fully human and more like Him!

Ambiguity

Happy New Year Everyone!

It was exactly a year ago when Jim took a prayer retreat to seek the Lord about our future. It was exactly a year ago when God clearly said to him that it was time to leave France and take our family back to the US. We knew that the primary reason was for Michael's good, but we also knew that God had every member of our family's good at heart, and we knew that He would show us the way forward.

We left France in June. We got back to the US just in time for the economy to bottom out and for the nation to be torn in two over an election. Jobs and opportunities we thought were certain disintegrated and the plans we had made seemed to vanish right before us. All that had been clear to us before became very unclear.

Today we are in Mississippi, still waiting for Him to show us the way forward. We still have dreams in our hearts and still have a burning desire to serve the Lord with all of our lives. There are opportunities, but we are not sure what God is asking us to do. There are some things that we do know: Jim will still be working with the Mission Society and will still pour his life into encouraging and discipling artists. What is not yet clear is where we will settle and exactly what this next season will look like or what is best for Michael or the other kids.

We're seeking God with all of our hearts. Our desire is to serve Him. So we wait and hope and dream. I will be the first to admit that this time of waiting is not easy. I don't like ambiguity. In fact, I hate it. I don't even like suspenseful movies. I always enjoy a movie better when I know how it ends, honestly I do. I was reading a Francine Rivers novel over Christmas and finally had to read the very end so that I could enjoy the book. I don't mind waiting as much as I mind not knowing! So why would God put me in this place of ambiguity?? I'm sure the answer is obvious, He wants me to trust Him in a deeper, bigger way. He's stretching me and asking me to (no actually demanding that I) stay desperate for Him.

So as this new year begins I am reviewing how God has been faithful to us in the past. As I do that, I find myself grieving the fact that I can question or doubt Him...ever. What I know is that He is good, always good. He is a faithful provider, sustainer, lover of my soul. So I'm focusing on who I know Him to be and asking Him to invade my heart once again, to overwhelm me with His presence and His love. When God puts me in a place of uncertainty and removes my props (the things that make me feel secure), I find Him in a new way. He gently draws me close to Himself and reminds me of a tenderness I can have with Him when all else is in the shadows.

So more than I long for Him to show us the way forward, I long for Him to draw us close, to be intimate with us, to be our all in all.

As you begin this new year and you face all that it will bring your way, here is my prayer for us all, above all else:

"May our roots go down deep into the soil of God's marvelous love. And may we have the power to understand, as all God's people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love really is. May we experience the love of Christ, though it is so great we will never fully understand it. Then we will be filled with the fullness of life and power that comes from God." from Ephesians 3

And may our hope never be in an economy or a government or in what we have or do not have. My our faith in Christ never depend on what He gives or doesn't give or allows or does not allow. May our confidence never be in our own ability to provide, to figure things out, or to navigate rough waters.

May 2009 be a year where we find our Savior to be our all in all, the hope of the world!

Walking Through the Seasons

I have come full circle. We have been living temporarily in Brandon as we are on furlough. This is where we are seeking the Lord about what is next and where we are resting and adjusting to life back in the US. Ironically this is also the city we lived in when Michael was born; before we went to Cape Girardeau and had an amazing church staff experience and 5 years before we went to France. As I shop, drive and walk the streets of Brandon, I have experienced strange emotions. This is where we walked through our desert, our most difficult days. We went through a heartbreaking church experience and adjusted to life as parents of a handicapped child.

Yet as I walk these streets today, I’m not in the desert at all. What was once a difficult place is now a peaceful one. Being here has caused me to revisit and reflect on those painful days when just getting out of bed and facing the day took more energy than I had on my own. I remember begging God for strength, to bring good things to us, to take us out of our desert. And eventually He did. As we left Brandon 13 years ago, I remember thinking, “Well, that is that. I’ve been through my desert, I’ve lived difficult days and now God is taking me on to safer and happier times.” He did take us on to a great place. But what I’ve discovered as the years have passed is that….deserts come and go. We’ve never gotten to a place where life won’t bring uncertainty, where we’re safe from heartache and disappointed.

