day 1: move

Today I begin a monthly blog challenge of 31 days of five-minute free writing, hosted by Kate Motaung here. It will force me to write daily, and it should be a fun way to be part of this virtual “five minute Friday” community I’ve enjoyed over the past year.

I will post all of them at this site, with the links going active as I write each day: https://heatherdavisnelson.com/2014/10/02/31-days-of-five-minute-free-writes/.

Without further ado … I begin with: “M O V E.”

***

photo from cnn.com

photo from cnn.com

I want the faith as small as a mustard seed that’s big enough to move mountains. In fact, I’d settle for faith that could move my heart one-inch closer to loving people the way that I wish I could. Or faith to tweak my life just the tiniest bit so that it looks more like ideal. You know, just a few more dollars in the bank and a couple less pounds and happier children and a bigger house. Just that.

But God wants more for me. He wants me to have faith not in my ability to muster up mustard-seed faith on my own, but to have the faith that is powerful and strong because it’s rooted in the God who made the mountains (and the galaxies and the oceans and the entire universe). This God who created light from darkness and everything out of nothing. To connect to him by even a mustard seed’s worth of belief is to believe that anything is possible. Anything that HE wants to happen is possible. And it’s to believe that what’s more miraculous than a mountain moving would be my heart creeping closer to a completely abandoned faith in this God who can move me to do and be who he’s creating me to be in this world. 

That I would move closer to awe of this God who moves mountains … now, that would be miraculous when I too easily am moved instead by the carnival mirror delights of this world.

***

a tale of twins: the first year

She leaned over the white porcelain coffee mug and asked me, “So what is it like to have twins?” It’s a question I’ve heard a million times since finding out we were expecting TWO over four years ago. I never know exactly how to answer it. “I’ve never known anything different,” is true but is rarely a satisfactory reply.

It began with two heartbeats blinking on the black and white screen. Two tiny fetal poles, two placentas, and two embryonic sacs. A belly that expanded at twice the rate, causing most to assume that I was months further along than I was. Two lives to nurture, meaning I was twice as hungry and twice as worried. We quickly began to think in two’s. Two cribs, two coming-home-from-the-hospital pink gowns, two deliveries to consider, two of everything (except for the double stroller). The expenses doubled, but so did friends’ and family’s generosity. The gifts piled up and filled up the walls painted pale pink with brown and pink polka-dotted curtains handsewn by Gigi.

As I crossed the threshold into my third trimester at 25 weeks, twin pregnancy expanded to include the dreaded diagnosis of “early preterm labor,” to be treated with “strict bed rest.” One trip daily up and down our stairs; no getting out of the recliner that molded to the shape of my very pregnant body for anything except bathroom trips. The waiting and the waiting and the waiting, anxiously monitoring each movement and cramp and ache and pain. Is this it? Would they wait for another day? Another week? Another 10 weeks? They did. At thirty-five weeks, I pushed for two hours for my firstborn; and seven minutes for my second child. Lucia’s newborn cries were the background and motivation for Alethia’s delivery. A proud Daddy cradling two pink bundles of fresh baby. Surprisingly healthy, they were. Until they weren’t four days later. It was back to the hospital for both of them. When two newborns are being pushed, prodded, poked with needles and screaming in tiny terror, which room do you choose? Which one needs me more? Which one can I handle better? When I’m with one baby, I’m wondering how her sister is doing in the room next door because I can hear her screams and I want to be there but I can’t leave where I am. And then we are both told to wait outside the dual rooms as they do spinal taps, and tears are streaming down my face and the orderlies are bringing me tissues and candy and soda as vending machine offerings. As if anything could possibly help the mom overwhelmed with hormones and questions and emotions and fear. Times two. The undercurrent of feeling inadequate magnified twice over.

We make it; they get to share a room for the next five days as their weight and temperature stabilizes. Alethia is ready to be released before Lucia; but the pediatrician agrees to wait until both can leave together. For how could I possibly split time between hospital and home when both need their mama?

