Inspiring

Imagine if Christians became known as “the most encouraging, creative, loving, life-inspiring people I've ever met.” What if people far from God said about you, “I want to be around him because he calls out the best in me”? Why don't we see ourselves with that identity?

When I fell in love with Phil,
It was because he made me want
To be more like Jesus.

Could we do that now
For everyone we meet?

If “pointing out progress
Motivates forward movement,”

Would this work for my children?
For my friends?

Just how radical a life would this be?

Zaccheus

Jesus was just passing through Jericho
But he went home with Zaccheus,

Who was also a son of Abraham,
And salvation came to the house that day—

A beautiful story of repentance,
Restoration, transformation.

But I am struck with the offhand comment earlier,
“And when they saw it, they all murmured.”

I was stuck on short Zaccheus of Sunday school song fame,
And I had passed over the intensity of his job.

Chief tax collector.
And, in real time, Jesus had to tell

The Sheriff of Nottingham
That he would dine with him, befriend him.

Holy, loving Jesus going home with the
Oppressor, not yet repentant.

I would have murmured, too.

I say this to my shame.

Incomprehensible

I have made his heart and his servants’ hearts as hard as stone.

When I read the Bible,
Six-year-old Joe is never as attentive
As his older brothers.
Sometimes I wonder if he gets anything at all.

We read today about the Ten Plagues
And Pharaoh’s hard heart.

Joe suddenly started repeating what I had just read.
“God hardened Pharaoh’s heart.
God hardened Pharaohs heart?
Why would God harden Pharaoh’s heart?
If he wanted the Israelites to leave,
Why did he harden Pharaoh’s heart?”

It leaves me feeling socked in the stomach,
That my child understands that this is a mystery.

This messes with any tidy understanding
Of free will and agency.

Joe encountered the inscrutability of God today.

Stand amazed with me.

Good Samaritan

Seminary students prepared a sermon
On the Good Samaritan.
They were told that an audience awaited
Across campus.

An actor was strategically placed on the way,
Doubled over and moaning.

Of the students told, “Hurry! You’re late!”
Only one in ten stopped to help.

Of the students told, “Take your time,”
Six in ten stopped.

This study brought tears to my eyes.
Are not most of us busy, most of the time?

How could anyone rightly weigh the priorities
Of an impatient audience with the groans
Of an ill man?

If the harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few,
Are we too busy to labor?

Even assuming we identify the harvest correctly?

Candy Corn

The little triangular candies
Were not my favorites growing up.

I gained an appreciation when
Some mentioned how they anticipated candy corn.

Then I stopped eating them.
Who needs all that fake color and flavor?

In a care package today,
The “healthy” version, colored with vegetable dye
And flavored with … I don’t ask.

They are too sweet for the rest of the family.

I’m not disappointed to have two bags for myself.

I’ll eat them slowly, over time.
Even “healthy” candy corn has
Sugar enough to make my heart race.

Unseasonal

When the temperature reached 80
And sunny,
I could do nothing but smile at the gift,
And send the boys out to play.

Fall

As a breeze wafts through the window,
I look up from my reading to see
Hundreds of gold leaves floating down
Into the clearing.

Magnificent decay.

Retribution

This is what the Eternal says: “Israel is My firstborn son. I say to you, ‘Release My son, so that he may serve Me,’ but in your stubbornness you refused to free him; therefore, I am going to kill your firstborn son.”

An imprisoned son
Necessitates the death of the captor’s son.

Somehow the signs escalate quickly
From tricks with snakes
And water turned to blood
To the predicted, expected eventual outcome:

The death of the firstborn son.

God's Instructions

Reading about God’s early instructions to Moses,
I am struck by how terribly unkind God’s instructions are.

Moses obediently throws down his staff.
It becomes a snake so feared that Moses fled.

And God tells him to pick it up,
Not safely behind its head, but
Dangerously, by the tail, where the whip of muscle
Could sink fangs into the hand that grasped it.

Moses obeys.
He is safe.

Next God tells him to put his hand in his shirt.
He obeys.
It comes out leprous.
What kind of a God rewards his obedient servant
With a dread disease?

He is, in the end, healed.

What kind of God sends his obedient servant
To the ruler with a sign easily duplicated
By the magicians of the court?
Why is it necessary to have Moses stumble away, embarrassed?
Why necessary to harden Pharaoh’s heart?

What kind of God takes the lives of the people he is saving
And makes them horribly worse for a time,
So that even the faithful doubt his obedient servant?

The Psalmist says that He Himself knows our frame;
He remembers that we are but dust.

Why, then, must our frame be tested,
Our dust tormented?

I rail against this story,
Even as I stand amazed at the intensity,
The trial,
The faithfulness,
The seeking of both God and man.

Birthright?

Israel had twelve sons
From two wives and two concubines.

Oldest cast aside for sleeping with his dad’s wife.
Next two cast aside for their violent slaughter
Of an entire city.

And the favorite sons of the favorite wife
Did not receive the inheritance.

Judah, fourth-born son of the less-loved wife,
Carries the lineage.

So the birthright is not entirely age-based,
But also meritorious?

