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Things I Love 5: The Blog Series That Just Won’t Die

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I know I’m approaching slasher film status with my fifth blog in this series. Thankfully, this blog is 100% Jason- and Freddy Krueger-free. I’m keeping it strictly PG for the kids.

So let the list of things I love continue from where I left off at #102.

102) Seeing someone who really hurt me, albeit unintentionally, and being able to be friendly and cordial with her and realize that means that I am truly growing in grace.

103) The freedom that comes when you can finally admit that you were hurt and your world didn’t end.

104) Friends who you can vent to who will not just tell you what you want to hear, but will give you much-needed wisdom.

105) Good soul food by people who know how to cook it up right.

106) The dream of someone out there who will fall in love with me for me.

107) Those moments of unexpected and unexplainable joy.

108) The fact that I have enough things I love to make up five blogs’ worth of material (and counting).

109) That my parents are still married (which I now know is a rare blessing these days).

110) That I can step on my cat’s tail and/or on her foot and five minutes later she will still be in my lap, contentedly snoozing away.

111) The smell of apples (and the taste of a fresh Fuji apple).

112) Chocolate Cheerios (though I’m a bit peeved they weren’t around when I was growing up).

113) The new-found ability to start up a conversation with anyone at any time and realizing that people actually want to talk with me.

114) The amazing display of cheeses at The Fresh Market.

115) The book that inspired all these blogs– One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp. One of my favorite books I’ve ever read.

116) Another day to be alive and blessed.

117) French Toast from The Pancake Pantry (but only the one in Gatlinburg).

118) Being in Gatlinburg and having a million happy childhood memories stirred up all over again.

119) Any movie where Fred Astaire dances with Ginger Rogers.

120) Being able to roll over and sleep for another hour.

121) The freedom of not having to try to be friends with everyone.

122) The fact that there will be at least one more of these blogs (and likely more after that).

Things I Love 4: The Slow and The Lackadaisical

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In case you didn’t get the title, it’s the opposite of those never-ending series of movies called The Fast and the Furious. I think we’re probably looking at at least 18 more of those, so gird your loins.

But I digress. Back to the list of things I love, starting at #81.

81) Spontaneously starting up conversations with strangers with small dogs at Starbucks. The best part is that we’re not strangers anymore, but friends.

82) Finding out I wasn’t the only one who struggled with that or felt that way.

83) Finally getting around to seeing a movie I missed years ago and finding out it was worth waiting to see.

84) Listening to Morgan Freeman’s voice (if he ever narrated a book on CD, I’d buy it, even if it was Intro to Trigonometry.

85) Finding out that U2 finally has a NEW album coming out later this year.

86) The elegance and beauty of Grace Kelly.

87) That the end of the Greatest Story Ever Told has already written and it’s has the best ending ever.

88) Or if you prefer, all of history is like the title page and table of contents, and after it ends is the real beginning of the Real Story in which every next chapter is better than the last and where you don’t want to ever put the book down.

89) The peace that comes with acceptance that a friendship is over and that it has served its purpose and best of all, being thankful for the time we had.

90) Every time I see the transformative power of the risen Christ in my life.

91) Believing in love again and especially believing that there really maybe someone out there who will want and desire me.

92) Being in a place at night where you can see the stars.

93) The smell of chlorine. I know it’s weird, but it takes me back to going to the Y as a kid.

94) The smell of bus exhaust. Again, it’s strange, but this time it takes me back to the days of marching band trips.

95) Watching fireflies and listening to a symphony of crickets on a slow country night.

96) Seeing a mother who isn’t preoccupied or busy or glued to her smart phone and is loving on her child and living in the moment.

97) Those little candies called Smarties.

98) That I really can taste the rainbow when I eat a Skittles.

99) Listening to my cat snore.

100) The good feeling I get after eating a really good Southern home-cooked meal.

101) That there will be more of these blogs because there are so many more little things that I love.

Things I Love 3: The Trilogy of Terribly Named Blogs

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I continue with my list of things that I love, things that may not seem like such a big deal, but are present and daily reminders of the goodness of God in a thousand small ways. I will pick up where I left off with #57.

57) Not feeling the need to be friends with everyone so you can have deeper friendships that have more meaning.

58) When you hear a sermon that speaks directly to you and feels like it was written specifically for you.

