Faith

September 18, 2018

Feeling Young Again

*** I am so pleased to once again, share a post with you from my son and favorite guest blogger, Miles Macleod. It is a beautiful and insightful take on Matthew 18:3. You can follow his family blog on macleodsonthemove.weebly.com. Enjoy!

Can you find the monkey?

So it’s been about six weeks in Malaysia and I’m feeling young again. But don’t get too jealous. I’m not talking about the grip-life-by-the-ears-and-drive-off-into-the-sunset-with-reckless-abandon type of young; it’s more like the I-can’t-read-this-menu-do-you-have-any-photos-of-your-food-so-I-can-point-to-the-pictures young.

It’s infuriating at times and good for a few laughs at others, but mostly it’s just embarrassing. Like the time I couldn’t figure out how to turn the water back on in my house and had to seek my neighbor’s help, or the time I drove down the wrong side of the road (they drive on the left here), or the time I did that again, or the times I pick up Quincy from daycare and can’t understand what his teacher is asking me to do so I just smile and nod and leave and don’t do what they ask, or the time I accidentally drank pond water from a spigot and the nearby guards laughed before showing me how to get filtered water, or how it’s taken me two weeks (and counting) to replace the only lightbulb in my bathroom (Erin showers in the dark every morning), or how I sometimes say “Good morning” (“salamat pagi”) to my neighbors when I see them walking in the evening (“salamat petang”).

Whatever confidence I had gained as a successful member of society while living in the States has quickly disappeared. Now, I’m more unsure, more unaware, and more pensive. More child-like.

There is a verse in the Bible, somewhere in Matthew, where Jesus tells a bunch of people to be more like children. It will help them, He says, get into Heaven. Whenever I’ve heard this verse mentioned, I assumed he wanted us to have more faith — child-like faith — a faith rooted in trust and untainted by the limitations of empirical evidence and the cynicism of adulthood.

Now, though, I’m thinking I had it wrong. Why would He want us to have the same type of faith that led me to put my trust and my bloody teeth and my cookies and milk into appeasing some mythological creature (see tooth fairy) or cultural apparition (see Santa)? That can’t be the same faith that He wants us to have, right? I would think He wants a more adult-like faith than that, one that has been tested and refined. So why be like children then? Well, in light of my six weeks in Malaysia, I’m thinking what Jesus likes so much about children isn’t so much their faith; it’s their helplessness.

I think about Quincy and his own helplessness too. At one years old, he relies on me for pretty much everything and because I come through more often than not, his love and his trust for me grows. I’m there to carry him on my shoulders when he tires and grab him from his crib when he wakes. To kiss his boo-boos and read his books; to teach him boundaries and open his doors. To him, I am everything. My identity — in his eyes — is defined by his own limitations.

And so it goes with world travel. For those who have yet to do it, I strongly encourage you to give it a try. There are numerous benefits, but perhaps none more so than the spiritual clarity that comes with it. My can-do American attitude has quickly been replaced by a please-help Malaysian posture. And through this transition and in the midst of my helplessness, my Father’s identity has been redefined by my own limitations. He is made strong in my weakness. My place in this crazy, amazing world has never been more clear. I am child-like. But for my Father, that’s okay.

Quincy in Cambodia making a new friend

August 31, 2018

The Way to Wellness

The pain awakened me. My feet were throbbing, and the ache reached up to the back of my knees. I lay still trying to figure this out, then realized as I readjusted my body that my back, neck and head hurt too. I remembered swimming in Nantucket Sound a few days earlier. God am I that old? I sighed and lifted my pounding head from the pillow, slid out of bed, and limped into the bathroom. I can find the Tylenol and open the child-proof cap without even being conscious.

It wasn’t until that evening, when my clothes felt like they were on fire that I realized I was sick, not just sore. Then the shaking chills. I fumbled around for a thermometer. 101.7. I gulped some more Tylenol and went to bed. It was a restless night but I awoke free from fever, although not from the pain. I called my doctor.

“Hold on,” the secretary said flatly after hearing my story, punctuated by, I have never had a fever that high! for dramatic effect. When she came back on the line she said, “The doctor said, ‘You’re a nurse. You know if you’re sick.'”

I do? This was my first thought. Because historically I am pathetically unaware of my physical well-being, until my body just drops and quits. I’m a great nurse for you but like most nurses, detached from the signals and sirens going off inside my own body.

