Listen. No One Wants to Visit Your Church.

Check out my new post up on I4J.org. http://www.i4j.org/2015/kelly-cowan-listen-no-one-wants-to-visit-your-church/

Blurt

Can you remember your last blurt? Read this article I was privileged to post on Innovate for Jesus yesterday as I share my experiences with blurting and what lessons God has had for me in that.

You, Me, and a Cup of Coffee

Who knows you well? Or do you scatter your thoughts and confessions and cares across the winds of your expansive community? Having a single accountability partner is a treasure. Here's an article I wrote that got posted today on having a heart friend who can ask you - what page are you on now? Check out this link to see why I think so: http://marshill.com/2014/02/17/you-me-and-a-cup-of-coffee?fb_action_ids=10151928957046444&fb_action_types=og.likes&fb_source=aggregation&fb_aggregation_id=288381481237582

A hypocrite's confessions

There are a number of things that I feel very strongly about, from silly to super important. The goodness of coke. The magic of the south. Our need for forgiveness. The joy of writing. The evil of man. The beauty of kindness. The way it heals you to be hiking in nature. The widespread need for justice. The importance of family. The love of Jesus. And also, the invasiveness of technology on relationships and priorities.

I wrote a piece a while back called “My beef with technology.” I wrote all about the various forms of technology, and their uses by people around me, that were getting on my nerves. That was when I had a flip phone. I had a beef with technology and I also did not have technology. I literally never answered my phone and was well known among friends for being very difficult to get a hold of. I hated phone calls in general. I was barely texting, while everyone I knew had a smart phone. I got stopped by a guy one day who laughed at my phone and said, “Do those things still exist?” When I got texts from other people it was more annoying than anything because half their message got cut off because of my memory space. I never, ever even conceived of checking my phone for texts. It was a miracle when I noticed one was there or if I got a call. I was very hands free with technology, just trying to stay close enough for Jason to be able to get a hold of me, since that was important to him.

I almost got a smart phone a couple of times. But each time I didn’t understand what the point was, so we waited. In the meantime, little flipper did me just fine. I had phonecalls and texting when I wanted them, scribbled out my directions from home, checked my emails when I got him once a day, and every once in a blue moon someone got a hold of me. The introvert’s perfect life.

One day Jason finally got a new phone for work, so I reluctantly got his hand me down. It bugged me at first because I went from having this nice little tiny thing to what felt like a heavy miniature suitcase for my ear. It felt like it would rip a hole in my back pocket or maybe swallow my face. My dislike only lasted so long, because I finally realized what sort of conveniences I had been missing. I think a lot of people sit down with their smart phones like the day they get them and spend hours on them, adding applications, getting to know all the in’s and out’s, and feel in general like they’ve adopted a perfect child. For me, it’s like every few weeks I’d notice something new and helpful. So at first I was just glad my texts weren’t cutting off. Then like a month later I found the search button for the internet, which was nice. Then I began to notice the little facebook tile spin when I had an update, which was kind of cheery and all. It was quite a day when I realized I could take notes on there and make folders with my little thoughts on different things. So I grew to kind of like it, though no matter how I put my mind to it, the maps still don’t make perfect sense to me and I still write them down before I leave. Don’t you feel like you pass a street before it tells you to turn? Probably just me.

I think I didn’t really want to admit I liked my new phone. I wanted to just hate it. Like only hate it. I still knew what I hated about devices in general, which made me not want to leave any room for liking them. No love-hate. Just hate. That would make it less confusing.

Admittedly, technology has been a blessing to the world in many regards and there is much to like. With every invention, much struggle has been alleviated from the backs of mankind, finally bringing about a certain relief and breakthrough on everyday work and obligation. To disparage it as a whole, despising its existance, would be foolishness and single minded in its argument. It is what it is, and depends on how it is used. It has either brought good or evil, beauty or pain, common grace or an open door to sin, depending on what sort of heart has made it an instrument. It is a tool and it is used by mankind for many purposes.

However, I feel discouraged that many are willing to overlook or belittle the consequences of such an open swinging door of technology in order to enjoy all of the benefits as an individual. Not to my credit at all, only because God made me this way, I have a gift of keen social awareness. This is a blessing in some regards and kind of a problem most other times. I can’t overlook what’s going on all around me, for good or bad. I see nonchalant glances. I see little reactions on kids’ faces. I see a small hand held. I see a woman being admired. I see what look comes over someone’s face when they are disappointed. I see that frozen hesitation before the tears come. I see the enjoyment of inclusion. And the discomfort and figeting of exlusion. Remember those activity pages in kids’ magazines that ask what’s wrong with this picture? That’s kind of my filter. If I need a job one day I’ll apply to make those.

From personal experience and observation, I have noticed that beyond the usefulness and benefits of technology, there has also come a struggle for boundaries, decency, and respect. I have been accutely aware of a prevalent lack of wisdom associated with the use of technology and an underlying tyranny of the urgent, pulling humanity away from priorities and the ability to have a contented present-ness where we are.

So I admit a personal struggle to notice the goodness, the helpfulness, the advances of technology, because I can’t help but feel the heavy weight of how it has come like a bulldozer through so many families and relationships. From laptops to smart phones to video games to television shows, I have experienced myself or witnessed on countless occasions many smaller stories in life where technology has brought a moment of pain, distance, hurt, rejection, or displaced priority. And these from loving family members, well meaning people, without an intention to slight or injure. And I grieve for that and all the worse, more ill meaning stories happening all around.

Children are being ignored, not seen behind yet another dancing screen. Or else they themselves move from show to xbox to games on their parents’ phones. Entire evenings of entire years are being wasted on surfing mindless chatter while books dust. Youth are secretly enjoying pornography while their parents are busy watching some of their own in a different room. Stalking is now the hobby of the everyday housewife. Teenagers get to know everything posted about someone before they have to find the courage to meet someone in person. Marriages share a couch with dualing laptops. Dinners are interrupted by little clips of your favorite songs and distracting check-in’s under the table. And the waves of information have come over our heads and are drowning us all, because we weren’t made to carry the weight of the world and still have keen consciences. We read about a tsunami killing hundreds and then click on a celebrity update and send a little hello message to a friend on facebook. And with the lightspeed of updated information, truth is questionable as being the fastest to get it out there has taken priority, and apologies can be offered later for the slaughtering of plausability.

I came across a blogger a while back who shares my heart exactly. Her blog is called Hands Free Mama and she has a passion for being a wife and mother who is known for being present in her relationships and not torn in different directions by whatever is tugging for her attention at the time. She wants her children to remember her as a mom who was right there in the day with them, never saying “hold on a sec” and showing no self control over her use of technology, though it is so prevalent in our society. I “liked” her on facebook and have kept up with some of her posts. I considered myself a kindred spirit with her. With like minded encouragement, I was constantly bringing it up with other moms, praying about it, and watching boundaries in my own home with my screen time and priorities. It has become one of my social issues I am really concerned about and extremely burdened for in my particular mini-culture of stay at home moms who have a constant example day in and day out to the next generation of future adults, who will also be facing their own temptations and decision making one day very soon. 

In the same breath that I write all of this, something in me changed recently. With an increasing measure of laziness, curiosity, and letting down of my guard, I have become a total hypocrite in an unrecognizable way to the woman who just wrote the rest of this blog. I’m not sure how it happened, but I know it was a slow progression and a constant dismissing of my seemingly small decisions. In the last six months I have allowed myself to completely slide into being what I hate.

I hate it when moms leave their laptops open and on all day in the middle of life and I do that now. I hate it when people check their phones everytime they get a new text and I do that now. I hate it when people talk to their kids while they still are looking at their phones and I do that now. I hate it when people use their down time in lines and waiting for school pick ups on their phone instead of talking to their other child in the back seat and I do that now. I hate it when moms use their kids’ quiet times or nap times to just doze out on tv shows, and I do that now. I hate it when spouses sit in front of the tv or beside each other on laptops, and I do that now. And I really, really hate it when people get their cell phones out while driving or at stop lights and I have totally been doing that now. I feel very strong hatred of the exact things I am doing.

