my mamaw

Mamaw hand needle-pointed the pillow I am holding... Sunflowers.Today I told someone this of my grandmothers and my childhood: “They were like two pillars on either side of us... holding us up.” 

One the town side: Momice. She had CIA instincts. The first sniff of trouble, she appeared at our door. 

On the country side about a mile and a half down the road: Mamaw. Preaching the Word to us.

I have written a tribute to Momice aka Zelda Bernice Williams Morgan. Read it as posted on 4/8/10 and tagged under “heroes.”

Mamaw holds a power over our lives. Growing up at times I felt like her presence could hold my world together. And on a number of occasions, it did. 

The Sunflower River bordered her back yard. An azure pool separated her house from the river and entrapped all the water moccasins. I remember the snow-ball bushes, aka hydrangeas, lining the back of her house. A lover of roses, she grows a garden of them wherever she lives. She seems to carry a bunch with her whenever they are in bloom.

As an adult, I’ve sometimes thought that I possessed a similar power. Like a quintessential jewish matriarch, I have hoped that I possessed some mo-jo that could ward off evil. If I took communion, confessed sin, read (even memorized) the Bible; wouldn’t that protect me from evil? 

That is not the way of Calvary.

God dunks me headfirst into the world, at times being laid waste by the effects of the fall. For a believer, the power of the cross means that God uses even evil to polish our souls so that we can reflect more accurately the image of our nail-scarred Savior. Broken and healed. Resurrected on our behalf.

We show our Father’s power, His omnipotence, when we walk in our broken places willing to be known. We resemble Jesus more and more as our brokenness is healed in His presence.

We walk with scars. We walk with glory radiating from our faces. Jesus bore our shame in His Body. Our abuse. Our perpetrations. Our sorrows. He bore them, so we don’t have to.

Momice is in Heaven with Jesus. Singing in the choir like she used to belt out praises from the back row. I’ve never felt safer than right under her wing in that back pew. I know for a fact that she is up to a lot more than that, though. Her mischievousness must be a delight to Jesus. 

Mamaw, still with us, is recovering from a fall. She still holds a mysterious power over her family although not in the way I thought of as a child. She is a beloved woman and those she loves are blessed.

sword drills

Matt and I on our wedding day, January 5, 1991. Anger invaded my body and pushed aside good sense. 

I risk nausea to read in silence Safe Haven Marriage, a book assigned for the marriage group we are about to attend. We are late. And I am bringing the refreshments. Joshua and Sam chirp in the backseat as Matt navigates our van toward church. 

Matt and I had argued only an hour before and I had not recovered. Given a choice, a root canal would have been more appealing than a marriage class at that point. I couldn’t even look at or speak to my spouse, how am I going to absorb any information about loving him?

I read... “Contempt blah blah blah predictor of divorce. Criticism blah blah blah predictor of divorce.” Great, I am thinking but still not speaking. Matt drops me off first with the snack and drives around to take Joshua and Sam to childcare. 

Larry Kayser greets me as I plop down the chocolate chip cake on the table. “Wow! You look so tan! Have you been in the sun?” I want to tell him it is the glow of anger but blame the soccer field instead. 

Somehow I make it through half the group with this strategy: Say as little as possible. 

An hour in, I pray to Jesus. Help me. I don’t want to be robbed of this time. 

And I speak a few sentences because it is hard for me to be quiet. I steal a little look at Matt.

Then in closing, Larry opens his Bible and reads:

Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. Colossians 3:12-14

And I feel it. The sword. I give myself over to it. Like a pin poking a balloon, the sword deflates my swollen ego. Divides bone and marrow. Rage and blame. Fear and loathing. I feel something soften deep with me like a moisture infiltrating a dry shell. Living Water rushes in and my heart is clay again. 

Later that night I sit with an open journal. I ask for honesty and humility and grace. I write these words: He bore it in His body so I don’t have to bear it in mine. Once again the Water in the form of tears softens my hardened heart. 

Then I take that much softer heart to Matt and we begin again. The anger is important identifying markers in my soul... things Matt, my soul-mate, needs to know to know me. Intimacy. 

It is a remarkable moment birthed in hope and promise.

God means what he says. What he says goes. His powerful Word is sharp as a surgeon's scalpel, cutting through everything, whether doubt or defense, laying us open to listen and obey. Nothing and no one is impervious to God's Word. We can't get away from it - no matter what.

Hebrews 4:7-14

Update on 04.21.2012 by gigi

Two Notes About This Post: Matt has approved the content and given his blessing on this post. Also, the next chapter in Safe Haven Marriage is entitled "Dealing With Marital Emotions." Stay tuned.

love song

Today I did something sneaky. I bought Joshua the Hunger Games book 1. It sits on his bed now waiting to captivate him. He’s been asking me for weeks now if he could read it. I need to read it first, I always said. This morning he wistfully told me that he had wanted to read it before his cousin Dan’s birthday. Dan’s plan is to go see the movie for his birthday. Newsflash. Today is Dan’s birthday. 

He’ll get this gift when he gets home. I won’t be here but later he’ll hug me big and say he loves me. He will forgive me for not getting it sooner. We’ll read it together and talk through all the characters and plot twists and turns.

I wait in anticipation for Joshua to get this gift. I’m probably more excited than he will be.