Someone had to tell me when I was pregnant, when I was turning yellow from eating bad shellfish, when I should consider that I might have a concussion. I don’t like to spend time inside of myself. It just never seems beneficial.

There’s a plus side to my ignorance. My husband marvels at my ability to deflect “vain imaginations,” my resilience under pressure and a forward drive that prevents a morbid preoccupation with inward scrutiny. I stunk at meditating in the 70’s. At a yoga class I took a few years ago, I started giggling then had to leave when the instructor told us to be “mindful.” It sounded like Dali Lama meets Miss Manners.

But there’s also the flip side. A lack of self-awareness can lead to self-deception; perhaps nothing evil or even un-Godly, but I can easily slide into my old comfy self-reliant shoes – the ones with well-worn scriptures and broken-in prayers.

Then he said to them, “You like to appear righteous in public, but God knows your hearts. What this world honors is detestable in the sight of God.” Luke 16:15

Yikes! Detestable? Let me look at another translation… how about “abominable?”

I recovered from my sickness of unknown origin after six days and felt like I was coming out of general anesthesia. I had lost time, so my natural course of action was to catch-up and get busy. Then one morning early in prayer, I heard God speak to me very clearly. He said this:

“Don’t take Me lightly.”

It startled me – it was a warning, just short of a rebuke, and I knew I had to spend some time looking inside, and at how the inside was manifesting outside. I had to take my spiritual temperature.

Charles Finney wrote in the 1850’s about negative morality – how Christians are inclined to settle for just being good people. We don’t curse, don’t smoke, don’t hurt others. We are nice Christians, assimilating into the mainstream of life, but if we are just good, not sanctified, we stink like last week’s garbage. We become hollow trophies, relics of dead religion and social injustice programs – applauded by mankind and the devil. Detestable to God.

What was my remedy? Repentance first. I had been “esteeming the things of God lightly” – foremost, my relationship with Him. I had been rushed, distracted, malnourished from “lite” prayer, lazy grazing in His word, genuflecting before His throne room of grace. I felt ashamed. My temperature was lukewarm at best, but in the public eye I spoke eloquently, laughed easily and even loved well. But was it His love, or mine? Could I have loved if they hated me or my Jesus? Or if I speak Truth, not just what someone wanted to hear? Can I rejoice in suffering, when what I think is rightly mine, is taken by a just and sovereign God? I knew all this, but I had begun to take it lightly. We are pulled from the flames of hell, redeemed and set free by a brutal death on a cross and clothed in heavenly righteousness. How can I ever take that lightly? A Love far greater than anything I could return? Yet I was treading softly down the well-worn path of neutral Christianity.

My worship was indeed sick; not dying or dead but just sick enough to make me useless, just like the fever that haunted me for six days, wearing me out, weakening my reserve. I still functioned, but I was hollow and ineffective. Salt without saltiness, a flame without warmth.

“Indeed the safest road to Hell is the gradual one–the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts,…” ― C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters

I thank God for His warning, that He loves us enough to say, “STOP!” Since that day, I’ve noticed all the places where I can worship Him “in spirit and in truth,” not just in lip-service and the “dont’s”. At work, when a patient’s call light is on again, at home, when my husband who never asks needs to know how much I love him, or looking at the night sky studded with every star my God has named. Funny – once I started looking for places to worship Him, my joy returned. Playing the piano, walking the dog, talking to Jesus before I close my eyes at night. I feel renewed, and so very loved. Thanks, Lord, for pulling me back in, close to You.

Because Your lovingkindness is better than life,
My lips shall praise You.
Thus I will bless You while I live;
I will lift up my hands in Your name.
When I remember You on my bed,
I meditate on You in the night watches.
Because You have been my help,
Therefore in the shadow of Your wings I will rejoice. Psalm 63:3-7

July 25, 2018

Color-Coded Chaos

Will finished his cigarette and took one last look around his yard, his house then grabbed his cooler and shoved it into the back of his black pickup and rode off. I could see him through my sunroom window where I pray every morning, through the thin layer of cedar and maple that separates our two homes. When you live so close, you either love your neighbor or, if you’re a Christian you “have to” love your neighbor. My husband and I did both, for six years, and in return I think Will liked us and may have even been a little sad saying goodbye.

Now my own life is changing, that much I know. In my excitement, I’ve started way too many things at once and I wake up exhausted. I’m not even working.

