Trying to Earn Love January 31, 2008

Yesterday I had a great day with our son, Nathan.  Those days can be rare, mostly because I am still struggling to relate to a child who is so different from myself.  The frustration level in our relationship can become a wedge between us at times. 

So yesterday was wonderful.  I was choosing to focus on his strengths and not get so bent out of shape when he didn’t do something my way.  The more I chose to relate lovingly with him, the more he cooperated.  What a concept!

The sad moment came when I was tucking him in bed last night.  I thanked him for being such a sweet boy and talked about what a wonderful day we had.  He smiled and said, “Do you love me more since I did a good job today?”  When I told him “no,” his face fell.  It took several minutes to explain to him that I love him even on his stinkiest of all days and that he doesn’t have to earn my love.  

I’m sad that Nathan has learned this performance attitude so well from us.  I have spent most of my years relating to Father just the same way.  If I do enough and do it the right way, maybe God will love me more.  What an incredibly insecure way to live.  It’s so hard to unlearn…

Learning a New Beat January 27, 2008

If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer.  Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away.  -Henry David Thoreau from Walden

It has taken me over 7 1/2 years, but I am finally embracing the fact that our son truly lives in a different world.  I have tried for nearly his entire life to bring him into my own - but to no avail.  It has only caused friction between us and anxiety in his heart.  Something has to change.

We brought him home for school last September, and even that has been a headache.  I have been his biggest stumbling block – me, with my teaching certification and cirriculum ideas.  It’s all rubbish in this circumstance.  We are left with a difficult decision.  Do we fight to help him conform to the world, or do we enable him to march to that different beat?  The correct answer seems obvious, but it is still difficult.  Marching to that different beat takes effort on our parts, and it ensures that he will probably always be different.  Even now I notice when adults around him squirm.  You can almost hear their thoughts.  “Why would he say that?  What on earth is that kid talking about?”  My own personal favorite that I say out loud to him on almost a daily basis is, “Nathan, why would you do that?”  Stupid question.  His answer is always the same.  “Because I wanted to see what would happen.”

I am reading a book called The Edison Trait.  I’ve only just started it, but it is wonderful.  I happened upon it while on the internet, though I don’t think it was a fluke.  I was crying out to Father to show me how to reach this child that He created.  I’m only on chapter 2, and the imact in my heart is already enormous.  I have been asking God for the last several months to help us deal with Nathan’s deficiencies.  That prayer has quite suddenly changed.  Father, help us to hone Nathan’s incredible strengths. 

Our son sees things that I never have.  He asks questions that no 7-year-old “should” have any business asking.  He challenges everything around him, adults included.  Do I really want him to be like me?  Growing up, I would never dream of challenging anyone in authority.  I believed what I was told.  I didn’t learn how to think.  Do I want that for him?  No!  With that answer resounding in my heart, I step into new territory.  The old rules that I’ve held to don’t apply.  I feel like I’m floundering in the dark, but I hold to the One who created both me and this precious little boy.  It may look messy to me most of the time, but I know that Father will guide us.

Women in 2008 January 22, 2008

After two blog posts brought on by my visit to the doctor at the end of last year, I was going to leave the poor guy alone.  I have realized this week, though, that I’m not quite done. 

His questioning whether I could possibly glorify God as an agoraphobic and insinuating that my counselor was providing ungodly counsel were bad enough.  Probably the most painful part of the visit was when he asked me if I wanted medication.  I told him that I needed something to be able to function.  He then turned to my husband and asked my husband if he wanted me on medication.  Ladies and gentlemen, if my husband had said no, the doctor would not have written the prescription!

It is 2008, is it not?  I had a discussion with my husband the other week about women in this new century.  He felt that women in western society really have nothing to complain about.  After all, look at the women of Saudi Arabia.  How can we feel like second-class citizens here in the West when so many suffer exceedingly more?  My answer is that as long as the mentality that my now former physician has is still in existence, things will never be right.  The women of Saudi Arabia suffer from the same mentality mangnified many, many times over.

My former doctor told my husband and I that my husband is my “prophet, priest, and king.”  Erm….  since when?  I thought that Jesus was the high priest and king.  I didn’t know that my husband had to mediate between me and Jesus.  He also reminded me about Eve being decieved and how much I need my husband to help me through this so that I’m not deceived.  Are men never deceived?  Stereotypically, men are more logical and women more emotional (though I wonder how true that is).  Can logic not be as much of a stumbling block? 