59) All the black and white episodes of The Andy Griffith show.

60) A well-timed pun.

61) Finally being comfortable in my own skin.

62) Being able to laugh at my own goofiness and not be bothered by the fact that I’m a goober 99% of the time.

63) That all the future promises of God are as good as done.

64) GPS that keeps me from getting lost on these hopelessly and gloriously confusing roads in and around Nashville.

65) That  nothing, absolutely nothing, will ever separate me from the love of God in Jesus Christ.

66) Taking all my size 34 jeans to Goodwill because they’re way too big for me now.

67) Scottish, Irish, and British accents.

68) The fact that I’m taller than Tom Cruise.

69) People who get me.

70) That the people who matter don’t mind and the people who mind don’t matter.

71) Reading through The Chronicles of Narnia and The Lord of the Rings every single year.

72) Ditto for The Hobbit.

73) My very,very red New Balance running shoes that are super-duper lightweight.

74) Anything Patty Griffin has ever or will ever record– even if it’s singing through the phone book alphabetically.

75) That no one is beyond the reach of God’s love and that it is never too late to start over.

76) The movie Elizabethtown– and anyone who has actually seen it and appreciates it the way I do.

77) Wearing my red chucks, i.e. my very red vintage-style Chuck Taylor Converse high tops.

78) Any worship song by Hillsong, Kari Jobe, or Chris Tomlin.

79) A good quote from Mother Teresa.

80) That I promise in the future I will try to think of better titles for these blogs.

Losing Your Way

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I went to downtown Franklin like so many other times before. In fact, I’ve made the drive so much I can go into autopilot and be thinking about other things while I navigate those familiar roads.

This time, apparently I got too wrapped up in my own thoughts and made one of my turns a block too early. I looked up and for a second I thought, “Where the heck am I? What have they done with my downtown Franklin?”

I figured out what I had done and had to do a bit of a scenic detour to get to my destination, but I got there.

At some point or another, we all get lost. Sometimes we get lost in our thoughts. Sometimes we get lost in a web of anxiety and irrational thinking and find ourselves saying things and acting in ways that aren’t true to who we really are.

But no matter how far out of the way you’ve gone, it’s always possible to get back.

Sometimes it takes being a part of something greater than yourself, volunteering for a cause that is way bigger than your own problems.

Sometimes it takes a friend gently but firmly speaking the truth to you in love to set you straight.

Sometimes it takes going to a favorite place on a perfect night and being in the moment with cool spring breezes and familiar sights and sounds.

Everyone gets lost. Even in the healing process, you will have bad days where you fall back to old habits and fears. I had one of those last Tuesday, but I’ve since owned it and moved forward. It’s okay to admit what you’re feeling, to be okay with the bad days because you know they are as equal a part of the healing process as the good days.

Most of all, there is never a time when Jesus doesn’t know where you are. He knows because he’s right there with you, often walking beside you unnoticed as you’re too enveloped in the fog of your pain and doubt to see him.

For those who know what it’s like to be lost and then found, you truly know what a sweet sound amazing grace is.

 

Sanctuary

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I love old churches.

There’s one I particularly love in downtown Franklin. It’s an old Espiscopal church that dates back prior to the Civil War, and every time I step inside I feel like I’ve been transported to a vanished age. One where life was a lot less fast-paced and complicated.

A sanctuary is a place of safety and peace. It’s also a place where God comes and takes up residence.

The Apostle Paul said that believers are the temple of God. That means that you and I are the place where God dwells, where people come to meet God and to find peace.

I love that.

In a world filled with violence and unrest, people are desperately searching for calm. Where there’s so much upheaval and turmoil and chaos, people are looking for rest.

We as believers should be that place of calm and rest. People should see our lives and be drawn to our light. They should see God in us and the difference he makes in the way we respond to the storms and turmoil in our own lives.

That means that when those storms come, we know that God isn’t vaguely out there somewhere beyond the clouds. He’s not trapped in a building with a steeple or locked away behind  ornate church doors. He’s in us, with us, and for us.

We can know the peace of having the same Jesus who calmed the storms with a word of his mouth living in us. That same Jesus that overcame death and hell.

I’m thankful for sanctuary. I’m thankful that God has come to make his home in me and in all those who cling to Jesus as Lord and Savior. I know that means that I should be different than those around me, so they will be drawn to the God inside.