I seriously feel like two people writing this blog. I totally agree with the me that wrote the last three pages and am super disgusted with the last paragraph I just wrote. Yet, what I just wrote and hate is what I do! That makes me a complete hypocrite, not living out what I say or think. I expose my heart’s true cracks and lack of will, as I live in a way inconsistent with my convictions and my true burdens for my family, my community, and our culture.

And I didn’t see it coming. It’s not like you feel like you can just stop either. It feels like a totally new lifestyle habit that will be hard to stop doing and being. Once you avail yourself to being that “present” to the demands of your phone and email and facebook and even knowing the very most updated information on the news, it becomes difficult to step back into the knowing of just your present life and not know what is continuing to happen in the rest of your community or world. We have an insatiable desire to pry into information and be updated continually and we feed it with our habits of checking in. And each new message or email is just feeding that little desire to be included. I don’t even have sounds or ringtones turned on because I hate them, but I pick up my phone constantly at various times, looking for that little number in the tile telling me I have something to check. And on really bad days I am checking it as each individual message is coming in, and once in between as well. I am on top of every email, every text, every facebook comment. And to be totally honest, with all of this indulging of extra and more information, my bedtime is later than ever, keeping me up past midnight most nights and keeping me from waking up for my morning quiet times.

I am absolutely feeling mastered by my phone. And I am so surprised this is where I am when I was so determined, so resistant, and honestly so disgusted by the behavior I know currently possess. It amazes me how I can think about the many times I looked over my piece of technology to interact with my child in one day and be sicked out by that, and then repeat the behavior the next day. I need humility that leads to repentance. My conviction is currently only leading to a guilty sense of feeling bad, but it has not fully culminated to laying this addicting habit down, repenting that I am needing my devices more than is healthy for me or my relationships, and asking for the Lord to show me how to surrender this to him in a continual way.

Going through this has definitely reminded me in a very clear way that even when I feel strongly about something, I can betray myself. I am capable of self-deception and choosing temptation over conviction. I am not invincible in my determination, so the way I wave a flag about my opinions on a matter should be done with a bent knee of humility. My character is flawed and my actions are carried out by the state of my heart, which is in constant need of refinement by the Holy Spirit.

I am going to slow down this week, create some temporary boundaries for myself, and take some good, hard, long looks at the faces of my children. And I am going to pray that my heart is refined, and renewed, and purified, pulled away from my reckless spinning desires and slowed to an intentional walk in the ways I feel true convictions to joyfully walk in. I want to be free to live in love, prioritizing the people I feel true gratitude for having in my life, getting the priveledge of displaying the kind of life I hope my children get to live one day. I’m thankful for this jolting look at what I believe set right beside what my behaviors have actually demonstrated so that I can wake up and live an honest life in line with true convictions. And the grace of God will free me from regret’s condemnation and give me a joyful hope in starting again.

Most Likely, Definitely, Unapologetically the longest Christmas Letter Ever 2012

It's the end of 2012. We've blown through another 365 days. We've got a reel of new memories and flashbacks and quotes and nostalgic feelings to show for it. The girls are 5 1/2, our boy is 3 1/2, and Jason and I are...not 40 yet :).

If I could condense down what this year was about, it would be how we balanced rejoicing and grieving. Look around at the people our hearts love and even those we are getting to love, there is just constant gaining and losing, enjoying and mourning, good news and heart wrenching ones, receiving and giving away, blessing and waiting. If we were going through one, another family or friend was going through another. I feel like we have had to learn how to ask the Lord for his heart in this. Because on our own we're just awkward and lacking a perfect love. How do we fully embrace gratitude for the tiniest of joys to the most extravagant, and nearly simultaneously learn how to throw our hearts and arms around hurt and pain. Yet all of life is both! So I guess I'm saying something to you all, not just about it. If you're year has been full of joy, and we watched you bask in it, we have rejoiced with you. We have smiled upon you and been thankful for mercies and graces. If this year has been unbearable for you, and we knew about it, I want you to know we've been pained with you, as much as our hearts knew to bear it. We prayed for you and we held out lots of hope for you. Especially that the God of all comfort and Father of all compassion would meet you like we couldn't. And we didn't do it perfectly, and I pray we didn't fail you, but we were learning how to walk with you. And we'll keep trying. This fallen world has its brokenness in all of creation and in each of our hearts, and also has the light of God's graces, ever evident and shining down in the rays of his goodness over all that he has made. I have to say I feel I have only fumbled through that balance this year compared to the grace with which Christ did this on earth. We will keep learning, we will keep throwing ourselves into the tumble of following the example of a perfectly loving God, and also accepting the relieving truth that he offers us grace, hope, and HIMSELF to keep going. There isn't a better offer out there.

When the girls turned 5 this year it felt like a big deal in my heart. Not just because our "lady babies" were a giant number like FIVE. But also because I felt like Jason and I made it. I felt like celebrating with him that we had come a long way. When I was puking my guts out til 18 weeks in the twin pregnancy and two weeks later was flat on my back for the remainder of the pregnancy being taken care of by everyone who knows me (and doesn't know me!) and scared to death we'd lose both girls, we never saw their 5th birthday coming. We couldn't see it through all the preemie struggles and growth struggles and then our son being born while the girls were still just ONE and all the days we carried our "velcro" boy around in a carrier because he never wanted to be apart. We never saw the growing coming. We just saw what they needed, what we needed to be for them no matter the cost, and how we had to keep growing in love. Our minds convinced us it was 5 million years to get to five. They were sweet years and I miss the "tiny" years like crazy now that we're in the "little" years, but it's a season that in some ways feels like you're the one family that will actually just keep cycling through that three hour schedule and never spin out into the current. So Jason and I celebrated. We loved those days and we love these days. Because all of it is who they are - and we love who they are. And...we made it. And not in a way like, "thank goodness it's over" because MASSIVE places in our hearts miss the "old them" each day. We have an odd, constant, and fairly emotional awareness that each inch they gain means loss for us. Yet we celebrate. It's been an honor and a joy. (Can you imagine how I will write then they graduate? Oh the day. Somebody catch me.)

 
This summer kind of felt like a big three month party to me. If you don't live here in the outrageously beautiful northwest, well, allow me to tell you that it's 99% likely to be terrible october 1 til july 4th, and then you have this glorious window that the whole world should envy intensely if you have any adoration at all for the beauty of creation. Because for that window, not only is the weather just perfect, but God just decided from the beginning that this place would be a display of his splendor. Feeling like I had three "big kids" we took on the Seattle area and said yes to pretty much whatever fun idea came our way as long as it was OUTSIDE. Just put on the sunscreen and sleep later.This was the first summer we went camping as a whole family, so we went twice - once to Mt Rainier and once to our new favorite spot for this - Deception Pass. Now we're counting the days til we can buy them backpacking gear. That will be the best.   I know I will look back and see the rarity of this time. Because they are old enough to be able to do everything, yet so attached to us as their parents and curious and goofy and inquisitive and uninhibited. And I'm writing things down like crazy. 