I am grateful for my husband.  He brings a whole different perspective to life.  It’s not better or worse, but it challenges me.  I hope that I offer him as much richness in life as he has offered me.  We complement one another.  We used to be polar opposites, but we have gradually caused the other to inch closer to the middle.  While he has not treated me like a second-class citizen, I can understand his confusion regarding gender roles.  Some of the most abusive ones out there are the ones quoting scriptures.

I love how Jesus treated women.  The story in John 4 about the woman at the well (a Samaritan woman no less) has moved me to tears.  He didn’t call her names or tell her to clean up her act.  Most women who have lived that way have done so out of desperate longing for love.  She thirsted for living water, for love from the One who created her.  She found that in Jesus.  Then there was the adulteress woman in John 8, dragged to the temple to be stoned (where was the guy?).  Another tear-jerker.  Oh, and my favorite story is the biggest one in the whole of scriptures.  The Resurrection!!  Who did Jesus reveal Himself to first?  A woman – whose testimony in a court would have counted for nothing.  I just love Jesus!

God knew what he was doing when he made man and woman.  I know some fantastic men, and I am grateful for their presence in my life.  But that old mentality regarding women – weak, illogical, deceived, etc.  – I can do without that.

The Cat Rescue Lesson January 21, 2008

I rescued a cat last week.  I must be honest right away and admit that I don’t really like cats.  They have an air of snootiness and independence that I just don’t care for.  I am a dog lover.  My dog needs me.

In spite of these feelings toward cats, last week’s cat was the third feline that I have gone out of my way to keep alive.  My first rescue involved me lying in the mud for two hours on a cold afternoon in PA trying to coax a kitten out of a pipe with an inch of water in it.  It had been in there for two days, crying under my mom’s office at work.  After this two-hour showdown, it finally walked forward where I could see it.  We gazed at each other for a moment, and then I lunged and pulled him out.  My mom took him home that night.  A year later, my mother called me again from work.  This time it didn’t look good.  The kitten could barely hold up its head it was so hypothermic.  I rushed it to the vet and its temperature did not even register.  As they say, though, cats do seem to have nine lives.  It went home with someone that night and was acting like a typical cat in no time.

I was reflecting on these rescue missions for an animal that I don’t have much love for when I began to wonder how much love I have for my fellow humans.  There is so much human desperation on this planet – so many people with barely a hope for survival.  Do I care?  Do I truly love?  Or am I too numb from the overwhelming need?

There was a resolve inside of me each time I committed to rescuing one of those cats.  I am asking Father to stir that resolve in me regarding his precious children – a resolve rooted in love and guided by His Spirit.   

Is It Over Yet? January 18, 2008

The SC Republican Primary is tomorrow, and my phone never stops ringing.  For some reason we managed to escape the Democrats’ calling list, but we are still averaging 3 or 4 calls per day.  It’s school yard politics.  “So-and-so said such-and-such about me, and it’s not true!”  I’ve not encountered such nonsense since I taught middle school.  And we are supposed to trust one of them to be able to work peacefully not only within their own party, but with the opposing party and leaders all over the world?!  It is laughable.  And terribly sad.

Mike Huckabee had a very illuminating statement to make about the fight that once took place in this state regarding flying the Confederate flag on the state house grounds.  He said, “In fact, if somebody came to Arkansas and told us what to do with our flag, we’d tell ‘em what to do with the pole, that’s what we’d do.”  You can find the article here.  He is the “favorite” among evangelical Christians.  The Jesus I know wouldn’t speak that way. 

The Democratic primary in SC is a week from tomorrow.  After that, our telephones should have a well-deserved break… for a while, anyway. 

My Harry Potter Experience January 16, 2008

It is difficult to describe the experience of reading all seven Harry Potter books in less than a month, but I am going to try.  From the very beginning, I was hooked.  Rowling’s use of language was phenomenal, even down to the Latin roots I saw in a lot of her “made up” words.  Many of the names of the characters were even significant if you take the time to look.  Oh, and the book and even chapter titles – by the time I reached one of the final chapters of the last book at the most crucial moment and noticed that the next chapter title was King’s Cross, I just melted on the inside!!

The Harry Potter experience for me brought together so many of the themes I have been pondering.  The books clearly demonstrate the death of body and soul brought on by seeking power and immortality.  Those who would seek to cling to their power at all cost were sure to lose it.  Even self-preservation was costly, especially when the governing structures got involved.  When fear motivated, the results were not pleasant.

One of the things I appreciated so much is how Harry is taught that love is even more powerful than magic.  This lesson is not learned in a sterile environment.  It’s learned in the mess called life, and I appreciate that these characters were flawed and messy just like me.  They didn’t always respond the way they “should,” but they were a work in progress.  I truly grew to love these characters. 