Lord, help me to love others as much as you loved me, and to show them the way to You the way you once showed me.

Amen.

 

 

God’s YES

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“Whatever God has promised gets stamped with the Yes of Jesus. In him, this is what we preach and pray, the great Amen, God’s Yes and our Yes together, gloriously evident. God affirms us, making us a sure thing in Christ, putting his Yes within us. By his Spirit he has stamped us with his eternal pledge—a sure beginning of what he is destined to complete” (2 Cor. 1:20-22).

So many people think that Christians are all about what and who we’re against. And honestly, we  haven’t done a very good job in dispelling that sentiment. We’re sometimes too eager to condemn the sin and not nearly as willing to love the sinner.

But I have to look at a guy like Adam Lanza and say with all honesty, “That could have been me. But for the grace of God and different circumstances, that could have been me.”

That scares me and comforts me at the same time.

It scares me because it means that I’m not nearly as good as I sometimes think I am. It means that I am just as in need of a Savior now as ever and just as prone to wander from the One I love as ever.

But it comforts me because God has promised to stick with me through everything. He’s stamped his YES on me through Christ and nothing will ever change that.

I think we would do better to show love instead of judgment. We’d do better to reach out to those in trouble instead of later saying thing like “I could have told you that boy would end up like this. I could see it coming a mile away,”

While we were yet sinners, while we were at our most unlovable worst, Christ died for us. He reconciled us to God and now gives us a chance to be a part of reconciling others, too.

I don’t know about you, but I want people to know what and who I’m for. More importantly, I really want people to know that God is for me and for them and has a new start for anyone who’s willing to take him up on it.

That’s all.

 

The Biggest Loser

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“Take a good look, friends, at who you were when you got called into this life. I don’t see many of “the brightest and the best” among you, not many influential, not many from high-society families. Isn’t it obvious that God deliberately chose men and women that the culture overlooks and exploits and abuses, chose these “nobodies” to expose the hollow pretensions of the “somebodies”? That makes it quite clear that none of you can get by with blowing your own horn before God. Everything that we have—right thinking and right living, a clean slate and a fresh start—comes from God by way of Jesus Christ. That’s why we have the saying, “If you’re going to blow a horn, blow a trumpet for God.” (1 Corinthians 1:26-31)

I remember back in elementary school at recess, I always dreaded the selection process. That’s when the team captains (usually the most popular and most athletic) chose teams. I generally was picked near the end.

But what’s really bad was to be the one not chosen. The one that the first team captain said to the other, “Oh, you can have him (or her). I’ve got all the people I want.”

To be chosen last is bad enough. But to not be chosen at all is worse. Nobody wants to feel left out or unwanted. Everybody at some level wants to be appreciated and validated and acknowledged for their own unique gifts and talents.

Jesus wanted you. Jesus wanted me. He picked you and me, not because He had to, but because He wanted us. He wants us to be a part of his team and to be a part of the work he’s doing.

God picked those who are considered foolish and weak. God picked the nobodies of the world. Look at the twelve disciples. Most leaders would have picked the cream of society and the smartest, prettiest, powerful people around. Not Jesus. He picked fishermen and radicals and tax collectors, none of whom had much of an education.

That’s comforting. At least to me.

It’s also a warning. If we get caught up in how wise we think we are, God might just send someone to confound our wisdom. If we get too hung up on our own strength, God just might send some to shame us. And if we strut around thinking how great we are, God might just send a few nobodies to adjust our perspective.

But for most of us most of the time, it’s good to know that Jesus wants us around. He wants to use people exactly like you and me to reach the world, to be the people to be his hands and feet, to take this great message of reconciliation and hope to those who need it most.

To the world, you may be a nobody. You may never win any awards or make millions of dollars or make any who’s who lists. But in God’s eyes, you are a treasure beyond price. You are worth every drop of Jesus’ blood. You are the apple of your Abba’s eye. You are the Beloved.

I don’t know about you, but that’s enough for me.

PS Thanks again to Mike Glenn for inspiring this blog.

 

Fountain Ramah Church Part II

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I went back to Fountain Ramah Church today. I knew exactly where to turn and what to look for this time, so my route wasn’t quite so scenic, if you know what I mean.

The main pastor, Blaise Katshing, spoke about how we should allow ourselves to be colonized by God. It struck me as weird when he said it the first time, like maybe I heard him wrong. But the more heard him speak about it, the more it made sense.