This has been a cool year for Jason. He has a small handful of things he absolutely loves to do in his spare time and one of them has been hibernating for about ten years because of a shoulder injury. But finally, he's taken up kayaking again. Along with mountaineering, Jason seems to come alive when he goes kayaking. I like seeing him enjoy something he has loved for so long in his life and we are working to make it fit in our schedule. Jason is enjoying his job at Microsoft and is also enjoying ministry at Mars Hill. As his wife, and a fan of his for the past 15 years ;), I just enjoy seeing him caring for people the way God has equipped him, especially in teaching and leading. We went a marriage retreat this fall and I think we're just thankful because though we've been through rough seasons of growing and changing, this year we feel this gratitude of progress and closeness between us. I really love having Jason as my best friend and this year was evidence you can keep growing with best friends. Thank you God. On a silly note...Jason is officially a cowboy. Yee Haw! Well, from the knees down. He loves boots. And he has made me his cowgirl. Now we just need some more land. :) Grace would say, "And horses." Salem would say, "And dogs." And Kanah, though a little allergic, would say, "And lots and lots of newborn kitty cats." (None of their requests will ever be realized, especially the cats, ever. But please have them over if you have any of these :) And if you have land, we'd love to tromp around in our boots on it). Personally I think the boots help me cook better from Pioneer Woman's cookbooks. Especially the chicken pot pie. Hm.

Salem. Jason and I still write in the kids' journals that we started when they were born and the first thing I wrote about in Salem's journal for 2012 was how this year he has earned the nickname "comedian." He makes all of us laugh so hard and he has really become good friends with the girls. This year buddy started preschool which was just about indescribable as his heart heavy parents. I think our favorite, besides his exquisite handsomeness of course, was how this silly wild man was just quietly confident going in that morning. He wasn't scared but he was just so chill and barely spoke. When Salem's not in school, he is obsessed with his sisters. He loves what they love, especially if it involves dress up or being rowdy. Salem spices up everything we do and we couldn't thank him more for it. When we embrace the added Salem-ness to our life, it's always bound to be better than not. He's our snuggly, comedic, forgiving, thoughtful, and entertaining buddy man. To finish writing about Salem, please imagine him signing off with a wink. His "first wink" was a few months ago. I was stopped at a light and turned around in the car and winked at him. He kept a straight face, put his pointer finger to one eye and pressed it closed like he was pushing a button really hard. This made me laugh like crazy and my heart burst open. And I also wanted to check to make sure his eye was ok.

Last year, the girls were in preschool while I had Salem a few mornings a week alone.I loved that buddy time in a way I can't convey. It was such a gift to just get out of the car, throw one kiddo on my hip and walk into a store. Without multiple walks around the car, without a diaper bag, without a complicated stroller. Just buddy on my hip. Such a fun gift and a gracious answer to prayer from a season where I was trying to love all three well but wanted them alone too. But this fall, while Salem was off to school this year for preschool, I kept the girls at home with me and so now we're flip flopping the mama time this year. We've decided to have our ladies in our home another year and have them start kindergarten next year instead. I have been so pleased with this idea, because I truly feel like this is the first year with them that I have gotten quality girl time (as a sane person who doesn't just have pj's on). I love teaching them, getting to know their minds, being challenged to get creative with them, and just simply throw it out the window and have mommy dates with them. I know next year and every year after will be a different story, but I can't think about that yet. I only want now for now.

Kanah. Though fairly quiet around most of you, Jason and I have the real treasure of just staring adoringly when this little passionate heart talks and talks about what's going on in her head, even about God and faith. She has discovered that she can make phonecalls whenever she wants if she just asks. When she calls someone, she is so cool about it and just walks around the house while she chats. Thirteen, just hold off a little longer. Recently she was walking around with her leap pad videoing all her favorite things saying, "I want to take pictures of my things so my kids can see what I was like when I was little...Hm, what else can I show them..." (Maybe she'll have mama's heart for legacy). She is very articulate and emotional and expressive and I'm praying the Lord can capture this exactly in our hearts forever, since video just truly cannot.  Kanah is learning to read and write well. She loves sign language and singing very, very loudly from the back seat. She's really getting into sports, especially from doing t-ball at camp this year, and basically wants to do all of them. She didn't think she'd want to do ballet with Grace until she tried on ballet and tap shoes and then we were buying two of all it within minutes. Next she wants to try karate. She will try and do lots of things in life. That's Kanah! And she teaches her mommy to want to be like that too and I thank her for it.

Grace. Little Grace is growing and learning, finding confidence in who she is and in her unique personality. She is especially finding her niche as a dancer. She is so lovely when she dances and I just think she will always do it in some form, because it just seems to be a natural gifting. We are excited for them to begin to learn who God has made them to be, that they might slowly figure out how to walk in their abilities and later, through similar trial, their callings and convictions. The girls especially beginning to walk in this. Grace continues to be a mix of giggly, sweetly sensitive, sympathetic with others and quick to learn. All things GIRL are on her radar more than ever, with her browsing through American Girl catelogs, making cards for her "best friends" and changing her dolls' clothes continually. She has made so much progress with reading and writing and articulating herself this fall at home with mommy. I just feel so proud of her for all of her work with me, and I feel blessed I have gotten to be her teacher and the one who sees this progress as it happens. Grace is a GRACE!

Me. (Kelly). My life is both complicated and simple. Complicated by my responsibilities and simple in that I still like the same things. Give me coffee, a girlfriend to ponder with, a journal to tinker with and a hike stretching out in front of me, and I am quite a happy creature. I am always learning to be comfortable in my own skin and to walk about in the joy of what God has created me to be and to do. The Lord has been teaching me patiently and graciously for a long time now about gratitude and I'm still on that journey. It keeps me from despair, self-centeredness and selfishness. I feel like this year I am learning all over again what it means that Christ is my confidence. I am enjoying the dignity of being a mom, wife and homemaker. I am enjoying writing again, though somewhat secretly (=empty blog). I have had the honor of getting to use it on a project this year and though challenging, I was thankful to be broken and put back together again for that work. I'm helping with the women's ministry at church again and reading a book called Instruments in a Redeemer's Hands has been transformational in teaching me how to reach hearts like Jesus does. It has made me cry at times because it hit so deeply with a counselor heart I have had in me all along but haven't known what to do with like I want to. I don't feel like I've figured it out. It feels more like a spark. And though small, ALIVE in me, and with a strong indication there is a fire to come. So there is a real excitement about that in Christ. I have been working on my hobby of being behind a camera and capturing all I can of my kids and our life as we walk it. And, when weather.com allows, I just eat up hiking and wildflower hunting, and sun basking and stomping through creation, in order to enjoy the ever shrinking places of QUIET in this world. I wonder why I might like that? :)

Well, that's all of us. The title didn't lie did it? If you stuck with me, you like us. Thanks for liking us.

We wish you a Merry Christmas. We hope that you met the wonder of Christ's love in Christmas. It's the best story. It's full of magic, wonder, and truth all at once, which is the best kind. Thankful.

Yet in thy dark streets shineth
thy everlasting Light
The hopes and fears of all the years
Are met in thee tonight

Jason, Kelly, Grace, Kanah, and Salem

The Wonders of His Love

Merry Christmas dearly loved family and friends,

I was talking to a friend the other day who had had a conversation with someone who was kind of anti-Christmas letter and cards. To her they seem pretentious and say, "hey look at us and our perfect family." Part of me understands, because we mostly all send pictures standing close, happy and smiling with the glossy print shimmering off the pages. My friend simply responded that she liked getting them and sending them because she looked forward to seeing pictures of her family and friends, whom she loves and enjoys. I liked her simple answer to why we like to send them. Enjoying one another. And though I know that some send cards and updates without a thought, and some even send them to put their best on display, others send them with a tenderhearted intent to cheer and send their Merry Christmas greetings to those they truly hope enjoy the joy of the season. I believe that is our intent and as I write on behalf of our family in order to give testimony to our lives and also give our thanks to the Lord, who has graciously led our rambuncious clan another year with his kindness. So with that thought, I write on about the lives of five people who have lived and breathed and laughed and struggled through and embraced another 365 days of the gift of life.