Just Saying

How incredible it seems to me
That the oldest books of the Bible,
Written a thousand years and more
Before Christ,

Would have precisely the stories included
For the genealogy of Christ.

You’d think someone would have planned it!

Holy Ground

When Moses approached the burning bush,
God told him to remove his sandals.
He was standing on holy ground.

Feet shod, protected, disconnected.
Were they made of skin?

God had killed animals to clothe Adam and Eve,
No longer naked and unashamed.

Now God tells Moses to unclothe his feet,
Breaking down the division between earth and man,
Between man and God.

On holy ground, come close to God.
Unprotected, but connected.

Two Names

Women come up in Genesis:
Eve created,
Sarah laughed,
Rebecca and Rachel beloved,
Hagar and Leah unloved,
Dinah raped,
Tamar shrewd.
Women of action remembered also for
Their marriages,
Their offspring,
Their place in the patriarchy.

And then we come to Exodus one,
With Hebrews rapidly multiplying.
Pharaoh calls the midwives,
Shiphrah and Puah.

Remembered not for their place in a family tree,
But for what they did:

They feared God,
They disobeyed Pharaoh.

We remember them by name still:
Shiphrah and Puah.

Subversive

Every son that is born ye shall cast into the river.

I think of slave woman Jochebed,
Living in a hovel in Goshen,
Who hid her beautiful son three months
And then, shockingly, obeyed Pharaoh’s order.

She cast him into the river.

She obeyed, but not as expected.
Her son, guarded and protected.

How long could she have thought to keep this up?
Did Pharaoh’s daughter find him the first day?

Or was this an act of survival and hope,
One day at a time?

As it is, indeed, for all of us.

Three Jobs

When asked to list three jobs
He didn’t want to do,
Abraham, age eight, answered decisively.

Army man.
Slave trader.
Race car driver.

Artistic, gentle son,
I am glad you know yourself.
And history.

Bewildered

You and I pack our schedules
To keep from getting bored.
The world is full of interesting things
And we like to engage.

We get that life is short,
And we have no patience for pettiness.
Give us realness and depth, or don’t bother.
Some might say we’re intense.

You came and told me much,
With an openness that is usually earned over time.
And I am left feeling like I bellied up to a fire hose:
Filled up and flung out.

And I wonder: what can I do for you?,
Even though I suspect that is not the question.

Broken Glass

I once broke a jar and put the remains
In a trash bag and set it by the door,
Ready to take out.
In the five minutes of final food prep,
I stumbled into the bag
And wound up with seven stitches for the gash.

But my phobia of broken glass began long before that.

So I can do nothing but thank God
That when the glass broke on the carpet of the playroom
With such a muted crack that no adult noticed,
That the damage was limited to a total of
Two small cuts on two small fingers of two small children.

for I say unto you, That in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven.

Exactly Right

On a shoot in LA,
You passed a stall of clocks made of
Books, row upon row, beautiful.

Scanning titles, you found
One of my top ten, so when I opened it
Weeks later, I felt very known, loved.

I think about my clock Odyssey
And want to tell you: Yes.
There is time for the journey.

True?

St. Augustine said, “You become what you love.”

I wonder what St. Augustine meant when he said that.
Maybe:

If you love money, you become hard;
If you love children, you become playful;
If you love learning, you become knowledgeable;
If you love God, you become godly.

Or maybe:

If you love grace, you become gracious;
If you love truth, you become truthful;
If you love love, you become loving.

Love the good.

Mind Blown

Isn’t this the cup from which he drinks? Doesn’t he use it for divination?

Joseph and the dreams doesn’t bother me.
I like the strangeness.

Then we have Joseph and his cup,
That he claims is used for divination.
Twice.

Perhaps this is simply part of his disguise,
The build-up before the big reveal.

But what if he did practice divination?
That was what the dream prophecies were,
Telling the future by supernatural means.

Sometimes it seems that those who follow God
Most closely
End up looking

Most crazy.

Wendy

What a wise person says is the least of what they give. It is in the little habits of life, the daily acts of kindness and courage that were handed down to that person by a mentor a generation ago which were handed down by a mentor before—and stretched back into the dimness of time.

A year and a little more I had
Wendy as my weekly mentor.
One Saturday I tried to do something loving,
And it failed, and I was sick and took the wrong bus home.
In short, it was a disaster.

And in my campus mailbox the next week
Came a card, the “Get Well Soon”
Crossed out and rewritten
“You Are Cool.”
I laughed about that for days.
It was so very Wendy.

In my memory, she always clapped and cheered
When I walked in her door,
Exuding eagerness to know me, to be with me,
Sharing her gift of hospitality.

I clap and cheer for guests now,
Passing on the hospitality I have received.
May there be another generation of
Welcome, coming soon.

Two Virtues

A scholar spoke about two virtues:
Resume virtues and eulogy virtues.

The first are achievement and education,
The second are character traits.

We focus on the former at the expense of the latter
To our harm.

Only a fool would count a diploma
More worth than honesty, peace, love.

Dream Doubled

The doubling of Pharaoh’s dream means this future is fixed by God, and He will make it happen very soon.

Joseph proclaims the meaning of two troubling dreams.
The shocking statement comes between explanation and suggestion:
Two dreams are a guarantee of what is to come.