When a country colonizes another, like England did with India a long time ago, the idea was to have the locals learn the customs and language of the colonists. For India, it meant that they learned to speak English, act English, and take on English practices and customs.

If we are colonized by God, it means that He takes over completely. We learn to speak in God’s language and to think like He does. Just like the Indians became English subjects, so we who are colonized by God now belong to the Kingdom of God.

It means that we carry the Kingdom of God in us because the Kingdom of God is the presence and rule of God. And if we have been taken over by God, it means God now reigns and rules in us.

When we speak, we speak God’s words. Wherever we walk, it is God walking. Whomever we touch, it is God’s healing hands we touch with. That’s what it means to be colonized by God.

I love that church and I love the people that I meet there. I have never known people who grasp as much what it means to be the family of God as these people. I have never felt so welcomed in any place as this place.

I believe that revivial will come from places like this, where the people are crying out to God for a breakthrough and not settling for the Christian status quo, but people who are desperate for God to move in and around them. People who thirst and hunger for God more than anything else in this world.

 

5 Minutes

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I’ve been trying to lose weight and get in shape. Lately, that means putting in an hour on the elliptical. For me, that’s a lot.

Some mornings, I feel there’s no way I can last that long. So I try for the first 5 minutes. After that, I try for 10. And so forth. If I break an hour down into 5-minute segments, it’s not nearly so bad.

Life is like that.

Some days, you think there’s no way you can survive for the next 24-hours. You feel completely and utterly overwhelmed. Don’t try. Just take the next 5 minutes and breathe deeply and slowly and think to yourself, “I can survive the next 5 minutes.”

Sometimes, you are held captive by your fears telling you that you’ve really messed it up this time and that friend is gone for good. It’s tempting to try and fix what really isn’t broken (which never works, by the way). Or you take the next 5 minutes and are able to start seeing the cracks in the fabric of that lie.

You can do anything for 5 minutes. You can pray or be silent or wait. You can breathe slowly and deeply. You can remember one blessing God has given you and dwell on that.

When I’m stressed out and can’t sleep, 5 minutes of meditating on the goodness of God can make all the difference. It can take me from almost falling back into my old approval-addiction, “nobody likes me” trap to remembering that I am still blessed with family and friends who surprise me all the time in unexpected ways with grace at every turn.

So set your stopwatch or your phone for 5 minutes. It may be a small start, but sometimes all Jesus needs in your life is the smallest place to start. Then He can do amazing things in your life.

I am living proof of that.

 

Fountain Ramah Church

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A friend invited me to attend services at Fountain Ramah Church. She gave me directions because she doubted that my GPS would pick it up. She was probably right.

I drove down Blue Hole Road until it dead-ended, turned left then made an immediate left onto a gravel road. The first time, all I saw was a doublewide trailer with a fence around it and a no trespassing sign. So I went all the way to the other end of Blue Hole Road, turned around and came all the way back. This time I found it.

I stepped inside to what looked like a converted garage. There were chairs for probably 60 people. There was no typical-for-Nashville worship band of professional musicians. The singer was a bit off-key at times, but it was the purest worship I’ve experienced in a long time.

The preacher spoke with a heavy dialect and was hard to understand, but I have rarely been moved by a sermon as much as I was by this one. He spoke with a passion and fervancy that ignited something in me.

At the end, he prayed over some of the members. He laid hands on them and prayed blessing and protection and healing over them.

He motioned for me to come forward. I had to look around to make sure he wasn’t pointing at someone else. He laid hands on me and prayed for me to know my purpose. He prayed that my hands would be the hands that Jesus used to touch and heal people. I was moved to tears.

He prayed for my friend who is leaving for Colombia in about 4 weeks. He prayed protection and anointing over her. It was just like when the early church commissioned Paul and Barnabas as missionaries by laying hands on them and praying for them.

It was the closest to New Testament church that I’ve ever experienced. I was so blessed and encouraged and challenged.

To my friend who invited me, thank you. Thank you not only for inviting me, but also for being my friend. When I think of all the people who have impacted my life and made me more like Jesus, you will always be near the top of the list. I count you not only as my friend and my sister in Christ, but as my hero as well. May future generations rise up and call you blessed for your faithfulness to the call of Christ on your life.