“Hi honey! What did you do today?” my husband asks when he comes in from a day of building things, caked in saw dust and sweat.

“Oh, I was working on the non-profit/ book stuff/coaching website,” whatever the case may be. And he nods respectfully even though I could be creating Frankenstein in the basement for all he knows. In a way I wish I was because I’d have something to show for hours of labor each day. But nothing. Just dreams that make more dreams.

Will was the best-ever neighbor. He watched our house when we were gone, rescuing all of my plants on the sun porch last winter when the temperature hit a numbing six degrees. He even watched our house when we were home, sending my husband text alerts about suspicious activity in the street. Once he saw me walking my dog at night past his house.

“You should be careful here at night,” he warned.

“I’m okay,” I assured him. “I have a big dog.”

“I have a big gun if you ever want to borrow it,” he offered with a smile.

Now looking over to his empty house is like looking at a corpse in a casket. He’s not there so it’s just a house, swept clean and echo-ey. Last night my husband and I prayed for good neighbors, maybe ones that we could point to Jesus. We tried with Will, inviting him to church many times.

“The church would burn down,” he responded. Or he would wave his can of Budweiser at us and yell, “I’m too drunk!” But I have hope for Will as he heads to his new home high in the Vermont mountains. God speaks through His creation and I believe our good neighbor will hear.

I’m in a season of transitions and I’ve always had a hard time separating things. Same with when I lose someone close. It’s like the whole weight of everyone I’ve loved and lost bears down on me and I’m crushed. My son Miles and his wife and children just packed up their lives and left their home of seven years in North Carolina, to begin a new life in Malaysia.

“Malaysia? ” people say, with their faces twisted up in shock. “How long are they going to live in Malaysia?” I think only God knows that answer. It’s far, it sounds crazy but that’s how following Jesus often looks. And they are all ecstatic.

They visited us on the Cape before they left. And to complete my joy, my other two grandsons were here at the same time. Balls, trucks, beach buckets and books lined every foot path inside and out. Joyful chaos. Then it was time for goodbye. As they pulled out of the driveway a small hand pressed against the back window, then they were gone. I know now why my mom hated goodbyes.

See I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the desert. Isaiah 43:19

A knife, a grenade and three crayons. I move methodically around the room, eyes to the floor that is strewn with the last remnants of my grandchildren’s busy worlds. The big stuffed teddy bear that Leo dragged around the house and yard with him had to go back in the Celtics can with his other buddies. Pipe cleaners, Popsicle sticks and the glue my granddaughters used for the odd jeweled raft they created that was semi-stuck to the small play table, were sorted back to their shoeboxes. I sighed. These kids utterly wear me out in such a glorious way. The bubbles go up high on a shelf and I turn to scan the room, still and quiet. Curious George, missing an eye, winks at me as I turn and go back to my grown-up world.

I wish my life was as easy to sort as that play room. Career up on a shelf, people close to my heart that I know God wants me to spend time with – maybe they can sit next to Curious George and chat while they wait for me look up from my laptop. The book, speaking invitations stacked neatly in predictable color-coded boxes. Just yesterday I stared at all the messages I had flagged in my mailbox, wondering why they were so disorganized and then it hit me. They were organized by color flag. Only I had picked a random color each time I flagged one.

“Oh purple looks cute! I’ll flag that purple!” Not a clue that there was an opportunity for some order.

But maybe, just maybe, I am exactly the way God intended me to be – the same girl that danced on the desktops to break up the monotony of a 2nd grade classroom. Jesus is probably shaking his head at my mess and thinking it would be a good thing if I could sort it all out a little more, and He would help me, no doubt.

“God is not a God of chaos,” I’ve heard over the pulpit more than once. And it’s true. But I think He’d rather have us doing something, than just being like Will’s house. Empty and echo-ey.

Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.

So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal. 2 Corinthians 4:16-18

Renewed day by day. I like that, no, I need that. Yes, there is much to do. Maybe Jesus can help me color-code my dreams. Or we can build a jeweled raft and try not to glue it to the table.

“Hi honey! What did you do today?” my husband will ask.

And for once, I’ll have something to show him.

March 5, 2018

Just a Dog (Not a Dog Spelled Backwards)

Yet God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God’s work from beginning to end. Ecclesiastes 3:11 NLT

Georgia is a dog.