Joseph, sold a slave, thrown in prison,
A dozen years or so spent simply surviving faithfully …
This Joseph also had a double dream.

His future fixed by God, he walked
In faith that God would make it happen very soon.

October 21

Four sons we dedicated
At our small hippie church.
All four grandparents there.

I wanted a special dedication for Caleb.
All four grandparents were in town
One night, and so we gathered
At the home of his nativity,
With our biological family
And our Virginia family.
Some of both families attended
The dedication of our oldest son
And youngest son.

We sang songs and read Scripture,
Said the same beautiful prayers,
And then talked and ate and laughed.

It was all very me, very us,
A celebration of the child
God has given.

L'Abri

Years ago I read about a chalet
That took in wanderers.

They trusted in the Lord’s provision.

They asked that those who should come,
Would come,
And that the rest would stay away.

They asked for guidance for each day,
And avoided efficient plans for the future.

They asked for God to send co-laborers,
As he chose.

In four weeks,
We’ve hosted twenty people or groups
And had more than a dozen other visits off farm.

As I look at the calendar,
There is a pattern: no one turned away,
Visits like clock-work,
Like someone is coordinating our lives
Day by day.

This was not what I anticipated
When we moved to the land.
I expected literal fruit.

But if what God offers is a different kind of fruitfulness,
I’ll take it.

Cathedral Motto

Inservi Deo et Laetari.
Serve God and be cheerful.

I like this motto, written in a cathedral
Where the Living God is worshipped.

I understand “Serve God.”
I often serve with cheerfulness.

But if I look at Noah, with survivor guilt,
The unnamed saints sawn asunder:

Is good cheer the right response to
Brokenness?

Parents

We expected you to soon be pregnant.
No preventions, a bride suited to motherhood
More than any I’ve met.

Barrenness.

And so you were pregnant on paper,
Going through the process of adoption
With trepidation and faith.
Matched with three siblings,
Cousins to my sons.
Until Kazakhstan closed permanently.

A paper miscarriage.

Presumably, too, the monthly bleeding
Offered a slap.
Every month, year by year.
Body betrayal.

A secret pregnancy,
Baby delivered at eight weeks,
And nothing but a bouquet to commemorate.

A few years later, an unexpected call.
Ten weeks of pregnancy.
Time to announce, to celebrate.
I was with friends, and I hung up the phone and wept,
Speechless and shaking
With joy.

Hours later, the baby was born.

You are a mother,
My brother a father,
With all of the pain and none of the joy.

“Here is the world.
Beautiful and terrible things will happen.
Don’t be afraid.”

Expected

With the perspective of war in the heavenlies,
It came as no surprise that minor disaster struck today,
After a rich week for many of my closest friends.

And so, when we backed up the driveway to church
And found the freezer no longer freezing,
With three full cows inside: it felt almost predictable.

We’ve been here before.

While Phil refilled the Freon, I drove to church with boys,
Filled with questions about what exactly we are doing here.

In prayer with a friend after service:
The fruitfulness of this farm may not be seen yet in crops,
But there is fruitfulness in rich relationship with our friends,
Finding healing and beauty as they walk with God.

In light of transformation, defrosted meat is hardly a trial.

The first time and second times freezers failed,
I was shocked and appalled.

Would it be called maturity that this third time hardly bothered me?

Because frankly, I would prefer maturity to resignation and despair.

Better Day

I had thought nothing could top my Tuesday,
When my times of refreshing came from the Lord.

I was wrong.
Today, times of refreshing came for my friends.
And that was better.

Intense prayer offered an intense encounter with Christ,
And afterwards I left my farm and sobbed convulsively
That Christ brought truth at just the right time.
I see God in timing, and today was the fullness of time.

Then to a bridal shower, where we prayed for a beautiful friend.

Then to dinner, where we talked of the work of the Spirit,
Of the beauty of the people of God in the Church,
Of the transformation that happens one by one,
How that feels small in the midst of the world’s need.
Yet how powerful.

Then to an impromptu prayer meeting,
Well-attended despite last minute.
The Spirit brought hope and peace and thanksgiving
There among friends.

And home to talk: share concerns and hurts,
Not in acrimony but in calm and expectation.

Such a rich day.
Thanks be to God.

Catalytic

My week was bookended and filled with prayer.

Intense prayer on Sunday
That, seven days later, proved
The catalyst that was needed.
I got to be a part, and I stand amazed.
War in the heavenlies breaks out
Here on earth.

Monday I gave over much of the homeschooling.
This was not an expected answer to prayer,
But I could not do it all, and give thanks
For an unexpected answer.

Tuesday: weep and pray in a gathering of friends,
Hear the word of the Lord,
Be prayed over and leave in peace.

Wednesday morning, a time of personal prayer
My soul longed for,
Followed by Wednesday evening,
Praying blessing as some loved ones leave.

Thursday was pregnant with waiting prayer,
For direction and guidance and peace.

Friday continued that vigil.

Ending in a crescendo of prayer
Saturday, where the Holy Spirit came in power
And brought clarity, truth, peace, love.

Encouragement

A stray comment reminded me
That the hunger for encouragement
Applies to all.