Jason and I have the great honor of knowing, enjoying, and parenting Kanah, Grace and Salem. In the Bible, the apostle Paul refers to people in the church as "my joy and my crown, my glorious ones in whom is all my delight." God has given us these little people to love and steward and lead and we are to lay our lives down for them. Taking care of them IS our joy, our reward, our delight. They are that special. And on days I totally forget that, the Lord is gracious to eventually remind me again and bring me back to gratitude for them and all He gets to teach me because they exist. I never knew that more than just being thankful to the Lord for what I am learning by being a parent, that I would also be thankful TO my children, for how I get to grow and who I am becoming through the refinement of each and every day. We can either live in such a way as to embrace this change the Lord purposes, or else we can just sort of get through it and avoid the painful, intrusive growth. By his grace we are learning, and there is so much joy in that.

I heard a song by Ed Cash the other day that reminded me of Salem so much called Firecracker Boy. Here's a piece:

He was a fire cracker boy. Dreaming about all his new toys
And the love his family had
A fire cracker boy
Surrounded by tremendous joy
Shining eyes were in this lad

When our kids go to bed at night, we're so tired. But then minutes later we're talking about them and soon we're peeking in on them and staring at their sleeping, wondrous faces. Salem is so full of life and energy and muscle :). We do not think he knows how to walk; he can only run and dart and spin. He is so silly and funny and goofy even at 2 1/2, making the girls laugh and mommy shake her head continually. Jason hopes one day that the kids will want to climb mountains with him, but I am pretty sure by 3, Salem could dart up a moutain side with just his milk sippy cup tucked in the back of his pants and some goldfish in his pockets. His naps are long gone now and so apparently he was made for long days of fun and playtime, because he has not looked back to his baby days. He thinks he is a triplet with Kanah and Grace (and because he's gaining on them in height, I have actually been asked that multiple times). He surprises us because he also loves coloring every detail of a page and doing puzzles, often requesting help to do difficult ones with my help even though they are way over his head. He is confident and fearless. He is Salem the brave. Jason and I pray for Salem, that the Lord would use him as one who leads in humility and truth and love. We love our firecracker boy and he is a glorious instrument in our lives to keep us young and passionate for life and off the couch in general.

When the girls were babies I could barely envision them being two, much less having long legs and hair down their backs and putting clothes too small for them in boxes that I never thought they would be big enough for in the first place. The other day Jason called me from Target double checking what size Christmas dresses he should get, and I realized he was shopping in the girls' section, and not in the toddler section. I was dumbfounded when he got home and they actually were the right size. They are 4 1/2 and they can wrap their legs around my back and seem long when I snuggle them and do many things on their own. They take their dishes to the sink, they wash their hands, they help clean up, they fold and put away their own clothes before bed (I am wondering how long they will ask to do that...) and Kanah even helped me put all the address labels on the back of our Christmas card envelopes. They remind me of things and help me find things and help their little brother get his shoes on and cross the street. Young Girls. We have girls who are speaking like we do, they are learning to write, playing elaborate pretend, socializing, and are participating in conversations over meals with us. And now they are in school. They have so enjoyed their class, crafts, music, chapel, and gymnastics. My little darlings are not early risers so on preschool days when I have to awaken them at 7:15, they are just completely OUT, but they have not once said that they do not want to go to school as I move them along to get ready. They love learning, love their teachers and enjoy community. A memorable moment this year was the first week of preschool, when Grace said to me from the back seat "I have a friend at school!" (Enter the feeling of the sweet heart pains of a mother's heart) and then the next week to seem shyly greet their new friends at school while they hid by my side. We enjoy the fellowship of these little creations who are no longer babes in any sense.

Grace is as lovely as ever. I still feel that the Lord knew that her name was perfectly suited to her and we would never have been able to guess "who" was Kanah (whose name reminds us of Jesus' miracles, as is she, and the word itself means 'of a humble place') and "who" was Grace (whose name means 'undeserved gift'), but the Lord enabled us to name them as he made them. She is so kind and gentle and out of all of us, she BEST teaches the rest of us in the family how to be gracious, patient and loving. I learn from her quietness, the way she allows others their turn, and how she is aware of their needs. She is usually the first to run get the blanket and stuffed animal of a sibling crying from falling down. She's helpful, running this and that upstairs for me, and responds with only a gentle rebuke because her heart is pierced easily. We have learned to be different with her, to meet her with a softer tone, and to keep our ears open for her voice over all the noise and commotion. Her preschool teacher told us at the conference that when Grace talks she has learned to listen, because when she does choose to speak up she has something important to say and you need to stop and listen to her. This is true. And speaking of her voice, she just has the most precious little voice and Jason and I just treasure up her little girl way of saying everything and I mourn the day already when she doesn't sound like this anymore. You will generally find our lovely Grace trying on dress up clothes, dancing, stealing away to play pretend with a small stash of tiny ponies or critters, or coloring princess pages for hours at a time. She prances around the house and is forever asking you to draw her something in her sketchbook. Grace is a delight and we feel honored to not only know her, but that we get to be the ones whom she looks to for all of her love and affection.

When I think of Kanah, I hear Jason singing his song to her in my head. "Amazing Kanah, my sweet little girl. Amazing Kanah, my sweet little bug..." I love that Jason has come up with songs for each of our little ones and they love the songs so much that I find them singing them to themselves sometimes. Last night Jason and I were talking to Kanah on the phone, since she was spending the night at her grandparents' house, and she Jason and I could not stop looking at each other, laughing, because she was responding to us like a 15 year old. "Hi dad...Yeah...Uh huh..." She is such a little love, and at the same time gives us flashes all the time of her going from 4 to 14 in a blink and all we can do is laugh and gobble her up while we can. Kanah is truly amazing and gifted. She puts forth a confidence that I myself pray to possess about what she thinks she can do. She just loves with a ferociousness in the same way that when she squeezes her lamby lovingly, I think the stuffed animal is going to burst into a thousand pieces. She is just so passionate! I love how when she is trying to respond to Salem's 87th request of "Kanah, look!" she just says, "That's cool Salem" and goes on with what she is doing, sometimes not even looking at him. I love how she leads, herding all of them into games and pretend playlands and into running games around the house. She is anxious to help Salem with his puzzles and to show him how to do things. I actually even enjoy her darling face when she cries (no, I am not cruel :P) because she just looks gorgeous even then and it also reminds me so much of her face when she cried as a baby girl. She is most precious lately to us when she is singing songs or when she is praying. All the kids are learning to talk to God with Jason at night and also with me at breakfast, as we have a calendar with tiny pictures of our friends' and families' faces so that we can remember them daily. Her little voice and things she says to the Lord are so sweet and she and Grace both make me tear up often, just listening. Kanah is our snuggle girl and we just are so blessed to have her precious presence in our arms and our lives.

On motherhood, I could write about 10 more pages. But I will spare you and just mention that I read a great book this year called Loving the Little Years and came away with a verse that has motivated me to write a mission statement as a mom. It's Ecclesiastes 5:19-20

"Everyone also to whom God has given wealth and possessions and power to enjoy them, and to accept his lot and rejoice in his toil - this is the gift of God. For he will not much remember the days of his life because God keeps him occupied with joy in his heart."

I read this verse so slowly. This truly is a verse to etch onto my memory, to write on the tablet of my heart, to feed upon as my daily bread. God has given me great wealth. A faithful, godly husband. A job for my husband that literally provides all of our needs as well as a future. A little Cowan clan of three who are terribly adorable and intimate in relationship with me. And a home in which to carry out my dignified job of wife, mommy, and homemaker. This is great, great wealth. And God also gives the power to enjoy this wealth as I do two things: Accept my lot. This must mean that I am not just given this life, but I also wrap my arms around it. I open the package. I receive it. I accept my lot, even and especially the parts that I don’t feel like opening. And two: Rejoice in my toil. Rejoicing in Scripture is something we choose to do. It is a chosen heart response. Accepting my lot and rejoicing in my toil actually feels impossible on some knarly, head knocking, back arching-tantrum days. But thankfully my eyes rested in the words, “this is the gift of God.” The POWER to enjoy my lot is the gift of God. So through his grace I am able to accept my lot and rejoice in my toil. This has been a vision, a word, to me this year...and also a relief.