The Harry Potter books were very imacting emotionally.  I would laugh out loud during one scene and find myself in tears on the next page.  They surprised me tremendously.  After all of the dire warnings I had been exposed to about Harry Potter for so many years, I was thrilled with what I found.  Hope and redemption were very real. 

There were other great themes that shone in these books, and I hope that my chlildren will want to read them with me someday.  There is so much in them to explore.  I’ll end this with two of my favorite quotes from the books, both taken from the last one: Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also and The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.

Hiding At Hogwarts January 13, 2008

I’m back….

I don’t remember when I last went 9 days without typing something here.  I’ve been hiding in a way.  Sometimes I just need to take a low profile and immerse myself somewhere else.  Don’t laugh, but I’ve been hiding at Hogwarts.

The Harry Potter books were just what I needed right now.  I’ve devoured books 3 through 7 since the first of the year.  (I had polished off the first two before Christmas)  I must once again confess my utter embarrassment over how I once viewed these books.  It is a great lesson in not judging something without even trying to understand it.  How anyone could miss how the serpent sets out to crush the lion…

I will probably spend the next couple of days gushing about Harry Potter.  Just to give you fair warning in case you aren’t interested!  There were so many phenomenal things about the books.  I will talk more in themes instead of plot specifics so as not to ruin it for someone who hasn’t read them yet.  They are worth every word of every page.  Oh, and the movies only barely capture the experience of the books.

Learning To Let Go January 4, 2008

Did you ever make plans for something and have this picture in your mind of how it might go and just get so excited about it?  Then, were you faced with the reality that you had to let it go?  Of course I know that everyone goes through that.

Doesn’t it just stink?  I had something on my heart over a year ago and began to pray and be open to however God was going to bring it about.  A few months ago, it was going to happen.  I was thrilled.  It’s been a rough road lately, and it was nice to have something wonderful to look forward to.

Well, that rough road has made it nearly impossible now.  At least impossible in the way that I had wanted it.  I had to hand it over.  It just stinks!!!! Did I already say that?  So many things in life that I dream about or am used to bring about – I have to let them go.  I wasn’t going to let this one go – but it wasn’t about just me.  It was going to impact many others, not to mention the three other people who live under this roof and have also been going through a rough time.

So that’s why I’ve been quiet for a few days.  I’ve been licking my wounds and allowing more of my pride to be dismantled.  Such an ugly process.  The good news is that the event is now at my best friend’s house.  So I’ll just camp out there for the weekend for as long as she and her husband tolerate me…

Ringing in the New Year With Matthew 5 January 1, 2008

An hour and a half left here in 2007.  I’m not sorry to see it go, though I really don’t think that dates mean anything.

In the comments section the other day, Kent quoted from Matthew 5.  I thought I’d type it out here from The Message.

You’re blessed when you’re at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule.

You’re blessed when you feel you’ve lost what is most dear to you. Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you.

You’re blessed when you’re content with just who you are – no more, no less. That’s the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can’t be bought.

You’re blessed when you’ve worked up a good appetite for God. He’s food and drink in the best meal you’ll ever eat.

You’re blessed when you care. At the moment of being ‘care-full,’ you find yourselves cared for.

You’re blessed when you get your inside world – your mind and heart- put right. Then you can see God in the outside world.

You’re blessed when you can show people how to cooperate instead of compete or fight. That’s when you discover who  you really are, and your place in God’s family.

You’re blessed when your commitment to God provokes persecution. Then persecution drives you even deeper into God’s kingdom.

Not only that – count yourselves blessed every time people put you down or throw you out or speak lies about you to discredit me. What it means is that the truth is too close for comfort and they are uncomfortable. You can be glad when that happens – give a cheer, even! – for though they don’t like it, I do! And all heaven applauds. And I know that you are in good company. My prophets and witnesses have always gotten into this kind of trouble.

Well, I can honestly say that the first one – the one where I’m at the end of my rope – seems quite true to me.  I don’t know where to turn. I look forward to more of God’s rule within me.  And that second one? What I’ve lost is just some basic dignity. Having been what society would call a “high achiever,” it is humiliating to not be able to do basic things due to panic attacks. The ability to depend on myself was always very important to me, and now I can’t do that. That makes me blessed as Father embraces me.

So, based on those two things alone, I expect much from 2008!  More of God’s life within.  I am hungry for that.  Oh, and I wouldn’t mind my heart and mind being put right, either.  Oh, and it would be heavenly to be content with who I am – whether I can sit through a meal at Cracker Barrel or not (I fled that restaurant the other night).

Anyway, is it a good idea to be asking for these things?! Probably not!  The process is usually not pretty…

Happy New Year!