Georgia is my new dog. She’s as sweet as a Georgia peach in June and already loves me, but I’m pretty sure it’s because I feed her, pet her and take her for walks. In other words, she’s just a dog. She’s not my child, so please don’t call me her parent. Her parents are two dogs of an undetermined, un-designer mix, which I shouldn’t have to explain.

I’ve noticed a trend in several areas of our culture where we are shifting our natural affections for weird ones, hence the crop of doggy shops that are abounding. Don’t tell me we are in a recession if stores like Bloomingtails or Posh Puppy Boutique prosper. Women at work whip out their phones to show pictures of their “grand-dogs.” This new obsession has been tagged “replacement – syndrome,” a mostly millennial craze which grossed 4 billion last year on such pet essentials as strollers and pet-slings. One article I read showed a young man licking his cat with a rubber tongue.

I am not without compassion. We yearn for what we feel we should have but don’t. Ever since I put down my sweet Rosie two years ago I have been perusing the internet for a new friend, “one with four feet” as my son Jake announced when he was five and tired of burying goldfish. It seems like a simple prerequisite but I soon learned that the world of dog ownership has morphed into an exclusive culture. Even if you can afford $2000 for a purebred, you may not be worthy of one.

I began to wonder if I was a good enough human to adopt a mutt. One turned me away scornfully when I told them, yes, I did have to work. Finally I found Georgia, named after her birthplace. I was sweating the adoption a little because I don’t let my pets on the furniture to “snuggle” – I don’t care if it is their forever home, they will be forever on the floor. And if they need a bath there’s the garden hose, although they get the senior fluff and puff at Petsmart should they live that long. But the southern rescue that released her to me didn’t sound like they cared about that. Different culture. I doubt they have a Bloomingtails.

Longing. Barren women fasten upon a pregnant mother or a newborn cry. Yearning for approval is soothed by a bunch of letters after a name or the accouterments of a fat paycheck. The bottle of wine brings a reliable comfort, so does the little pill for “my anxiety,” as my patients refer to it. Or maybe it’s the boy/girlfriend that really, really loves you…for now. C.S. Lewis wrote:

“The books or the music in which we thought the beauty was located will betray us if we trust to them; it was not in them, it only came through them, and what came through them was longing. These things – the beauty, the memory of our own past – are good images of what we really desire; but if they are mistaken for the thing itself, they turn into dumb idols, breaking the hearts of their worshippers. For they are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited.”

Solomon wisely noted that eternity is planted in each human heart. We instinctively long for what we can’t see. So we fashion a substitute, a golden calf. We lose hope, or just patience. The gifts which God delights in giving to His children become objects of worship or even worse, discarded as cheap arcade tokens. We want more, bigger, shinier and a short cut to get it. The longing becomes bondage.

And my God will supply all your needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus. Philippians 4:9

His riches in glory. Eternal life. Heaven. If you are a Christian, then you know this is not our home. We are sojourners, so we travel light and hold everything loosely, especially pets. I have learned that even the things we think are secure may not be. Anyone who has picked out their child’s casket will agree. We know there is more than this, but we can learn to love the gifts He has placed within our reach today. And be grateful.

If you are not a Christian, then think about the longing. God put that there. You are really longing to know Him, the one who tenderly formed you. That’s exactly why Jesus came.

I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made;^[a]
Marvelous are Your works,
And that my soul knows very well. Psalm 139:14

I found this on Amazon while I was looking for a ball for Georgia that she couldn’t eat:

Furbo Dog Camera: Treat Tossing, Full HD Wifi Pet Camera and 2-Way Audio, Designed for Dogs, Works with Amazon Alexa (As Seen On Ellen)

For $249, you can watch your dog on your smartphone while you’re busy at work, which you need to do a lot of because you spent $2500 for the dog and it costs another $150 a week just to keep her in doggy daycare, then there’s the toys, the accessories and the pet insurance. Furbo even spits out treats for Fido, and it has a 2-way chat and bark alert. I’m hoping it’s really a one-way chat and one-way bark. Be real. Almost 2000 people have given it four stars and it works with Alexa.

I’m glad I have a new dog. I love my dogs and I have even suggested getting a dog to people who are profoundly grieved. They are simple and loyal creatures, an oasis of comfort when the rest of the world seems too harsh and complex. I marvel daily at God’s glorious creation, from dogs to daffodils, which are pushing through the cold dirt right now. As I look around me, I am blessed. But this is not home; the best is yet to come.

