Definition

And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.

Phil’s favorite verse,
A basic definition,
An equation,
X equals Y.

Life eternal
Equals
Knowing God and Jesus Christ.

Live life eternal now.

Under the Sink

I.
Apparently bored with his board books and toys,
Caleb discovered that he can open the cupboard
Under the sink.

I was disconcerted to discover
Him eating out of the pot that holds
Compost scraps.
Why he wanted moldly apple cores and stale bread
When he had buttered fresh bread and peeled pears
Available, I don’t know.

And it could be a lovely metaphor
For how we sometimes choose the lesser option,
Except the entire situation disgusts me,
And I’d rather not talk about it,
Let alone write something poetic.

II.
I was rereading favorite quotes feeling literary
And elevated,
When suddenly I heard the onomatopoetic
Glug-glug-glug
Of an unknown liquid leaving a bottle rapidly,
And a sudden Caleb cry.

I dashed the twenty feet from couch to kitchen,
And there found the dishwasher soap
In a viscid puddle around my son,
So slippery that, much as he tried to escape
From the scene of the crime,
He could not get his feet under him.
After scrambling several times,
He decided he might as well make the best of it,
And happily started to splash and play.
The puddle spread.

It was easy enough to clean up—
It is soap after all—
And the puddle mostly ended up back in the bottle.

I’ve been a parent for more than twelve years.
This was a new one for me.

Socialized

A friend with a two-year-old said,
“Your twelve-year-old is so sweet.
He always greets my son warmly.
I hope, in another ten years, my son
Will be as welcoming to the
Two-year-olds in his life.”

People wonder sometimes
How homeschooled children
Can possibly be socialized.

In this home, we’re hoping for
Civilized.

A Musical Moment

I.
We sing a song at church
That I love inordinately.

Sisters, tell your brothers
That our God is alive.

From the first instruction to Mary:
Tell Peter;
To all believing women since,
It’s beautiful in its historicity
And its recognition that
Women have a place in the Gospel.

II.
What gives me goose bumps, though,
Is the moment where,
Having sung about the crucifixion,
Having sung about the dead Christ,
We sing about the king’s heartbeat
And all words and music go silent

But the beat of the drum.

Measure after measure,
Beat.

III.
I knew that the song would be broken
Unusually today, that because the sermon
Was about death and resurrection,
We would sing only the first half,
Leaving off where Jesus died,
Waiting to sing about the renewed heartbeat
Until after the message of resurrection.

And I was excited
For this creative entering in to death.

I was excited.

What was I thinking?

To stop with Christ beaten down,
With Christ in the grave …

It was powerful to dwell there.
It was devastating.

Longing

If an average American party goes three hours,
And I have people start to leave at four, let alone five,
Or six, I really have no reason to complain.
It was a good party!

I realize, though, that if I have 28 people come to visit,
And I could legitimately spend an hour or seven
With each of them,
When they leave, I feel the loss of not fully connecting.
Times 28.

So maybe I need to figure out more about hospitality,
That a party is not a visit,
That perfect connection won’t happen this side of
Heaven.

But because being with my friends
Feels about the way I expect heaven will feel,
I want the joy to last more than six hours,
And I feel the loss when all leave.

So then it’s not so much about me and my need for quality time.
It’s about longing for deep connection,
And having it, and losing it,
And longing for more.

Ten Hours

When we’ve had guests for ten hours,
And I’ve sang and prayed and cried and laughed,
And friends have worshiped and talked
And eaten and shared,

My heart is so deeply satisfied
That I want to create something new
That has never been seen in the history of the world
To approximate the wonder that I feel.

Identity

When the boys were little,
Say, one, three, five,
We would go to the grocery store.
On the way there, I would remind them:

We might be the only family that loves Jesus
That the people around us see all day.

And we’d have fun, talking our way through the store.
No tantrums, ever. No begging.
(Maybe a bit of disobedience on occasion. They are human.)

I think about that now.

That was about identity.

Remember who you are.
Live like it in the world you inhabit.