Jason and I had our 10th anniversary this summer. He sent me a cute, almost check the box type email, sometime beforehand with some choices about what I wanted do together. I love doing many things with Jason but my favorite thing to do with him is backpack and be outside, away from the noises and busyness of life. We realized we had not been back to the amazing and majestic Olympic National Peninsula in years so we took a trip there and just needed to be together, alone :), and enjoy our marriage. We are both shocked and very not surprised, all at once, that it has been 10 years. We've got quite a testimony from all that time but it also is a blink and we know that life ticks and ticks and you've got to wrap your arms around the moments because as a whole it just keeps speeding on. I know we both would say that this has been a year of rejoicing in some changes the Lord is making in our hearts toward one another and I just love that with Jesus, there are always redemptive surprises: ways you can grow and change and love even more than you expected. And I think that is the blessing of this year between us, that even though we are imperfect and fail each other, God is making all things new. We feel the newness. We are not puffed up by it. We are humbled and thankful and, again, just trying to enjoy that goodness. And also just keep laughing and becoming greater friends. On that note, we have great anticipation about the Real Marriage series coming at Mars Hill in mid-January to further encourage our walk together. Listen on line if you would like!

In a recent sermon, our pastor was talking about the difference between a biography and a testimony. A biography is about you and all you have accomplished. A testimony is about God and all he has done. There is a powerful verse Jason and I clung to before girls were born, when everything felt out of control as I lay on hospital bedrest for three weeks. It was Isaiah 26:12

"Lord you establish peace for us; all we have accomplished, you have done for us."

That is what I mean to say in this letter. I see his work all around us, in each of our lives. But it is not a biography about us and our greatness and what tremendous citizens and and human beings we are. It is a testimony of God's grace to us, his mess of a group, and of his ongoing redemptive work in us, making us into new creations for the praise of His great glory. I have enjoyed chewing on Christmas carols this year. Letting a line linger here and there. And Joy to the World repeats THE WONDERS OF HIS LOVE again and again. I was just kind of thinking about what that means. The wonders of his love are all the graces he gives us. And they are a wonder because we don't deserve them, didn't ask for them, we didn't ask to be pursued, but in our ill deserving state, in our ignorance and even our indifference, Jesus came for us. He knows our greatness needs, to our weakness he is no stranger. This season is about beholding the wonders of the most humble of Kings who is jealous for our hearts and who delights in us. This is very good news and the best testimony, which gives life and joy and meaning to our smaller testimony. Merry Christmas.


Love,
Jason, Kelly, Kanah, Grace and Salem

Break

Feeling compelled to take a blogging break and just do some writing on my own...will see where the Lord leads my heart and thoughts and writing. Love to you all.

Punch Buggy Hope

I had a question come into my head the other day at church. We have many questions, but this one felt like a sincere question that came to me and I did not seem to create myself. It represented a reflection of the state of how I have been doing as I have continued each day to put on my boxing gloves with my enemy whose full name is Anxiety And Fear. It came to me as our pastor was teaching on Isaiah nine, about the people walking around in darkness seeing a great light. Lord, are you Emmanuel? Are you really WITH me?

Jesus has continued to work on me in regards to this enemy who seems to enjoy hounding me lately. It has been six plus months of building tension and yet the Lord has faithfully spoken to me clearly most consistently through two ways: Scripture and prayer.

I happened upon a book that has been on my shelf for a long time recently by Beth Moore called Praying God’s Word. In the intro she says, “A stronghold is anything that exalts itself in our minds, ‘pretending’ to be bigger or more powerful than our God. It steals much of our focus and causes us to feel overpowered. Controlled. Mastered…God has handed us two sticks of dynamite with which to demolish our strongholds: His Word and prayer.”

Annie and I switch off leading bible study and I had just been feeling compelled for us to do a week of worship and prayer. We had been doing Proverbs for a while, which had gone really well, but it never seemed like we got to the end of our goal, which was to actually talk to the Lord himself about all our thankfulness and revelations and confessions and convictions. We got to talk to each other, but is that the end? It always left us lacking and wanting and something felt incomplete. We were just going to sing and pray for an hour and a half and see what would happen if we let our time be filled that way instead of squeezing it in if there was room for it. Now the talking would be squeezed in, and women can always find a way to do that!

As we went into a time of praying about our personal walks with the Lord, I found myself digging through Scripture that he had given me concerning fear, trying to think through what exactly I needed to say to him that day about it. I already knew what I wanted to pray about but just felt like a big mess of thoughts about it so I needed to think for a minute.

The first was from James 4:13-16 “¹³ Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” ¹⁴ Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. ¹⁵ Instead, you ought to say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.” First of all, very specifically I have had fear from going to Seattle to Charlotte in a couple of weeks. From one CITY to another. He states what I fear – I do not know what will happen tomorrow. I don’t want to not know! I want to know I will be okay. I want to know I will be preserved, that my life in his hands means that I will be safe and sound. It is so hard to trust what his actual promises are – that he has plans for me, to give me a hope and a future, but that does not mean that nothing bad will ever happen to me. The issue for me, which actually is really annoying because it feels so female and cliché, is that I want to control what I can hope in. It’s humbling, like most things God takes us through to come to the bug conclusion that is stated by a million women daily: I want to be in control. (Sigh). How I wish I were an above that, different sort of woman. I imagine a carefree woman but it’s less that, because that’s more ignorance or naivity (depending), and more a trusting woman. Well, confession gets me on my way.

Another friend began to pray as I jotted the James verses down and continued to flip through the Word. I landed in Luke 24:37-39 at the story of Jesus appearing after the resurrection to the disciples. “³⁷ They were startled and frightened, thinking they saw a ghost. ³⁸ He said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds? ³⁹ Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself! Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have.” It matters not whether these verses move you at this particular time, because what is powerful about the Word is that it is living and active, sharper than any double edged sword. And it comes to pierce with very specific intention. And this particular day, these were the chosen words of the Spirit to thrust right through the core of my wound up life. And I crumbled without wince at the blow. Crumbled into a makeup running, doubled over mess. Daughter, Why are you troubled? It is I, MYSELF.

From my pile of flesh on the floor, my heart did a familiar race and as my friend finished her words, I erupted into a desperate sounding cry to the Lord in the presence of my friends, new and old. I didn’t care. Let’s not pretend like I am that awesome: sometimes I do care. But this time I did not. I didn’t care if they thought I was trying to be spiritual. Or if they thought I had finally lost my mind and should step down from leading our group anymore. What I cared about was getting out my shrieks. On my knees and raw from barely spoken revelation to my heart, I needed to talk to him with all the sincerity that I could allow myself to reveal in a group of ten women.

And I’ll tell you, the combination of all that happened in those moments was so good, so healthy for me. Maybe healthy doesn’t mean much to you right now where you’re at, but if I can think of one meaningful word for me lately, it’s “healthy”. Because my body and my mind have felt so sick and crippled this year, so needy and fragile and dependent. I know when I am 80 I’ll be like, Oh Lord, come on honey. But for a 32 year old, Biggest Loser would probably add 10 years to my life on whatever chart they have that determines at what age your body is actually functioning. Anyway, it felt healthy. And honest. And I need honest words from the Lord, even if they are the same encouragement, I don’t care. I just need to hear from him and for my heart to be genuinely lifted up. And you can’t force encouragement. When it comes just right, with just the right word that not even you could have scribbled out onto a piece of paper, and even better at just the moment you asked for it, it’s almost more than you can ask for.