So do not be dismayed! If you have a Furbo and a Designer Dog but still feel like something’s missing, you’re right! Jesus is saying, Hey, this way! Once you know the Creator, then all of creation makes perfect sense. And you can freely love those around you, even your pets.

“I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.” – Jesus

Thanks Jesus, for a new dog, for making the journey through this life a little sweeter. You think of everything.

December 9, 2017

Fox Hunters and Heart Keepers

Wanna party?

Catch the foxes for us, the little foxes that spoil the vineyards, for our vineyards are in blossom.” Song of Solomon 2:15 ESV

“It’s my fault,” my husband admitted as we scooped the garbage into a new bag. “I should’ve put a lid on it.” He says it’s squirrels but I like to think something a bit more menacing could cause such a mess, like a Gruffalo. Whatever it was had a big, bad party in the back yard and didn’t clean up. I like to picture them hiding in the trees, paws covering their dirty snouts and chuckling while we schlop their mess back into the can.

Life is full of loose ends, like a giant junk drawer. I think it should be, that a life that’s too pulled together is dangerously aseptic. It’s like the Good Bacteria/Bad Bacteria theory that explains the explosion of super-bugs. We need to be a little dirty. God ordained it. When life gets too spic-and-span, it becomes something incompatible with life on earth. Sterile and phobic, we close the glass door behind us and watch the world go by.

But the other end of that spectrum is the junk drawer that morphs into the junk house. I remember looking at hoarding pictures snapped by a rescue team that extricated a woman from the only space left in her home. Piles of papers, dishes, boxes and broken lamps covered what was once a home. You could not make out where a couch or counter was. She had been consumed by her own mess.

Somewhere in-between lies sanity.

I’ve thought along these lines lately, reflecting on some of my own near-misses, where vanity and self-interest have collided with truth, I mean Truth. Many years ago, as a new believer, I became offended by something my pastor said and decided to go out on strike. I’ll show them.

One week went by, two, three…

Then around week four, as the phone stayed eerily quiet, and the mess from my pity-party was starting to stink, the Holy Spirit spoke these words:

My kingdom goes on, with you or without you.

Ow.

And I have never missed church since. Was I “right” to be offended? Maybe. But my rights pale in the light of the cross, don’t they? God’s scorching rebuke saved me from derailing and also taught me a lot about my place in His kingdom. It’s not my right, it’s my privilege.

The little foxes will nip right at the root of our salvation. God is nurturing and training our crazy branches into something beautiful and even fruitful, then a little critter called Offense, or Jealousy or Resentment begins to gnaw at the tender vine.

Jesus said He had to go home to heaven so that He could send us all some help. He must’ve known we’d need it. And the Holy Spirit is the Helper. He wants to help us grow and learn and start to teach others. Some dirt, a seed, then water. And lots of light. But we have to be the keepers of our hearts. He will warn, even rebuke but will we hear? And obey?

It should humble any believer to see what was once a healthy, thriving and vibrant Christ-breathed life wilt and die, weeds twisting and overtaking a once powerful testimony. Or perhaps the tender vine was crushed by the newer, prettier replacement – a trophy gleaming in a cabinet, a reminder of what once was.

But all too quickly the message is crowded out by the worries of this life, the lure of wealth, and the desire for other things, so no fruit is produced. Mark 4:19 NLT

Like I said, there’s balance. The critters will get in every now and then and wreak havoc. It’s the rhythm of a corruptible life. If there’s life, there’s the potential for death.

“Search my heart, O God!’ He will. Can we hear Him when He answers? Can we throw stuff away before it starts to stink and draws more rodents?

My theory is that most hoarders knew at one time they should just get rid of stuff, that the stuff they held was beginning to hold them. But they refused. “It’s just a lamp,” you say. “Besides, what if I need it someday?” And the slow death begins.

Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. 1 Peter 5:8 ESV
Or sometimes he dresses up like a cute little fox. The point is let’s be watchful, with hearts turned towards the light and ears towards heaven. I don’t want to be a trophy. I want to be just one of His beautiful crazy branches that Jesus delights in, with fruit that bears His glorious name.

C’mon, let us in! We are so cute!!!!

November 2, 2017

Finished and Famous Already

Olive, promoting my book without her front teeth!