Even the most confident need a cheerleader.

Woman in Control

Sarah persuaded Abraham
To take Hagar as a surrogate mother.
It didn’t turn out as she had hoped.

I recognize myself in Sarah’s desire
To just get something done,
The desperation of life working wrong.

Damned if you do and damned if you don’t.
I like neither the story nor the outcome.

Perfect Score

A friend used a two syllable word
When, perhaps, one syllable would have worked.
He took some good natured joshing
From a friend who claimed to have taught all he knew.

“I got a perfect score on the SAT verbal;
You’d think I could get a little more respect.”

Not that a two syllable word is worth much
Congratulations.

Seven Days

It has always stressed me out
That Noah was in the ark
For seven days before the rain
Began to fall. How horrible,
To spend a week in absolute
Stasis, while the mockers
Spent another week laughing.

Until I noticed that God told Noah
To enter, and that the rain would be
Delayed seven days. So Noah knew.

Why did God wait those seven days?
My impatient mind boggles.

Good Question

One son said:
If Moses wrote Genesis,
But never entered
The Promised Land,
How did he know the names
Of all the places?
Who added that information?

Larger Pipeline

The need around me is so heavy,
I cried out to God to make me
Stronger, bigger, more filled.
I want to be a larger pipe.

God said no. For now.
Grow in the language of intimacy.
I’m not sure what that means,
And it sounds stressful.
And I’m a bit upset that
God doesn’t want me as a larger pipe.

But since I’d rather be small and intact
Than large and broken,
I think I’ll take what God offers.

Destroy

We are going to destroy this place.

Abraham bargained for Sodom.
Six times he asked the Eternal One
To commute the sentence
For the sake of 50, 45, 40, 30, 20, 10.

I have heard that this was a failure
On Abraham’s part: that he should have
Pushed for the perfect seventh question.
I suspect there were not even five righteous,
And I’m not sure the wicked city’s sentence
Should have been lifted for the sake
Of one, righteous Lot. Who was saved anyway.

I have heard that Abraham could have hoped
That ten would have been possible:
That between Lot, his wife, two unmarried daughters,
A son-in-law and married daughter, and at least two sons,
That one family could have been enough
To preserve the city.
But it was not.

But I rather like the thought that,
With all the interactions between
Man and God, God’s purpose went forth.

Prayer for Me

When I was twenty and my friend was forty,
She went to a spiritual director.
“She will just pray for me.
Do you know what that feels like?
To have someone pray for me?”

I have had people pray for me
For the various bits of life that need prayer.
So have we all.

But to have someone pray
More globally, for the direction of life,
For the work of the Spirit:
Do you know what that feels like?

I do. Now.

Open Arms

Caleb and I have a game.
I sit on the floor.
He comes and gives me a hug.
I kiss his sweet cheek.
He throws his head back and laughs
And I smell his sweet breath.

Then he walks away.

I sit with my arms open and outstretched.
He looks back. Turns around.
Pretends indifference.
I lean forward, lean back.
Waiting. Arms ready to embrace.

Then he toddles forward and
We hug each other tightly.

There is nothing between us
Yet.

May this pattern of return
And reunion, of joy-filled reconciliation,
Be the pattern of our lives.

Growing Vegetable Soup

One board book ends with
Eating vegetable soup, best ever:
“And we can grow it again next year!”

Joe once had me read that again
And again. It’s the next year!
Grow the vegetables for soup again!

Real years have now passed,
And I read this book to another boy.

Joe, today, laughs until he can hardly speak.
“Remember that time you read this
Again and again, as if the years were passing?”

I am amazed that, of all the parts of childhood,
This was one he remembered.

I am amazed that the rapid passage of time
Strikes anyone, even a child,
As a thing of mirth.

Circle

A circle is complete.
Infinite lines of symmetry.
No beginning and no end.
Perfect.

I think of that sometimes.
If, in some ways, I am a circle,
I hope that I will be a bigger circle soon.

Still complete.

But bigger.

God With Us

Matthew, after his genealogy,
Begins with the angel telling Joseph
That Mary will have a son of the Holy Spirit,
That his name will be called Emmanuel,

God with us.

Matthew, after telling of Jesus’
Life, death, resurrection,
Ends with Jesus telling his followers
I am with you always,
Even unto the end of the world.

Jesus, God with us,
Emmanuel, unto the end of the world.

A Perfect Day

Read of Christ for an hour and more.
Made food for my family.
Read aloud the Genesis account of Noah.
Put the baby to sleep.

Drove through falling leaves of vibrant color
And cried as I sang along with songs I love.

Spent four and a half hours with a soul friend,
Talking of missions and poetry and
The work of the Spirit and children’s books.

Back home, singing at the top of my lungs.

Ate the food prepared hours earlier.

Drove to town with the family,
Talking the whole way.

Three hours with dear friends.
Listening, singing, praying.
Hearing a word from the Lord for a friend.
Hearing a word from the Lord for me.
Surrounded by love.

Talking the whole way home.

Few days are perfect in every moment.

This one was all I could hope for on this earth.

A Mercy

Lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever

Adam sinned and the garden of Eden was lost to him,
A flaming sword keeping him from the tree of life.