You know how you used to play “punch buggy”? Like two hundred cars go by you in a glaze and they’re not what you’re searching for at all. But after you’ve stared and searched and sat on the edge of your seat you finally see one and you yell “punch buggy!” with all your arrogant might and deck someone next to you and you feel so great for like five amazing competitive seconds and then you’re back to hoping that maybe after seeing a few hundred more cars you’ll see one again.

The handful times God has really met me lately have totally felt like punch buggy for me. Except it’s not just about feeling good, it’s about breathing and having the muscles to get up off the floor again. I’m telling you, He’s given me just enough punch buggies around every corner to keep me hoping. I’ve just been wandering in fear and boughts of depression and anxiety like I have never known it, both for known reasons at times and others just completely inexplicable. And I have felt just at a loss to even help myself. Yet the best part for me that I am realizing right this second, is that in those exact moments of seeing Who I had been grasping for out my “windows”, I wasn’t afraid. And if I can even be capable of being not afraid in a tiny handful of moments, I think I can keep growing the hope to believe that the fears might cease. Punch Buggy.

Emmanuel

We are ten years in to the new millennium and in that time Jason and I have gotten married, moved across country, lived in two different cities, had three children and countless other “worth mentionings” on the timeline. If you zoom in on our life in 2010 you will see that after a few years of hunkering down for baby life, we are all – including Salem – very much on the move as we run a family household of three zooming, playful toddlers. As all three of them on different levels are becoming more independent, this season has felt so much more about nurturing, guiding, instructing, training, encouraging and reconciling. This age has brought us to bended knees frequently as we see this age is about reaching down into their conversations, their frustrations, their concerns, their joys, and most importantly, their hearts. God has been gracious to teach us as we learn how to be individuals who abide in Him, as well as a married couple who takes care of each other well, while also being parents who know exactly where our children are right now.

The very lovely and oh so sweet Grace Cowan (3 ½). Grace has turned into such a dancer. She loves to perform for us, which is always such a treasured gift from her when she offers it, because she tends to shy away from the spotlight so often. She makes up her own routines, moving her feet, leaping about, and using such graceful arms. Grace has such a gentle spirit, bringing a peacemaker quality to play with her brother and sister. Grace says really adorable things like when we are passing by something and we say, "Look, Grace!" and after we've gotten past it, then she will say, "Mommy/Daddy, did I see it?" Out of the endless moments of joy she brings us is the sound of her laugh when she is most delighted!

The beautiful and full of life Kanah Cowan (3 ½). Kanah has been entertaining us this season with her renditions of Frosty the Snowman, Jesus Loves Me, Rudolph and Away in the Manger. She loves to sing, quite loudly actually, and if we’ve got our ears perked up to her voice, especially from the very back seat, we get that treat of her live performance very often. She has also become quite a bit more social this year, enjoying little friends and knowing to ask on Tuesdays, “when are 'the friends' coming?” Kanah brings us so much happiness and she just seems to be made for close relationship, as she is always pursuing hugs and snuggles and smiling two inches from your face.

The manly, the brave, and the fast Salem Cowan (1 ½). Now that Salem is closer to being two than being a one year old, he has decided he’s going to start speaking English in two and three word phrases, adding “mommy” or “daddy” to just about everything he says. Little Man is so expressive and loud lately that one of his most endearing expressions is when he simply whispers “k” in response to everything. It is quite often that Jason and I look at each other and shake our heads as we watch him play, saying the same thing again and again, that we cannot believe how much we love our son.

All three of the kids had a great time this year at gymnastics. By the end of the year, the girls took their first ever non-parent gymnastics classes and laughed and tumbled their way through every 45 minute session, while across the room I hung with little man’s class as he went wild on bars and trampoline and breaking all the gym rules he could. A big highlight for the girls this year definitely had to be their at-home co-op preschool with two of their little lady friends. Learning about God and his creation, doing crafts, and singing songs became a great way to start every Monday.

Jason and I have been really blessed this year to enjoy a getaway backpacking trip to Ingles Peak as well as a couple days down to Canon beach, our favorite yearly destination on the west coast. And before the year is up we are so thrilled to head back to the bed and breakfast that I used to work at in Blowing Rock, NC called the Inn at Ragged Gardens to have our Christmas date. We love our life with the kids but getting away just the two of us is always a gift – and we have both sets of parents to thank! We have continued to enjoy having our community group come to our home every Tuesday, as well as enjoy relationship with men and women, respectively, in our bible studies. And we could never part from a few very important individuals in our lives who are far away but whom God keeps close to the deepest places in our hearts. We are thankful for this, as I in particular, have been learning from the Lord a lot this year about leaning on Him by leaning on his people, who are gifted to encourage, lead, and counsel me. The Lord has been faithful to keep leading our hearts, counsel our marriage, and meet us where we’re at individually. I’m just so thankful to know Jesus and I don’t know where I would be or how I would see life without him.

For just a fun little tidbit on our day to day life, we have been working on remembering the verse I have pictured at the top of this blog. And the kids, including Salem, like to sign this one. For "from the fullness" we blow up our cheeks and make our arms round like a big belly. For "of his grace" we make a sign like we are sprinkling something over our head. For "we have all recieved" we have our arms extended and then pull them tight to our chest. And for "one blessing after another" we pat our heads as we say each word. I am thankful there is a fun way to teach toddlers Bible verses and it's one of the main way I have remembered too! :)

These two verses below are the ones we put into the bags for the homeless that we made with the kids. We all have a shared struggle of poverty in our hearts and Christ offers us riches beyond riches by his generous hand. We struggle in this physical life in various forms but all of us share the struggle of inner depravity and hopelessness without the gift of God. That is what these verses express together and that is our hope, for all of us, this Christmas. That hope came into the world in the most humble of ways. And this season, as a mother, I have felt an even closer association with how humble our Jesus must have been because as moms we are constantly being lied to that spending time at home with our children, our babies, isn't worthy. Yet what a worthy call, what a dignified gift God gave Mary to ask her to take a knee and give her life to love the baby Jesus who would save the world.

2 Corinthians 8:9 “For you know the generosity of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, he became poor so that you through his poverty might become rich.”

Ephesians 2:4-5 “But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in our transgressions – it is by grace you have been saved.”

Oh come, Oh come, Emmanuel...

Is he even a doctor?

I have such a weird doctor. I swear, is he even a doctor? The last time I was there, when the nurse was done and was about to leave the room while I waited for him to come in, she turned around at the last second and added, “Have you met with Dr ‘Fill in the Blank’ before?” “Yep,” I said. “Okay good,” she laughed, “So you know he’s a quick fix and you’re done.” “Yep,” I said again, “That’s why I’m here.” Which is actually true, for my normal day to day cold stuff. Let’s face it, I have three toddlers I am carting around and what I don’t want is a long doctor’s appointment with someone maxed out on patients because they’re amazing. I don’t need amazing. I need DRUGS. J (By the way, today I realized I would really like to buy one of those rope things that preschool classes hang onto. Why don’t I have one by now? They could all be attached with little caribeaners. It would be fantastic. Target?)

Anyway, then today at the same doctor’s office I show up for a walk in appointment b/c I happened to be in the building without the kids. My ear infection was feeling like it wasn’t going away – shocker. I already went to an ENT a couple of times earlier this year. So before I can even describe my symptoms, he’s whipped out the prescription book and is ready to sign the magic dotted line. But this time, minus kids of course, I’d kind of like to talk concerns. Like, “Hey I already did 10 days of meds and then I’ve been on some other antibiotics for another illness more often than I’d like to recount and I’m kind of feeling like I am taking an antibiotic every single day of 2010. I’m worried about that. What do you think?” What did he say?

“Oh don’t worry, we’ve got all kinds of things you can take.” And laughs, going ahead with the prescription.

Yep. Changing my primary.