Many are the plans in a person’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails. Proverbs 19:21 NIV

Yesterday was a big day, according to my granddaughter Olive. Two events made it so: Number One, she lost another tooth. Number Two, her Ama (me) became “famous.” Her word. A text came through from my son Miles, showing Olive pointing to the space in her mouth with one hand and holding up my book with the other. Something inside of me settled when I saw it. I was at once humbled and set free.

So I wrote a book, I published the book and now I am telling you that you can buy the book here:

The Greater Weight of Glory

I started to write this book eight years ago. I knew God wanted me to write it because it is really His story. But He decided to use my son Spencer and me as the main characters. Try describing one of your children in a book! So I went to a Christian writers conference to learn some things and meet some other writers. Here’s how it went:

Lunch time. You grab your tray and move through the line, making small talk with others. Hey, we’re all Christians here, so the ambience is kind and non-competitive. Nice. I turn and look for a place to sit, inhaling and holding my breath as the room begins to spin a bit and my hands start to sweat. I remind myself this is not ballroom dancing class in sixth grade. There I stood pinned against a gymnasium wall while a wave of really short boys fanned out in front of me, picking all the short girls around me for the next waltz. I pick a table of middle-age ladies who are laughing.

“Sure! Come join us!” They scoot around the table to make room for me.

“Where are you from?” The conversation is light and fluffy.

“What are you writing?” The question makes its way around the table.

Amish romance, one woman reveals with a wink and a naughty glance around the table. Every head nods in approval as we dish more pasta salad into our mouths.

Nutrition and fitness according to the Old Testament, another woman pipes up. Did you know honey has healing properties? No, I smile. That’s so interesting. Heads bob up and down. Mmmm, yes!

What about you? All eyes are now turned to me. I inhale again.

I’m writing a memoir. Exhale. Oh! Although it’s more drawn out, like Ooooooohhhhh….then here it comes, my shoulders hunch up waiting, while I play with the noodles on my plate.

What’s it about?

Deep breath. It’s about my son’s murder. It’s about all of the amazing things God has done through my son’s life and death. It’s about forgiveness and how faithful God is, it’s about…

But I lost them, right after “my son’s murder.” I feel the air disappear, the forks resting on the plates, chairs squeaking. I look up but no one will look at me.

Oh, well that’s very interesting, someone will say, a brave person, and then the topic will switch to wondering what they have for dessert, although I really don’t need any! Laugh.

And exhale.

I came home and put the book high up on a metaphorical shelf for four years and blogged instead. And it was good. But I knew it was there, calling me. The voice was soft at first, like hearing a baby talking to himself, but then it got louder. Come pick me up! It was time to finish.

At the end of the book I acknowledge my brother Bob who humored me with pretend Writer’s Group (just Bob and me with our lap tops in a coffee shop, trying to look like writers do) and my sons, who reminded me of why I write. Jake, for being my best and most faithful blog fan. And it was Miles, last winter, during the peak of my anxiety over finally finishing the book and then what? suggested that maybe I’m writing for a great – great grandson who will need to hear the Story someday. I pictured an exasperated Brooklynn, my 9-year-old granddaughter, as a mother, or maybe grandmother, taking an old dog-eared paperback off her shelf and handing it to a scowling teenager. Here – this is God’s story, it is our story of deliverance and legacy.

What could matter more?

In Embracing Obscurity, the anonymous author makes this point: God intentionally calls us Nobodies, you and me, to be His vessels of honor, so that no one can boast in ourselves. That’s refreshing to me. This book is His gift to you that was poured out through me. For that, I won’t ever despise it. It is my offering, like your gift or work or motherhood, or straightening chairs in the sanctuary, or the time it takes to have coffee with someone who is struggling. Whatever gift He has chosen to place within you. It’s all pretty lame until God says, “Yep, I can use that.” The goods are His. Our purpose here, dear brothers and sisters, is to simply show others the way with whatever we have.

So, no press release or balloons. And if you want the book, you just click three times and it activates probably another three clicks somewhere in a huge warehouse on the west coast. A paperback book is spit out with my name on it. Enjoy!

As for me, I’m famous already – in the heart of a 7-year-old girl who carries her tooth in her pocket. I think Jesus would really love that. And if it’s good enough for Him, it’s surely good enough for me.

*** special thanks to Robert Lyon for the cover illustration and Paraclete Multi Media for the design. Well done!