When confronted with the problem that there are only 10 minutes left before the Q's leave for school/work, but there is still breakfast to be eaten, teeth to be brushed, shoes to put on, and general gathering of stuff to be accomplished, three of the four us will eat, brush, and gather more quickly than the usual pace.  The reason why three of us do so, is that we don't like to be late.  We don't even like to be less early than we usually are, let alone late.

 

One Q, however, reacts quite differently to time constraints of any sort.  It is as if she becomes paralyzed.  The banana bite sits in her cheek whole, begging to be chewed,  but cannot be chewed because the chewer has just been told to hurry up.   While three of us rush around stuffing our briefcases, computer bags, and backpacks, the fourth meanders, seemingly aimlessly, with the banana bite still in her mouth, trying to figure out what needs to go in her backpack, all while contemplating which shoes best match her outfit.  Once she figures out which shoes she wants to wear, she remembers that she left them at her friend's house last weekend, which then usually brings on tears.  The backpack is still not packed, there are no shoes on the girl, and the banana bite is threatening to choke her because she is now crying.  At this point, three of us are sitting in the car, and it is now one minute till blast off...and I mean her mother (and sometimes father and sister) blasting off because she's so frustrated with her meandering time-unconscious daughter.  And here's a little nugget of ugliness for ya:  Car horns are a deadly weapon to a sensitive child who cannot seem to grasp the concept of hurrying.

 

After all, being on time is more important than pretty much anything else, right?  (ugh..at my stupid self sometimes)

 

Sarah is a second born child, in a house full of first borns.  I haven't done any studying on this whole birth order thing, but my experience tells me there's something to it.  She's a patient, funny, smart, creative, sensitive child.  Some of her first words were "guh guh guh" said rapidly together.  When she was about 18 months old, she kept saying "guh guh guh" every time we walked past the door to the garage.  I didn't figure it out until one day I was trying to get all of us out the door, and I was walking behind her, saying "go go go Sarah.  We need to go." 

 

Time, to her, is like a shock collar.  She plays and frolics through the backyard that is her life, and only pays attention to time when she's forced to stop and change directions.  Unfortunately, on many mornings, it is a painful change of direction.

 

Time, to the three first born Q's, is almost like a favorite toy.  We think about it constantly.  We organize it.  We re-organize it.  We figure out the best way to use it.  We figure out the best way to waste it.  We play against it, like some weird challenge.  It brings us satisfaction when we line our time up successfully.  It causes us much stress when other people don't value our time like we do.

 

My goal this year is to value people's hearts more than I value being on time...starting with my sweet little 8 year old's heart.  Time will be gone with her before I know it, and then I'll have all the time in the world...to be on time.

My friend Gina gave me Regie Hamm's American Dreams record a couple of years ago.  Listening to it humbled me.  I was an instant fan.  Read his blog.  If you're a writer, you really must read his blog. He's all famous now because of the American Idol thing, but he's been a great writer for a long long time.

 

He recently posted  an entry called The Artist's Way.  You must read it, if you're aspiring to make the writing thing go farther than your living room.  I don't think you need to agree with all of it, but YOU MUST READ IT.  Here's the link:

 

 

Approaching goals and dreams with a proper view of reality is freeing.   Doing that is difficult sometimes, because it requires some measure of soul searching.  And once you begin the soul searching, not many people have the maturity to accept what they find.   

 

 I've been trying to figure out where songwriting belongs in my life for a few years now.  What I've found is that I really don't want this as badly as I should, if I'm going to call myself any kind of serious writer.  I'm certainly not working at it very hard right now.

 

Songwriting has found it's way into the "hobby" category in my life, for now.  The word "hobby" is like a four letter word to me.  It is a fairly weightless word, when compared to the word "career"  or "calling."   or "passion."

 

There have been times when I've wanted it to be a career.  There have been times when I have felt overwhelmingly passionate about it. There have been times when I've carved out hours, daily, to hone my craft.  And,  I have always wondered if it is a calling on my life.

 

I still want to work at it.

 

I still want to serve the church with it.

 

I still love it.

 

But right now, it is  hobby.  I would be lying to myself if I saw it any other way.  I would be sporting a ridiculous sense of entitlement if I had expectations beyond what a hobby offers a person.  I would be thumbing my nose at all of those people who are working their kiesters off to make their songwriting dreams come true, if I expected any more than what I've put in to it over the past several months. 

 

Maybe another season is coming.  But for now, I'll enjoy it for what it is, and work to have the maturity and humility to let it be what it is.... 

 

 

 

 

a hobby.

