November 5: Seasons Come and Seasons Go


The leaves were blowing on the breeze today.

Crunching underfoot.

Scuttling across the cement.

The wind plucked them from their place in the sky.

Brown and shriveled now.

Their glory has passed. 

Sometimes it seems like this season will last.

The brilliance; the light.

The crispness in the air.

But eventually it, too, will cease to be there.

The things that plague you now won't always be.

What God's doing now isn't the only thing you'll see.

A new season is coming.


October 28: Write 31 Days: The Discipleship that is Motherhood


Sometimes the best kind of discipleship--
the vessel that lays down ones life
and instead takes up His--
is the kind in which you have no choice.

I suppose there's always a choice,
but in vocations like Motherhood
you can't send the children back, 
as much as you want to some days.

It's a forcible dying to self before
the child even enters the world.
The change of diet and drinking habits, 
of sleeping and bathroom breaks.

It's a loss of modesty in the mess 
of it all, in the casting of your body 
aside to give life to another.
Life that changes yours forever.

It's sacrificed sleep and sanity, too,
to care for the sweet babe.
Feeding schedules, dirty diapers 
and more consume your life.

Their needs first; your needs last.
More experienced moms say that
this too shall pass, but in the trenches
of long days it's hard to understand.

The self does not go willingly but
Flails and stomps and storms about.
Even mothers have an inner toddler who
Could use to learn a lesson or two.

Over time you realize the joy that comes
with serving others first. The love and 
satisfaction that comes in frequent bursts.
And you slowly start to conceive that

The "important" things you cared about 
don't really matter all that much.
Because new life always springs from 
the One who was broken for us.


Some Thoughts on Knowing God: "Momma!! I Don't Hear You Walking..."

Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the garden. {Genesis 3:8}

Eva has been potty-trained for almost a year now, but as those of you with little ones know, it sometimes takes a while before they can do all the wiping and whatnot by themselves. So, she will sit and wait for me to help her.

"Momma! I'm done!"

"Okay, I'm coming." I reply.

Now, "I'm coming," rarely means I'm coming right now. It usually means I'll come when I've finished what I'm currently doing, when I'm done helping whatever child is needy, or when I must finally relent my comfort and get up off the couch.

So if I don't come quickly enough for her liking, she will start yelling out to me. 

"Momma, I'm done!"

"Momma! I don't hear you walking..."

"Momma!!! I. DON'T. HEAR. YOU. WALKING!"

And I laugh, because my 2 year old knows the sound of my footsteps approaching the bathroom to help her, and she also knows she can't hear them yet, which means that I'm not, in fact, coming.

Sitting on the couch with her this morning while she and her brother watched a dinosaur show, I thought about that concept. How she knows the sound of my walking. How, likewise, I know the footsteps of those with whom I live and love. I know what it sounds like when my husband walks by. The door can be shut, and I still know without a doubt that it's him. 

I know what it sounds like when her tiny, two-year-old feet are frantically slapping the hardwood floor, running as fast as they can after the dog. I know what her oldest brother's feet sound like when they're upstairs stomping around like a gorilla. And I know whose feet are out of bed and coming back down the stairs at night when all the little feet in the house are supposed to be asleep. 

I know the sound of their walking.

Can you imagine being in Adam and Eve's position (I'd say shoes, but my guess is they weren't wearing any) and knowing the sound of the Lord walking?

They communed with the Lord. They were intimately acquainted. They worked together, talked together, and did life together.

They knew the sound of his footsteps.

And I guess the question to us today is, can you hear Him walking?

Do you know your Father's footsteps?

The reality is, He's moving and working among us, regardless of the state of the world today. But can we hear it? Are we looking for his footsteps? 

May the soil of our hearts be fertile and ready to focus on him alone. 

May the harvest of our minds produce a crop of revelations from his Spirit.

May our eyes be clear as water to see his sovereignty and grace. 

And may our ears be intimately tuned to his character and ways

that we may hear him walk in the cool of the day.