Is this not a mercy? That in his knowledge of good
And evil, he was not able to live forever?

Forever with enmity, forever with fear, forever with shame.

Better to end in death, with the hope of a coming Savior.

Beautiful

Friends lived together.
Then they lived apart.
Then they married.

Their church called them to righteous
Without turning them away.
How did they do that?

They asked questions.

Do you live together? Yes.
Do you sleep together? Yes.
Do you know the Bible calls that sin? Yes.
What are you going to do about it?

Practically, they could not pay two rents
While one was in school.
The church found a home for one to stay in.

Personal holiness thus became
A community endeavor.

As, I suppose, it almost always is.

Story

The Crucifixion is actually a better story than The Chronicles of Narnia.

A thought so surprising
And true
I have nothing to add.

Conduit

When I sink deep in prayer,
Sometimes my palms grow hot,
And I feel like a conduit
With the Spirit flowing
From my head out my hands.
My head pounds. I end drained,
Not ready to leave the moment,
But want to sit in that space
In silence and peace for a time.

This only happens when I pray.

A Funny Story

One of my smartest friends said:
For years I thought
Trotsky and Tolstoy
Were the same person.

Why did Stalin want to kill Tolstoy?
Did Stalin read War and Peace,
And finally yell, “What the heck?”
Then condemn the author to death?

Until the day my friend saw the date of the novel:
Eighteen sixty-nine.
That made no sense with Stalin.
A flash of insight.

The world suddenly made more sense.

Transcendence

Alone, I listened to music I love
As I drove down damp country roads,
Fall colors a vivid tunnel around me.

Lazarus II

Jesus wept.

The shortest verse in the Bible
Makes no sense.

I have no doubt that Jesus, man of sorrows,
Entered into pain.

But here he had declared
That God and the Son of God would be glorified,

That Lazarus was dead,
And that he went to waken him.

Then he wept, minutes before raising the dead.
He had just seen Mary, and those with her, weeping.

Grieving for his friend’s pain,
For humanity that suffers under death.

Hebrews tells us that Jesus was made perfect through suffering.
In context, clearly this speaks of his death.

But I wonder: did that suffering begin now,
Seeing what his mother would feel when he died?

Lazarus I

Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus. When he had heard therefore that he was sick, he abode two days still in the same place where he was.

Classic Bible study mnemonic:
What is the therefore there for?

Jesus loved these siblings.
Therefore, he stayed where he was and let Lazarus die.

What pattern of logic, or love, does this follow?

Seven Basic Plots

Scholar Christopher Booker
Claims there are seven basic plots
Across all stories.

Which one is the story of the Christ?

Tragedy fits least,
Though a lost creation and a crucifixion
Are tragic elements.
We can hope not everyone ends up dead.

Rags to Riches tells half.
Properly it should be riches to rags to
Riches. Christ made himself nothing
But will receive a name above every name.

Voyage and Return works,
Because Christ left his home,
Became a man, and then returned.
But the story is deeper than that.

Rebirth is, perhaps, more our story
Than his, though if a resurrection is a rebirth,
This is the story of the Christ.
Thanks be to God.

The Quest stirs within; don’t we all
Know that something is lost that needs to be
Found? Don’t we all want someone to seek us,
To find us?

Comedy surprises me by how dark it gets,
How close to disaster the story comes, before
All works out well and ends in a wedding.
Coming soon: The wedding feast of the Lamb.

Overcoming the Monster:
Sin, death, and the devil, defeated.
Christ victorious. We live in that victory.
And his story is our story.

Thanks be to God.

Comfort Food

I liked spaghetti. Pizza. Meat-potato quiche.
For my birthday, I would get all three,
The day before, the day of, the day after.

Chicken pot pie was one of my favorites.
It was more work than most meals,
So we had it rarely, but always with enthusiasm.

And I could eat cinnamon toast every day.

It confounds me that I have
A son who dislikes spaghetti.
One who eats pizza only if it’s cold. And only one piece.
A husband who dislikes meat-potato quiche.
And, today, when I served the special pot pie,
A son who disliked it and another who ate only half.

How can anyone dislike meat and potatoes
In a butter pie crust?

And some sons don’t like cinnamon toast!

Shall I mention that half won’t eat my homemade
Macaroni and cheese?

I wonder: when they are grown,
What will be their comfort food?

Grass-fed burgers with organic ketchup?
Fresh milled spelt bread with Irish butter?

Realistically: chocolate chip cookies, fresh baked.

Three, One

For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.

The Godhead, mystery of three in one.

In Genesis, a man leaves his father and mother.
He and his wife become one flesh.

Separate and unique, but also one.
Does that help clarify
The mystery of the Godhead?

Psychosis

I was talking to a friend once about
Anxiety.
Could you think differently?

“You want to fix this!”

I remembered then the period
When I felt demon-possessed,
When suicide was a daily idea,
When rage took over my thoughts,
Even while a tiny voice at the back of my mind said
“You’re not being rational.”

In short, when I was psychotic.

We figured out, eventually, that wheat triggered me.
Now I know that if I try Ezekiel bread,
Or a beer that I realize, too late, has wheat,
I know that suicide will come to mind
And be more testy for a few days,
But my brain will eventually regulate and I will be
Myself.