I like that he’s sarcastic. I think it’s kind of funny that we talk about golf more than my condition. I like how he thinks that me having three kids is like a hundred kids (cause it kind of is and I like the credit). I like that he feels like a grandpa at Thanksgiving. I like that he’ll write me prescriptions when I’m at home, not wanting to come in with the little people who are likely to give me a whole ‘nother medical issue on the way over. I like that he’ll just give me the DRUGS! But. He’s not doing me any favors, for goodness sakes, besides that convenience card and with how terribly often I have been sick in the past year, he’s gotta go.

I feel this way with a lot of things right now. Like with prayer, I’m not good with a nice wrap-it-up prayer time and we all smile and mingle and leave. I need to cry it out. I need to call out to God. I need to PRAY. Not to be a Pharisee. But because if prayer really is touching the ears of God, I’ve got to get there! And with Christian community. I really don’t just need to hang out for filling up the calendar’s sake. I need conversation. I need true encouragement that God supplies through his people himself. I need questions, hard ones, and someone to shovel all these thoughts out of my brain and to plant some good ones.

I think in some seasons, kind of like with my primary, I am floating on by and I just need an occasional fix and I’m good to go. But right now is when I see that I am more than needing bandaids. I need the most real, the most truthful, the most soul-baring, exposing and painfully refining HELP I can get. Both for my body and spirit. And this requires a different sort of care…all around.

Sidekick servants

I don’t seem to notice the rain this time of year or the fact that it will probably be wet the next sixty days. I just expect to put on my rain boots and get on with it. (Kind of a small miracle, mind you, if you read previous posts I write around Oct). There’s something really special about the anticipation around the birth of Christ that has a powerful presence over the air in all of November and December. I get unusually happy about planning our usual traditions, thinking about how we will serve and then especially this year, enjoying looking into my children’s eyes as we are able to have fairly thoughtful exchanges about what this is all about.

Though lately I have been struck by how even though I love Jesus with all that I am as his daughter, I find myself tetering internally sometimes between staying focused on the glory of God and how good it would feel to make a fun list of what I would like for Christmas (since people are asking, after all!) Yet I feel an intense drawing, a tide that is bigger than me, moving me towards learning more and more to completely let go of the anticipation that has to do with me. And a joy accompanying the steps I make in that direction that assure me of what is right.

I wrote a few months ago that I had one word ringing in my head that I couldn’t shake and I didn’t know what to do with it: SERVE. One snippet of that blog said:

I do not know what I am supposed to do with this word. And honestly I think it’s pretty gracious that he’s just given me A word and not a twelve page document charting out an undertaking that might take the breath out of my chest like I might die if I have to go through with it. It’s like he’s working the value of this word deep into my core. And reminding me that this is what Jesus came to do. This is what form his love took for the world. I want my children more and more with age and maturity to also learn that life is about giving our lives away like Jesus did. I want them to get their hands in that truth too.

So I don’t know where this is headed. And that’s okay. It’s not like I have an empty day every day and I need to run out and fill up all my hours. I’m already maxed with loving on my three little ones and somehow, slowly, graciously, accompanied by a growing heart burden, I see him kneeding in a new piece of our lives that he wants to make part of how we live.

All I know is that if I keep listening I bet the Spirit will keep talking about this. Because that is what he does. And my heart is perking up. And my ears are being awakened morning by morning. And I am like one being taught.

I recently posted a question on facebook about how I could serve with three kids three and under. Seems daunting. But I can’t shake the tide, so I’m compelled to figure it out (darn it, we can’t be in a cave forever!!! He he). My main realization from that exchange was that I’m not crazy for thinking it’s a daunting idea to figure out serving with toddlers. They can’t do much and they mostly keep my hands busy, and not to mention most people would kind of vote for us to stay at home instead of coming to “help” them – ha ha. So there are simple ways to overcome these hurtles.

I realize my heart as the mom, the rudder on the ship of our day, is the most important factor. Am I thinking about how we will give our lives away? Is my heart showing itself to be gracious when someone drops their groceries in front of us and my kids see me help them? Did they see me stop to talk to a woman outside the store whose name happened to be the same as mine but who was forced to live a very different life? Am I providing them the opportunities? Are we having those simple conversations about the children who live in the world without mommies and daddies? My heart steers my thoughtlife which steers our talk life, which gets them moving towards Jesus and his compassion on this world, which leads to: serving with sincerity.

So, with a simple “agenda” on the horizon, me, Jason, and our sidekick helpers seek to serve this season (and beyond). Here’s what we’re up to, with small hands and feet in tote:

This is the first year the girls are learning to serve ONE ANOTHER, which actually has been the most powerful and relationship transforming idea to affect my children. They are learning that serving one another “honors God” and that this is a joyful gift to give to one another. I talked in a previous blog about how I am learning to CELEBRATE with my family when they honor God and I kind of go crazy with hugs and kisses when they allow God to give them a servant’s heart in tiny ways that really add up and matter. Throughout the summer and fall they have practiced this in small ways by sharing toys, giving up a turn, holding the door, practicing hospitality for friends coming over, etc. And this season they are doing extra chores to earn coins in little jars so that they will be able to participate in buying a small gift for their two siblings. This has helped us to an extent to keep the conversations about Christmas off what they want and on what they will give.

Our family date this year will be heading to a Target to gather supplies to make bags for the homeless that would be a blessing to them: warm socks, $5 giftcard to get something to eat, some homemade goodies, and a note from us. We’ll go home and make them together and keep them in our car, waiting on the Lord for who he would have us to give them to.

We have a special foster girl who is now 14, but who I used to work with through a foster care agency when she was 7 and 8. She now lives far away, still does not have a “forever family” and likely never will. She lives in a group home for orphans and we keep in touch with her especially on her birthday and holidays. She only has two families, including ours, who pursue her in any regard. We will be making a care package for her with the girls and mailing it off and give her a call as well. I would like to be more faithful to this girl as I cannot imagine living in such a fragile time of life without the security of a home or family or even a bed to consistently call your own. Maybe the Lord will open a door one day for us to bring an orphan into our family. In the meantime I cannot imagine why every believer would not in some way, shape or form – even if only, and most importantly prayer – let their hearts grow and break for these children.

Last year and this year the girls have been my sidekick helpers with cooking. If it weren’t for a climbing, curious little Salem boy, I would probably have them help me with dinner every night. They are looking forward to making goodies again with me this year for the holidays and packing them up in bags to deliver around to our neighbors in the wagon. It’s such a fun time and I can’t wait to take all three of them this year.

I think one of our favorite traditions is our Christmas craft party for kids that we have done for kids around the girls’ age. Everyone comes over for a couple of stories, maybe a song, and then gather around a bunch kids tables to do all kinds of crafts with one another. It’s great fun and it’s also fun to invite older kids in families we know to SERVE the younger children by offering a hand to moms with multiple kids. Last year all the moms brought a plate of cookies so that before they left with their crafts, they could make treat bags for their neighbors, etc. I am praying and thinking about maybe offering another way to add the element of SERVE to this fun day together so that our hearts are celebrating but also turned out to teach our kids about giving their lives away. We’ll see what idea surfaces. I'm asking God to speak up and let me know if He's got something on his heart for us. I'm listening.

So this is what we’re anticipating and planning. But sometimes it’s the “here let me give you a hand” surprising moments in serving that are the most intimate and joyful. And for me, 98% of the time, that’s directed towards three little human beings who are daily in my care, who clearly have been entrusted to me. And just like any foster child or homeless person or widow or slave, they are made in the image and likeness of God and desperately need to meet him. So if my hands and feet aren’t first willing to selflessly serve them, then what does that say about my heart to serve in general? That’s exposing.

I’m thankful Jesus turning my heart towards this one word. It is surely a word he is all about. And I just wonder if it might be my most joyful Christmas ever if I will let the current of this conviction carry me through.