I heard an EXCELLENT speaker at the conference last week.  His name is David Powlison.   He gets it.  The thing I love about this guy is that he has that rare gift of seeing the unmatched value and authority of God's word, all while having a very clear understanding that feelings and emotions affect how we understand God and His word.   He seems to have a wonderful gift in being able to identifty that place where God and His word intersect with the human experience.  We aren't robots. You cannot program a person with God's truths, and then expect him to act with no regard to his feelings and emotions. And, we are people who mature in stages, not immediately like robots.  God had reasons for giving us feelings and emotions. They must not be left unchecked, but they cannot be ignored, either.  It is not ungodly to hurt.  It is not ungodly to ADMIT we feel angry, or jealous, or sorry for ourselves.  Those things are REAL.  Admitting to God and others (whom you are properly close to) that you have these feelings is healthy.  Having the grace and love to help others deal with those same emotions GENTLY...and KINDLY...and GRACIOUSLY is pleasing to God.  Allowing others to excessively indulge feelings and emotions that are not of God, is not healthy.  Overly indulging our own feelings which are not honoring to God isn't right either.  So, the struggle is to have the courage to be honest about the struggle, and yet not indulge the parts of the struggle that go against what is honoring to God.  How do you do that?  I'm still learning about that, but here's what I think I may have learned so far:

 

Have you ever met someone who expected you to act like a robot; who responded to your hurt or concern by just giving you scripture, or telling you that your problem is nothing compared to the problems of others?  Have you felt spoken AT instead of TO?  I have.  Who knows?  Maybe I've been one of those people in someone else's life.  I'm sure I have, actually.  Just ask my husband and kids!    After encounters like that with people, I feel ashamed, and embarrassed.  I feel "less-than."  I feel discounted and dismissed.  Not only do I feel like I have to act emotionless and respond immediately to the truth or I'm not a very good Christian, I feel like I'm their project, or that I'm just plain annoying them.  I feel like they're trying to fix me, and that somewhere in the process of me getting fixed, my heart was forgotten.  The truth is, WE CAN'T FIX PEOPLE.  God can though.  Are we willing to do our part in an honoring, loving way, and then trust God with the results; results that may take YEARS and YEARS to show themselves?

 

God is God.  Feelings aren't God.  I understand that we cannot fix our focus on feelings, or experience, or peer pressure, or comfort, or anything else but on God, and His word.  However, we cannot speak the truth, without speaking it in love. 

 

And speaking the truth in love to a brother or sister in Christ is really really really really really hard to do.  I will never back down on that point. If you're spouting truth to people, without much thought for people's feelings or hurts, then you have issues, my friend.  There's no doubt about it.  You CANNOT separate truth and love, when speaking to your brother or sister in the faith.   If you are speaking the truth without love, it is to wonder if you even know the truth.  Here's how speaking the truth fleshes out in day-to-day living:

 

It means you first know the truth, by reading and meditating on His word faithfully.  And then:

 

It means you pray a lot more before you speak. 

 

It means you are slow to speak.

 

It means you listen a lot more to people, even if what you're hearing is difficult or painful for you.

 

It means you think more about the other person than yourself. 

 

It means you faithfully bear the burdens that inevitably come when someone lets you in on what's going on in their hearts, even if it requires sacrifice on your part.

 

It takes maturity.  Mature people don't take things unrelated to themselves personally.  They are able to enter in to people's struggles without giving them value, ie.  "her problems aren't as bad as mine" or "she's not living in Africa, dying of Aids, what does she have to complain about?"

 

It means dealing with people the way Jesus dealt with wounded, hurting, ignorant people. 

 

I'm not talking about the way Jesus dealt with the moneychangers, or the Pharisees, or those trying to profit from His words. 

 

I'm talking about the way Jesus dealt with the children, and His disciples, and the lepers, and the woman at the well.  He washed their feet.  He gave them hope.  He fed them.  He served them.  He was gentle.  He was patient.  He was kind.  And yet, He didn't back down, ever,  when it came to the truth.  He didn't deal with them like they were robots.  He dealt with them like they were people; people who were needy, and ignorant, and fallen, and in process, and desperate for love and grace. 

 

God heals.  God's word nourishes, restores, and grows us.  The power of Christ's work on the cross is our only hope.  It is an unmatched hope.  It is a victorious hope.  We can rejoice that God has remembered us according to His lovingkindness, and not according to our deeds.

 

But, understanding how all of those things translate into daily living as a frail, fallen human living with other frail, fallen humans is the mystery.  How do we communicate the awesome truths of God?  I heard someone say over and over and over and over that we should "love" people by "loving" them with the truth.  How?  How do we love them with the truth?  Do we wield it like a hammer, showing little grace?  Do we suffocate people with it, smothering their cries for help?  Do we dispense it to people with the expectation that they must be grateful, and change immediately,  based on our own ideas of sanctification and repentance?  That's what I saw in the person who claimed he was "loving people with the truth."  And his overriding message wasn't the truth, in my opinion.  It was that HE knew the truth.  There's  a HUGE difference between those two things.

 

In contrast, do we love people by living the truth?  Do we love people by speaking the truth humbly, carefully, prayerfully, graciously, and patiently?   Do we speak the truth, with the golden rule always ruling our speech?  Do we refuse to compromise the truths of God, and yet remain ever aware of how defining emotions and experiences are in the lives of people?  Are we humble?  Do we speak to people with the aim of helping them, or just showing people what we know?  Are we humble?  Do we trust God to change hearts, or do we take it upon ourselves to try and change people?

 

 

 

This fallen, frail,needy person is done talking.

 

 

 

 

 

Ok, I'm not done talking.  I'm adding this several hours after this post.  It's a skit from Mad TV featuring Bob Newhart, and the commentary following is from Powlison.  Very good stuff.