I don’t know what hubris would be required
To assume such psychosis doesn’t exist.

Crying Out

What I remember most from Caleb’s birth
Was that he cried and cried.
I was too tired and hurting to comfort him well;
But I don’t let my babies cry,
And I wanted the midwives to help,
To hold him or calm him so he could eat and sleep.
It felt like a very long time before
A double dose of Chamomilla calmed him.

Besides the physical trauma of a nine pound baby,
I held the emotional trauma of a traumatized son.

A year later now, to the minute, Caleb wakes and cries.
Whether he has a tooth coming in, or a cold coming on,
Or is just sussing out the memory of initial separation,
This time it’s just me awake to deal with him.

And so with both birth and birthday,
There is little I can do for these cries, so personal,
So unknown.

But I will sit up with you, son,
Through the watches of the night.

It’s not much, but what I have I give to you.

Micah

Therefore I will make Samaria as an heap of the field, and as plantings of a vineyard: and I will pour down the stones thereof into the valley, and I will discover the foundations thereof.

When we read Micah today,
Our collective response was:
What?

The heap of a field,
The plantings of a vineyard,
Stones poured down
And foundations found.

Is this good? Bad?
Cheerful? Menacing?

Seven chapters of words,
Full of unknown names
And ambivalent statements.

The famous “But thou,
Bethlehem-Ephrata,
Though thou be little”
Passage is there, though
Context offers little aid.

And the famous “He has shown thee,
O man, what is good” list of three
Requirements shows up,
Something to grab hold of
Among men of dishonest scales.

A couple glimmers amidst a morass of
Unintelligibility.

I remember why I haven’t ever
Delved deep into most minor prophets.

Good Taste

Caleb finds the drawer of bone china
Fascinating. He picks up a platinum-rimmed
Teacup and places it gently on the floor,
Then does the same with a crystal goblet.

I’m glad he has good taste,
And, at a day shy of a year, recognizes beauty
And fragility.

But I still close the drawer
And tell him no.

Last Year

Last year right now
I hadn’t yet met Caleb,
But I knew the time was near.
Phil and the boys were sleeping,
And I was listening to “Oceans”
And breathing through contractions.

Soon I would call the midwife,
And we would head to our friends’ home.

But for now, I was just by myself,
With a little one connected
For yet a little while,
Worshipping alone,
Not alone.

Community

A friend once said,
I have anti-anxiety meds
That I can take on demand,
Up to four times a day.

If I’m alone, I sometimes
Count down the minutes
Until my next dose.

But if I’m with a friend,
I don’t think about anxiety,
And I need no meds.

Community as therapy,
As healing.

Isolation is, literally,

Torture.

Come Before Winter

Paul long professes his hope
That he will leave his bonds,
That he will see his friends again.

He writes to Timothy, near the end,
Without that expectation.

Paul, forsaken,
Watching false teachers arise.

Cold, too.
Bring my cloak when you come.

Come before winter.

All Things

I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.

This classic inspirational quote
Actually falls in the midst of
Paul’s appreciation for financial aid.
He is content in plenty and want,
Thanks to the strength of Christ.

Nothing here about winning a track meet,
Starting a business, public speaking,
Or skydiving.

Confessions

I was talking to a friend about habits,
Those autopilot parts of life.
And I confessed that I have none.
Some nights I am too tired
To brush my teeth!

Me, too! she said.

Do we talk about the reality of life?
Like: I don’t tuck my children in
And kiss them.
Like: though we eat dinner,
We might have only one other meal,
And some snacking, on no schedule.

I don’t usually think this makes me less
Of a person or a mother.
It just is what it is.

But if it’s encouraging that my home
Is neither ordered nor ideal, I guess,

Be encouraged.

Receipt

First thing this morning I went to search
The car for the missing receipt.
I feel like I empty the car regularly,
But since I found receipts a year old,
Either I never quite finish what I start,
Or I don’t empty it as often as I think.

Without success, I systematically
Worked through boxes and bags in storage,
Not cleaning so much as rearranging.

Then my options were exhausted.

Talking to Phil, I reminded him
That I had paid for the dishwasher
After dropping him off at the airport.
In May? That didn’t make sense.
It must have been last November.

In a flash of inspiration, I realized that
Receipts from last year
Reside in a different folder.

And there, the last receipt was the one needed.

Thus, a faulty memory, and not
A faulty filing system, proved the problem.

But I have a cleaned up car!

Frustration

In March, we had our dishwasher installed.
Almost five years of hand-washing every pot,
Every glass, every plate, every spoon,
That boxy device released me from slavery.

Half a year later, the dishwasher quit.
We know it’s under warranty.
But I didn’t file the receipt.

In the chaos of moving, we have piles of papers
And mounds of detritus to wade through
In search of that one scrap of paper.

I’m all for organization.
But I’d prefer it to be on my own time,
Not with the kitchen monster of mess
Crouching, dragging me ever further behind.

I’ve found dozens of other receipts.
Why should that one vital one go missing?

I realize this is a first world problem.