Today I’ve been hearing God’s love song to me. I’ve been noticing all the ways he spells  out his love in the magenta blooms falling like so much snow in my neighborhood. The scent of wisteria wafts in through the windows and reminds me that winter’s reign is done for now.

Tonight we will gather with seven other couples as we did fifteen years ago around this time. We dreamed together back then of a church. We desired to go deep in our faith and plant and give our lives together. As it happens with a mustard seed, God took our tiny dividend and blew it up. Fellowship Bible Church exceeds any of our dreams. 

As I prepared the sacred dip (recipe below), I raised one hand in worship. Who but You, God? Who but you? I thought of myself at 30 years old. I still worked hard at my faith. I hadn’t learned yet about resting. About how Jesus sat down when He got to Heaven and it was ok if I did too.

When I think of all the places we’ve been, I stand slack-jawed at the grace of God. Through victorious and joy-filled days and through the pits of hellish nightmares, God has walked with us. He’s never left us. All along, He’s doled out gifts.

He waits for me to find these gifts. Gifts He’s been anticipating me opening. And I hear the song of His love for me.

Update on 03.23.2012 by gigi

Sacred Fellowship Dip

1 block of cream cheese

1 can of black beans, drained, rinsed and dried

1 can of rotel, drained

lots of cheddar cheese

Pre-heat to 400 degrees. Spread the cream cheese into an oven-proof dish. Top with the drained, rinsed and dried black beans (this is the secret). Spread the rotel out on top of the beans. Add lots and lots of cheese on top. Bake until the cheese bubbles.

This recipe is originally from Mary Pierce. We ate this dip at virtually every gathering for the first 3 years of Fellowship Bible Church. It's the secret of the church.

paths

Tears pooled around her deep brown eyes and slid over down her cheeks. She told the seminar leader how thyroid disease had wrecked her life. One day she felt great, she said, the next she was exhausted. Brittle hair. Dry skin. Thickened middle. The room grew quiet. We looked to the doctor leading the seminar. With gentleness he proposed a risky thought. Perhaps, he began and his eyes held her gaze, this is a different path but a better one. 

Sometimes God picks you up from one path and places you on a different one, a better one.

I thought of the things she had lost. Her health. Her energy. Her youthfulness. Her sense of control. What had she gained? Better eating habits benefiting her family and her. Powerlessness. Unanswered questions. No promises of a cure. Gratitude for things she once took for granted.

Often God radically changes our paths. Sometimes the world changes just by a few words. 

Has your life ever changed as a result of a sentence?

When this happens, the path we find ourselves traveling seems anything but safe or friendly or good. As I listen to my story and to others’ stories, I see a pattern of God re-creating circumstances. At first glance, this seems cruel. But seen through the grid of God’s goodness, they become opportunities for healing. 

I met a woman whose three year old son recently went through chemo for leukemia. She lost her mother to cancer when she was 8 years old. She is courageously living this traumatic season with an eye for what God may do to bring her healing in her inmost being - not just as a mother desperate for her son’s healing but also as a girl who lost a beautiful mother. 

God baffles us by these stories. What do we do with a God like that? What do we do with the wildness, the unpredictability of God?

Redemption’s work is making up for loss. I cannot author my own redemption. When I attempt to orchestrate my own circumstances to build a scene for redemption, I am in a dangerous spot. Redemption rarely, pretty much never, looks like what I think it will look. Most of the time we look around and say “chaos” or “disaster” not redemption. 

My experience and hope tell me that at those times, God is nearest. He is often poised in the wings to blow your socks off with how He brings His presence to the broken. It happens in the heart. What changes is your spirit. You are able to say with the saints of old: He is enough.

In Him we have redemption through His blood... Ephesians 1:7

whole

One morning last week as I walked on the beach, I kept finding the most beautiful pieces of shells and sand-dollars. I thought, “Imagine how gorgeous that one was when it was whole!” In my mind’s eye, I filled in the gaps and missing spaces. Some of the shells looked lacy where time had worn through the hardness. Some looked beaten and weathered.

I can relate.

Life comes at you fast to quote an advertisement on tv. Seldom do we feel ready. Rarely do we feel whole. 

My small group of women decided to study James. I really like these ladies a lot so I went along. Well, ok, I voted to study James too. So I asked for it. James keeps the barrage of commands coming like the waves of a rough surf. He talks a lot about perfection. And as a recovering perfectionist, this makes me shudder.

I’ve learned that the word for “perfect” that James uses means mature or complete. Whole. When God looks at me, He says, “Imagine how beautiful she is! She is whole!” Of course, He saw me in my mother’s womb. Before I was formed, He knew me. His eyes saw my unformed body. 

I will not know a day on this earth free from sin. It boggles my mind that my Father sees me as perfect through the lens of His Son’s Blood. The work for my salvation is complete. Jesus finished it on the cross some 2,000 years ago. 

I’m growing up. James calls me to. Wholeness does not mean external perfection. It has a lot more to do with internal completion. When I was 10 and asked Christ into my heart, I was completed at that moment. Perfect. But not mature. That takes place over time. 

Even the gaps and spaces are beautiful. Time wears us down and certainly our bodies are degenerating. But our souls are growing toward wholeness. The souls that are weathered by trials are gorgeous and unique. 

I dare say the reflection of our Father is clearest in the souls most pocked by trials. As hardships erode away our external facade, the soul’s gleaming light of rest in the work of the cross shines brightest.