God’s goal is evidently not for my life to be easy and settled, for all questions to be answered, for me to have arrived in a place where the pain is behind me and only smooth waters are ahead. I don’t know all of His reasons, but I know they are for my good. Perhaps He wants me to remember that I am desperate for Him and for His strength. Perhaps He wants me not only to understand the pain of others but to feel it with them because I’ve been there myself. Perhaps it’s the desert times that draw me so close to Him, which is the real goal after all. Perhaps He wants me to remember that this place is not my home and to keep my sights set on eternal things. Perhaps the desperate days grow me deep and make my faith rich. Perhaps I need to trust Him over and over when all seems lost.

The good news is that He never keeps me there. There are times when we are surviving the desert and times when He is walking us beside still, quiet waters. There have been days when the plan made perfect sense and I’ve been overwhelmed by God’s blessings and grace to allow us to be part of what He is doing. A desert doesn't mean the plan has changed or isn't working. The sweetest thing of all is that He is always there with us; restoring, healing, leading and showing Himself to be enough!

“For forty years you sustained them in the desert; they lacked nothing, their clothes did not wear out nor did their feet become swollen.” Nehemiah 9:20-21

As I walk the streets of Brandon today I realize that what I thought would kill me has only made me stronger. My feet are not swollen as I’ve walked through season after season, through times of heartache and times of amazing joy. This place is not what it was before, but then neither am I!

Go

"You can be sure I have seen the misery of my people....I have heard their cries for deliverance....Yes, I am aware of their suffering....now go, I am sending YOU" from Exodus 3

God sees suffering. He cares about those who cry and mourn and hurt, just as he did when he spoke those words to Moses. He longs to comfort, to be close to the brokenhearted, to whisper words of hope into hopeless ears. When he saw the misery of the people of Israel in Moses' day, he told Moses to go. I hear them, I want to comfort them, I want to be close to them.....you go.

So how does he comfort brokenhearted people today? Could it be that he still does it through people...through us?

Two weeks ago Jim and I were visiting longtime friends in Los Angeles. We have known Chris and Kathy since college. We even sang in their wedding 25 years ago. Like Jim and I, Chris and Kathy have had some unexpected bumps in the road. 15 years ago their 5 year old son, Peter, was diagnosed with a brain tumor. He went through surgery and treatment to save his life. His life was indeed spared, but they no longer had the little boy they had before cancer. Peter was now disabled, handicapped, not able to do the things was able to do before surgery. Today he is 20 years old, a brain cancer survivor. Life is not easy for Peter, but he is a true hero in my book. Nothing comes easy for him, but he has graduated from high school and is taking classes at a local Jr College. He loves to play board games, plays piano, and LOVES to tell jokes. (The picture is of our 2 boys: Peter and Michael)

If you have ever been seriously ill or had a child who spent a lot of time in a hospital, you know that just walking into a hospital stirs up strong emotion. Most of us who have been through an experience like that avoid hospitals whenever possible. We don't want to revisit the pain of those days or months or years, but not my friend Kathy. After her son survived brain cancer, she and another mother started an organization to support families of children with brain tumors.

Every Wednesday Kathy spends the day at the LA Childrens' Hospital visiting children and parents of children who are fighting for their lives. Kathy attends more funerals in a month than I've attended in my lifetime. She visits parents whose children will live and lead normal lives, she visits parents whose children will survive only to relapse a year later or to remain handicapped and disabled, and she visits parents whose children will lose their battle to cancer. She visits people who are in pain, who are suffering, and whose hearts are truly breaking.