Pipa Wisdom

I met a girl who plays the pipa,
A four-stringed Chinese lute.

As we talked about music,
I mentioned that I had played
Wrong notes the last time
I played with people. I am done.

She said, My teacher says,
Unless you are a professional,
The technique is less important
Than the spirit.

I’m not sure I have the spirit needed—
I would like more courage—
But the spirit, at least, I can attempt.

Day of Rest

I work hard six days a week.
Sunday I don’t work for pay.
I don’t homeschool.
In the past, I did no homework.

Back in high school,
With a packed schedule,
I would take three hour naps
Sunday afternoon.

Today after we got home from church,
I realized my vision was funny,
And it wasn’t just hunger.

A two hour nap
Made me feel human again.

How does anyone work
Seven days a week?

Buried Under Rubble

Nehemiah goes to Jerusalem with a clearly defined purpose:
Rebuild the wall.

The enemies in the hills hinder progress,
But he encourages and directs and the building goes forward.
Triumph!

And then, suddenly, the relationships blow up.

The rich have been enslaving the poor,
Taking their land, taking their daughters.

As if bondage to the Babylonians wasn’t enough.

I think about Nehemiah, cruising along with the seen challenges,
Managing well,
Suddenly hit with a problem he had not conceived.

Did he look at the broken down rubble that was once a wall
And think, Could there be a more perfect picture of the Jews?
Do I really have to deal with this brokenness, too?

In the end, there’s a way forward, and the bondage is broken.
For the moment, at least.

In a world of rubble, a permanent fix would be too much to hope for.

Chipotle Encounter

One Sunday we had gone to church,
And gone to the hardware store,
And gone grocery shopping,
And faced with an hour drive home,
And some time before I could get food on the table,
The rumble of six hungry stomachs pointed us to Chipotle.
It was mid-afternoon and we’d had nothing since breakfast.

And the line stretched halfway back across the restaurant.

But the very last person in line was someone we knew
Vaguely, a face from church that we had greeted his first time
And then mostly forgotten.
He had stopped by Chipotle earlier, seen the line, left,
And returned, only to find that the line was longer.
But he was hungry, so he stayed. And then we came.

And we ended up talking the half hour we waited in line,
And kept talking a half hour, an hour, an hour and a half.
The boys had long since finished eating and eventually
Went out to the car to amuse themselves with books and CDs.
But they let us have our time to meet this new friend.

We would have become friends eventually, I think.
We have enough over-lapping circles of affection,
We would have met and meshed.

But I like the serendipity of this Chipotle encounter,
A springboard to communion.

The Moabite

Ruth the Moabitess marries Boaz.
It’s a rare romance in the Bible,
With an end of love, restoration, royalty:
A new child for bitter Naomi to love,
A line that will continue to the Christ.

So the end of Nehemiah reads like a slap:
The Ammonite and Moabite are not to come
Into the congregation of the Lord for ever.
Nehemiah is right: the law of Moses is clear:
Deuteronomy 23, speaking of those peoples:
“Thou shalt not seek their peace nor their prosperity
All thy days for ever.”

And at the end of Ezra, the concurrent story is
That those who had married Moabites
Simply sent their women and children away.
An end of barrenness.
Correct, but bitter.

What am I to do with this?

It is not satisfying to assume that Ruth
Was the only one who converted.
Besides, the prohibition is clearly racially based,
Without regard to faith in the true God.

It is satisfying to say that, by lineage
And story and heart of God,
The story of Ruth is the story that should be told.

And what was happening with Ezra and Nehemiah
May have been what the exigencies of the moment demanded.
They were faithful, and I can trust that God rewarded that.

But we know that the law brings death.

In Ezra, the families wait to be separated, in the rain:
A cold, sad picture of brokenness and failure.
One could say: a picture of life under the law.

The story of Ruth comes during the days when the judges ruled,
A time when every man did that which was right in his own eyes.
And yet, here is this story of harvest and life.
It is such a better story!

Can I read this as a metaphor for the New Testament teaching,
That the law brings death, but walking by the Spirit brings life?
Because that’s the story I choose.

A Joke by Isaiah, Age Ten

What do you call proud winds?

Lest the answer come too quickly,
Let me mention that yesterday,
When I was draining noodles by the open window,
Isaiah said, “Look! All the steam is wafting outside!”

Perhaps that prompted the question of the name of proud winds:

Weather vains.

Three Things

In a college class, the professor asked:
What three things do you value?

I assume the young answered with typical fatuousness,
Music, beer … I wasn’t there, but I can imagine.

And then my friend Ashley listed her three:

Monogamy,
My fertility,
And pretty things.

Fear of Intimacy

We hope for intimacy between spouses.
Can we have it between friends?

The Bible shows the beauty
Of deep friendship between
David and Jonathan,
Describing it:

Your love for me was wonderful,
Better even than the love of women.

I don’t think that was a sexual relationship.
But clearly it was deeply intimate.

Do men have friendships like this with other men?
Some women have their best friends,
And some spouses share camaraderie.
And there might be, sometimes,
Friendships across gender lines.

But for the one who doesn’t identify as straight:
Can she have a close female friend?
Not a sexual partner, but simply a close friend?
What would be the scriptural prohibition?