Matthew 20:28 “Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave – just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

Like a Schedule with No Script

(written earlier this week...)

I think when I start my day circling my family room and kitchen with a coffee cup and prayer, somewhere in me I think it guarantees a perfect day. Because 4:00 p.m. comes around every single day and somehow either I have dementia or else I am in denial, because when my kids have their 19th tantrum, I am somehow shocked that all of this was possible. I mean I got UP and had my quiet time!

Yesterday was actually horrid. Have those horrid days? It’s actually worse when you wake up all Snow White like, as I did yesterday, waltzing around with your coffee, convinced today is going to glisten and glow. It has more potential to send you straight into the forest, like she did, terrified of all the evil in the world that she had no idea existed. That’s probably why it ended so badly. Yesterday I kind of forgot that evil existed. I kind of forgot that that included the evil that lurks in my kids and me. And that even if you have yourself ready before they wake up and a nicely gift wrapped schedule for the day, the script is not yet written for the emotions, the interactions, the fights, the words, and generally for all of the capacities of sin that flow from the heart. There is no script yet. The Director hands you that as you go, which is just not fair.

I hate improv. And that’s kind of what we are doing everyday here, know what I mean? My kids throw me a new manipulative request and the spotlight is on me – act! Respond! Say something! And it better be good! Life is more than unjust in this department for introverts. Come on! We were made to stare at life and respond later. But if I did that I would literally have no friends and my kids would run the house like little bandits, tying me up in chairs and stuff. It would be cool in heaven if conversations were kind of floating or paused, like in that teen witch show, and I can just ponder every response for a long, delayed while, while you...I don’t know, drift somewhere in a waiting room.

Having hope in your schedule with no script is just like what happens sometimes when my husband and I have our date night. It doesn’t matter what you plan, how good the ideas are or how fancy the food – if I don’t prepare my heart before we go – it ain’t gonna be pretty. I am going to have skyscraper expectations, dump all my junk on him, get my feelings hurt if he even waits two seconds to ask me how I am doing, and the date will be over before we leave the neighborhood. It’s just that crazy of a season, so it takes a little more of a fight with my inner wild woman to appear…well, a little normal ;). (Incidentally, the name Kelly actually means “warrior woman”, so you know I was probably born with more fierce issues than most). Maybe one day normal will not feel so unattainable, but these days, it’s quite a feat! So it’s much better if I focus a little on my side of our date script ahead of time J.

So back to yesterday’s script. On the paper of my mind, the day read:

Bible verse/signs with kids at breakfast

Playdate with friends at our house

Kids help “serve” our community group with little chores (oddly and thankfully they think it’s like a game)

Naptime

Playdoh and beads while I cook

Dinner

Community group

What happened looked more like:

Kids not eating

Tantrum followed by a bigger tantrum

Salem stealing backpacks, Gracie throwing wild uncontrollable fits, Kanah screaming

Playdate – (actually good and should have had her stay all day)

Only one of my kids serving, the other rebelling in timeout – again

Short nap for one and no naps for other two

Needed six hands to help them with a terribly needy, envious round of playdoh

Salem fussing (infinitely til bedtime)

Sheer miracle to get simple tacos on plates for last minute dinner.

20 people show up for community group (kicker: I do the childcare with friend – great humorous ending of script for the day)

I don’t even know how to write this one into the list, but somewhere later in the day I noticed an odd feeling an pulled my shirt forward to find the shelf of my camisole full of crushed cookies. The worst, most confusingly laughable part is that I do not remember any incidents that would land me swimming in cookie crumbs, nor do I even recall giving them cookies that day…hm. That’s kind of a good word picture for the whole entire day.

So when I woke up the next morning I instantly faced a sinking feeling that today would be exactly the same. There was no chance it would be good. I was going to fail miserably, my kids would drive me crazy, and I was not sure why starting my day the same way with a quiet time would even matter at all. I mean, look at my day yesterday!!! So I snoozed til 6:30 and finally felt motivated enough to crawl out of bed and get the coffee going.

I started reading Proverbs, like usual, and Jason came down to say goodbye and pray for me before he headed off before work to his accountability group. I got up from my quiet time, prayed with him and mumbled two or three grumbling comments about the day ahead and gruffily went back to my reading with a stubborn attitude of who cares. So instead of reading on, I got up to start circling my kitchen and family room, praying outloud with urgency and near anger. I just decided to be honest, because that’s all I had and it went something like:

“Lord I do not understand! I really am struggling to see how this matters! My day was horrible yesterday. It was nothing like I wanted to be. I am getting early in the morning. I am reading. I am praying. What else am I supposed to do? Lord I want to trust you but all I feel is oozing cynicism. I am overwhelmed by it. This isn’t working.”

That sort of helped. Sometimes if I am feeling cynical I stop reading or I just don’t even get to prayer, with a rolled eye sort of mentality and move along to getting ready or breakfast. But this is what the whole “crying out to the Lord” thing in Psalms and Proverbs is about. So I am circling, crying out, and then: He speaks. He spoke so quickly, before I could make another lap, that it surprised me.

I do a verse a week with my kids when I am on track with them. I have the ones we did the first half of the year listed on Word and now, so as to help them hide it in their heart even more deeply, instead of doing new ones we are just randomly going back over the old ones. So I literally just picked a verse and wrote it up on our board a few days ago.

So I’m walking, panting my prayers, and I look up and see:

“Jesus helps those who are being tempted.” It’s Hebrews 2:18 and the whole verse in the exact wording reads “Because he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.” And I can’t explain to you the influence, other than the Holy Spirit is powerful, why sometimes we read the Bible and it’s like skimming a book and other times it’s like you get knocked down by an evangelist on a stage. But I stopped dead in my tracks and I promise you I felt something a lot stronger than my cynicism at that moment. I felt BELIEF and GRATITUDE fill my heart in that exact moment I read that verse. His power flooded the words on my board and he gifted me with FAITH in them and the cynical chains from that morning were broken.

I heard him in my head say: This is true. Believe it for yourself.

With an unrecognizable heart to who I was moments before, I hurried back to sit down and look up the Scripture which immediately struck a cord with another Scripture that, for a second time, rebuked me and poured life into me all at once:

James 1:5-8 “If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That man should not think he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does.”

I have read this chapter soooo many times. I have rarely memorized chapters but this one I actually have. And it doesn’t matter because God makes things come alive that seem old sometimes. He is powerful like that. And all I could hear, as if I had never heard it in my whole life was, “Kelly you MUST believe and NOT doubt. You MUST BELIEVE.” The wisdom he desired to impart to me about my circumstance was that I was allowing the “faith,” if you will, of doubt to consume my belief system. Otherwise you will be like a woman who is unstable, which is exactly how I felt that morning without my belief securely written on my heart. I felt floundering and lost and bitter and frustrated and mad. And certainly: unstable. I think the wording is so interesting, so compelling, so commanding: You MUST believe.

I suffer in my own forms of temptation. I live sacrificially as a mom daily, sometimes laying my life down willingly and other days by force because I don’t want to do anything except love myself. But this is my road of sanctification. This is how Jesus is making me mature and complete. And on this road I suffer very particular kinds of temptation: unrighteous anger, impatience, selfishness, comparison, self-pity, despair, depression, isolation, and bitterness. I feel these evils lurk around me on their own schedule, using our family’s scenarios, dialogues and scripts to tempt my own heart.

And the reason these verse so touched me was not because it promised me we were going to have a great day. Not because it promised me my kids would behave a certain way. But because my deepest need in that day of chaos was that I would be able to be strong and this verse declared to me: in your every moment battle of your heart, I am more than able to help you in your temptation and you must thrust all of your belief on that and choose with all of your strength to overcome doubt.

Nothing else is promised. But what is promised is that I will be given the strength and the way out of my temptations and even the lines to say. And in the unscripted improv of my life, that is enough.