Contemplating Easter

We joined some friends at St. Martins in the Fields to walk the way of the cross on Good Friday

 

 

Spring Break 2015

 

Enjoying sweet time at my Mom's. Watching her fry chicken. Waiting on the results of her PET scan.

Kids still enjoy hunting for eggs, dying them and painting them

Baseball practices and games and hitting sessions

Buying a little fishing boat

Time to read, see a movie, go out for dinner. Time to bake, go on a grandparent date, shop for a dress.

Time for sleepovers with friends and grilling and a pottery session

Kids learning to do a flip on the trampoline

Making the gingerbread house we never got around to over Christmas break.

Leading Pilates for FIA al fresco and being thankful for no rain.

I love stay-cations!

 

High-tech bunnies

The Easter bunny has gone high-tech. Traditionally, my department has been to fill the baskets. I start looking for meaningful small things in February, right after Valentine's. For some time late on Easter Eve my husband has cranked out some scavenger hunt clues for the kids to find their baskets. This year, our oldest daughter took over and added QR codes for the kids to scan. Download the QR decoder app and try it. I am so impressed with this kid. I was also amused to hear this same kid confess that she used to steal every other jelly bean from her younger brother's jelly bean trail in the pre-reading days when the bunny left candy trails. Even in preschool she was stealthy enough to figure out that removing every other bean still left a trail.

They also amused themselves by placing the older sister's brown curly hair on top of the younger sister's face. Normally a straight-haired blonde, she looks surprisingly like her sister did when she was that age. I think I read encyclopedias and played with a light-brite at that age. I wonder what I could have done if I had grown up with Photoshop?

 

Drawing Near to God through laughter

I am not a silly mom. I am not funny. If I crack a joke, it's probably a literary one. Perhaps it's my no-nonsense schoolteacher training? But, I married a funny guy who loves to tease, and our kids seem to have picked up humor via his genes.

Today, on April Fools, I go about my day normally, doing laundry, preparing to teach my pilates class, figuring out what to cook for dinner.

I read a blog about funny moms who do things like freeze water in the bottom of cereal bowls, then cover the bowl with some cereal and milk and serve it to their kids to see their reactions. That seems interesting, but still like work to me. I move on.

Then I hear my kids begin to tell stories on one another. This one is my favorite.  My oldest daughter is a model student and leader in the youth group. Yet, she is sly. A tricky one that you would never suspect and have to watch. Here's a prank she pulled on her slightly younger brother.

She told him that this Korean sea weed was a "Mexican fruit roll up and that he would love it". My son, who has not yet developed a taste for seaweed and was expecting processed fruity sweetness, was not amused. But even I had to smile a little bit at that creativity. I wonder what it would be like to hear Jesus guffaw?

Drawing Near to God through Visual Arts

A year ago this week, we were able to visit lovely Ireland. Stopping alongside a cemetery full of Celtic crosses, I delighted in stumbling upon graves that were adorned not with eulogies to the dead, but visual art honoring the risen one. HOPE in a graveyard!

First Presbyterian Church, Columbia, SC

Jonah Statue, Shandon Baptist Church

Book of Hours in Columbia Museum of Art

Consider driving around through your city and looking for sacred art, or architecture. How can God speak to you through visual arts?

Drawing Near - Holy Week

Palm Sunday begins Holy Week. A week of reflecting on Jesus' sacrifice for us to be connected to Holy God.

These branches are given to children at our church to wave in remembrance of Jesus' entrance into Jerusalem, seated humbly on a donkey. As churches around the world stop to reflect and remember, we are offered a variety of ways to celebrate Christ this week before Easter.

For many people, attending a special church service around a holiday can be a powerful way to connect to God. For those who do not have a church home, invitations to our church were given around the city to welcome those who normally might not include church attendance in their worship of God.

After we distributed our bags of Peeps to our peeps, we were surprised to find a bag waiting on our door as well as the door on the house vacant next to us. We used these two bonus bags for a not-so-spiritul Peeps jousting party in the microwave and made s'mores.

Most times of year, our worship looks like this. Vibrant. Loud. Surrounded by the energy of others and driven by drumbeats and electric guitars. We attend the contemporary service at our church that is frequented by many college students. Most Sundays, I passionately sing praise songs like "Lead me to the cross...lead me to your heart". But, at Easter, I feel myself drawn to more ancient practices. I long for old hymns, quiet, and candlelight. I sit in silence. I wait.

My Mother is waiting. She didn't receive the news she had hoped for a a doctor's appointment today. She will have a PET scan Saturday and then wait two more weeks to hear those results. We wait for doctor's appointments and results. We wait to hear what schools and programs our children will get into.  Sometimes we wait for God to do something. But, sometimes, we just wait with God, and sit silently in His presence, and let Him remind us that He is good. That He is near. That He knows the end of the story. Even when we feel numb, or when tears silently fall. 

This year in my worship, I identify with the confusion and sadness and waiting the disciples must have felt in-between the events of Good Friday and Resurrection Sunday.

Pandora has been a great resource for my musical mood swings. I have listened to Gregorian chant, and even though I only understand a few latin words like 

 "In Nomine Patris Et Filii Et Spiritus Sancti"

 I am still comforted by the music for the soul. I also find myself turning to the hymns I grew up with. Fernado Ortega does a great job of leading me into God's presence with his hauntingly beautiful classical guitar renditions of "O Sacred Head Now Wounded".

When I feel a bit wonky and off-kilter, I simply kneel in God's presence and ask Him to lead me. Some days, I can't even muster up spiritual desire without His help. Some days I stuff chocolates in my face when I know that I ultimately desire to be self-controlled for the long-haul and not momentary hormonal surge relief. My habit is to routinely go to the gym, but some lazy off-days I read books and lounge about and seem to have no energy left to work out. I need Him every hour. In my apathy and gluttony. I call out, and He comes near.

Psalm 131:2

Drawing near- A touch of beauty

These roses were $3.99 at Aldi and last the entire week. Having flowers around me literally reminds me to "stop and smell the roses" and not let beautiful things pass by unnoticed or unappreciated. These little Joy journals (blank journals from Michael's clearance bin) were $0.45 after a coupon. Keeping a little journal like this is an easy way to keep focused on all the little ways that God shows me that He loves me, and not focus on the piles of laundry, or annoying things like lice, or heavy things like cancer. For $4.50 I can add a little touch of beauty to my day. That's less than a Starbucks and much cheaper than therapy.

I open my screen porch doors today and listen to the wind chimes that my mother-in-law gave us when we first got married. Like many of the gifts we were given, I had no idea at the time how much I would come to appreciate and treasure them. They call me to a little "Porch time" alone with Jesus as the wind blows. Listen in for a moment.

My awareness of God began early, thanks to my family reading this children's Bible story book to me. This illustration is of creation, of God filling the earth with the animals, but the image that was burned into my soul was of God hovering near protectively. I didn't remember the giant hand. In my mind's eye, I simply remembered God shining down from the clouds. To this day, being outside, or seeing the sun stream through the clouds instantly draws me closer into His presence.

When I lost my Dad at a young age, I remember God's presence revealing Himself to me as "the father to the fatherless".


A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in his holy dwelling. 
(Psalm 68:5, NIV)


This sense of His nearness was given to me at a young age, for a later time when I would understand how much I need Him.

How had God revealed Himself to you through life experiences? Does anything in nature especially remind you of His care for you?