The question is: Why would someone do such a thing? Why would she revisit her own pain and walk the halls of that hospital with hurting parents? Why wouldn't she just take care of her son who is still struggling and deal with her own ongoing pain? The answer is actually very simple; because God has seen their pain, he has heard their cries and he longs to comfort them. And he says to one woman to go and be his presence there. Every time she puts her arm around a desperate mother, or sits by the bed of a suffering child, or attends the funeral of a cancer victim, or cries tears for hurting people (and she sheds plenty of tears)...she is Christ in the flesh.

I spent a day walking the hospital with Kathy, a Wednesday that will stay with me forever. We saw 27 children who are fighting for their lives. I saw fear and pain and heartache in the faces of many parents. But I also saw some of the bravest people I've ever met. I couldn't ask the question, "Where are you God?" because I was walking the halls with his representative. God was there.

I read a quote once that said, "God doesn't comfort us so that we'll be comfortable. He comforts us so that we can comfort." I realize that I too often turn away from situations that will cause me pain. I don't pour out my life like I should to hurting and lonely people. I wasn't put on this earth to be comfortable or even to deal with my own pain. I was put on this earth to reflect the glory of God. I was put here to make a difference.

God sees the suffering and says "Go". So every Wednesday Kathy goes to where the hurting people are.

"He comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort others. When others are troubled, we will be able to give them the same comfort God has given us.'

2 Corinthians 1:4

"Now go, I am sending you!"

Find out more about Kathy's organization: We Can

http://www.wecan.cc/

God Redefined

I sit in my parents' house today, surrounded with suitcases and once again in a time of huge transition. We have just spent a couple of months packing everything we own, deciding what is worth shipping across the ocean and what to leave behind, saying good-bye to people, a country, a work, and a culture that I've come to dearly love. The future is once again unclear, uncertain and unknown. We've been here before.

Jim and I first went to France after we'd only been married for a year. I had never been out of the country and had never heard a foreign language other than the few words I learned in French class. Everything in me was challenged and shaken to the core. There was culture shock, but there was also a need to trust God and to press into Him in a way I had never had to do before. When all that was familiar to me was stripped away, I found that the God I had been serving was no longer familiar to me either. He redefined Himself to me as He allowed doubts and fear to drive me to know Him better, not just the idea of who I thought and hoped He was.

When Michael was born with severe physical and developmental handicaps, I was once again on the shore of the unknown. Once again I didn't recognize this God I thought I had come to know so well. In the dark restless moments of the months that followed, I discovered that He is so much more unpredictable and unable to be defined and understood than I ever thought He could be. He drew me to Himself and gave me peace and intimacy that I had not known before.

Then we packed everything we owned and took 4 children to a foreign country where I watched them challenged and shaken just as I had been. I couldn't "fix" it for them and had to let them ask their own questions and wrestle with their own doubts. I also got to see them discover a love and deep relationship with the God they had put into question.

So here we are again. We've left France and are looking at the unknown. Once again I have children who are confused and feel like kites flapping in the wind with strings cut. Once again I realize that I cannot demand or predict what God will do, where He will lead us, how He will provide, or how He will answer my children's questions. Again I come before Him realizing that I have so much more to learn about who He is.

These are times when I feel stripped of what has become familiar and I meet my God in a new way. I don't have to have answers. I don't have to understand. He doesn't promise easy, but He does promise to be with me wherever I go and through whatever I go through.

I discovered His Presence in a foreign country. I discovered His Presence in a hospital intensive care unit as I held my newborn baby. I discovered His Presence as I laid in bed, knowing that my children laid in their beds with questions, doubts, pain, and even tears. I discover His Presence as I lay down all expectations and let Him show me Himself as He truly is and not the watered down version I have created in my heart.

I pray that you will find His Presence in the unpredictable times in your life as He allows you to lose sight of who you thought He was and discover who He really is.

I long for easy, for predictable, for clarity. But today I long for His Presence more. When all else is stripped away, I find Him in new and deep ways.

Pressing On
Angela