Can there be space for deepening of relationships
Of all types, perhaps with a little less
Legalistic worry about
Ever riding in a car alone?

I’m all for fleeing sexual immorality.

But I wouldn’t mind increasing in brotherly affection.

Have we thrown out all possibility
Of deep relationship with a large portion of the world?

Unimaginable

A report from a friend:
Terrorists going from house to house.
Asking the children of Christians
If they would renounce their faith.

Every child said no.
Every child beheaded.

The parents left alive.

Should such hardship come here:
May my children stand firm.
May I, too.

Pray for these sisters and brothers.

Birthday Wishes

I suppose it is a measure
Of my childhood contentment
That every year
When it was time to blow out candles
On my birthday cake,
I would waste my wish:

I wish the Care Bears were real.

I had seen the Care Bears once when a young child,
Vaguely knew that “Sunshine Bear” was my favorite.

I had no real desire that they become real,
But since I had no real desire for anything else,
Why not wish for something fanciful,
As a sort of nostalgia for all the birthdays
As far back as I could remember?

What City

Years ago, my uncle mentioned that
A friend had found the city
That most suited her.

The thought gripped me.

At the time, fresh from college
And a bit of travel,
I could not imagine a delight
Greater than living in Florence,
That city of architecture,
Painting, sculpture, church, palace,
Bridges, piazzas, steak.

I thought of it, the world’s largest
Art gallery,
As my city. The city that suited me.

I returned later once, for a week.
Still magical, still beautiful.
But I prefer to visit, not live.
I had children then, and it’s a city,
With graffiti and sirens,
Cacophony of noise, tourists, grime.

This holds true for
San Francisco, Chicago, New York.
Such nice places to visit, and leave again.

For a place to live,
I like where I am. In the middle of history—
All Thomas Jefferson, all the time, but he counts—
Near a small city with brilliant people, fun people,
And a liberal arts university where students study
English, religion, Arabic, sociology, chemistry.

Perhaps there is a place that would suit me more,
Somewhere.
But I’m not looking too hard.

Tank

Phil spent the day putting a tank in the ground.

After he hacked through shale with a pickax,
He dumped in sand, angled the tank,
And added sand and more sand, tamping it down.

I kept thinking I should call the boys to do school work.
But this was practically a field trip:
Tank installation day.

And, really, it was 75 and sunny.

Jump in the hole higher than your head! Catch toads!

It’s a day that’s good to be alive.

Posthumous

At Thanksgiving one year,
I had a conversation with my friend’s mother about books
And life, and how unpleasantly dry her mouth was without
Saliva.

A little thing you don’t think of as a comfort

Until it’s gone.

She died a few weeks later when we were out of town.

Today her daughter brought me a gift.
I had hoped to go with the daughter to see
A Cezanne exhibit in a far city,
But the logistics proved too much.

In a box of her mother’s things, she found
A beautiful, new book, never opened:
Cezanne.

A gift for me to remember the artist, and

Karen.

All Scripture

I can recite the passage about
All Scripture given by inspiration of God,
Profitable for doctrine, reproof, correction,
Instruction in righteousness.

But I don’t necessarily understand what that means.
In Nehemiah, there’s a list of the exiles
Who returned, just like there is in Ezra.
If not identical, pretty close.

Nehemiah has a lengthy “history of God at work” speech.
My attention kept wavering.
It’s a summary of the Pentateuch. Why is it needed?

The names of each person or family who worked
On each part of the wall: I can understand that, I suppose.
It’s like a football lineup, telling which person played each part.

We made it through all thirteen chapters,
Racing through the names as fast as possible.
And in the middle of those chapters,
I did wonder: how is this useful for
Doctrine, reproof, correction, instruction in righteousness?

You Go, Girls

Nehemiah organizes workers
To repair the walls of Jerusalem.
In the midst of a long list of men,
There is Shallum, son of Halohesh,
And his daughters, working.
You go, girls.

Ezra

We read Ezra today.
What a fabulous book!

All the tattling letters.
The various potentates
Issuing opposing orders.
The reference to prophets,
Haggai and Zechariah.

The ancient men weeping
At the foundation laid,
Who saw the former
In its glory, their tears
With the young men’s
Shouts of joy. A tumult.

Subtle and overt threats;
How to transport
Valuables through enemy land
Without an armed guard;
The blank checks for supplies;
Genealogies settled by casting lot.

It felt like reading a novel.
Except it was history,
Compelling and real.

Honored

I was about to begin formal dinner prep
When I got an email from a friend,
Wondering if it would be okay to drop by.

She drove two hours to spend
An hour and a half with me.
And I was busy in the kitchen the whole time.

I realize the fall drive in the country is lovely,
And getting outside the city perhaps therapeutic.
But since she was coming to see me … what an honor.

Delivery Boy

Joe drew me a picture.
He left it on my dresser.
“Mommy, I think
The delivery boy
Left you something.
You should go into your room.”

And so I went.
He fell facedown on my bed
In a paroxysm of embarrassed delight:
Eager for me to see what he had done,
But hesitant, too, the way, perhaps
All artists are when faced with an audience.

Vulnerability starts young.