We bring them home (again). Sobered; relieved; and then the real work of parenting twins begins. I nurse Lucia for 45 minutes, and then she gets a bottle of formula to supplement. Nursing feels impossible, and she can’t quite get used to drinking from a bottle – plus there is the question of is she getting enough and how to know? I hand her to a waiting helper, my mom or Seth, and then it’s time to do it again with Alethia. One-and-a-half hours, and they’re both fed, swaddled, and sleeping. In barely an hour, the routine begins again. The days and nights roll on, one big blur of feeding and burping and swaddling and crying and a little bit of sleep between it all. We make it to one month, then two, and before we know it they’re six months old and smiling and cooing at one another and at us. It feels worth it, and it begins to feel easier. A year passes, and it’s a double birthday. One song and cake smash, and then the other one. We breathe a collective sigh of relief: we have brought two babies to their first birthday simultaneously!

DSC_0182

Five Minute Friday: “hold”

It’s been a good week, of finally getting a sense of our fall rhythm, of looking ahead to a beach vacation with family, of more quiet moments than rushing-hurry-hurry ones. And so I return to Five Minute Friday, hosted by Kate Motaung, five minutes of writing unedited each Friday on a given prompt, with the word “hold.”

****

You were so tiny that my finger dwarfed your arm. Your arm! At 5 lbs 6 oz. and 4 lbs 11 oz., you were small miracles. Miracles that waited through 10 weeks of strict bed rest before entering the world. And to finally hold you! To see the faces I had dreamt of – well, it made all 35 weeks of pregnancy worth it. Button noses, dark blue alert eyes, mouths that smiled as you slept your newborn dreams.

I thought I would never tire of holding you close. And I haven’t (most days). You still want to cuddle close after a bad dream or a skinned knee. There’s a unique way that you each settle in, laying your head on my shoulder with long legs that now stretch to my knees. Usually, it is this holding that is enough to calm you down. 

How you teach me! About settling in to my Father’s embrace – returning to him for comfort amidst emotional storms, leaning trustfully into his arms. 

****

 

September Book of the Month

photo credit: thegospelcoalition.org

photo credit: thegospelcoalition.org

All of you who follow my blog know how much I love to read and how much I love to write about what I’m reading. I want to try something new and do an online book report of my favorite book each month. For September, I’ve chosen Made for More by Hannah Anderson (2014: Moody Publishers).

Her subtitle says it all: “an invitation to live in God’s image,” and her book delivers just that. I’ve found on every page a call to reexamine what it means personally and relationally that we as humans are made to image God. To literally be a reflection of the divine. Have you considered this lately? What dignity that gives you and me! And how far we fall from our destiny every day! But Anderson’s book invites you back, invites me back. To live out of my identity – who I truly am. She takes what’s a basic theological truth and states it in new ways. No small thing for this raised-in-the-church seminary grad whose biggest downfall is that I know it all while my life is far from the truth I profess. Passages like these have given me reason to ponder and to live differently:

“…we are by nature image bearers. So when we turn from God, when we refuse to base our identity in Him, we are compelled to find it somewhere else because we must reflect something. … And as we image this false god, our very personhood crystallizes around it. … When we center our identity on these ‘lesser glories,’ we become defined by them, and we end up defining reality by them as well.”

A natural question that follows is what am I reflecting if not God? In looking at my life, too often I see my gaze shift to materialism, success, and productivity. When I image these “gods,” relationships become transactional, time shrinks to my to-do list, and failure causes me to erupt in frustration and anger.

Anderson calls me back to who I am created to be – who Christ has recreated me to be – with the following:

“The paradox of personal identity is that once we accept that we are not what we should be, we are finally in a place to be made what we could be. … Once we admit the inadequacy of our lives, we are finally able to discover the sufficiency of His. And this is what Christ offers us. He offers us His identity; He offers us Himself. When we are joined to Him, when our lives are ‘hidden with Christ in God,’ we can finally die to our old selves because as His image bearers, we become whatever He is.”

A close corollary and outflow to identity as those reflecting Jesus more than the god-of-the-hour is that it changes how and what we love. We pursue what we love and “what you love will determine who you are and what you do.” How are we changed into our true selves? By loving truly because we know we are truly loved.

In a word, this will look like grace. Generous grace. Anderson again pierces my layers of cynicism as she writes –

“In a world where we routinely hurt each other and where little is certain, being generous is risky business. So we refrain from giving; we hold back; we protect ourselves. And in the process, we become cynical, hopeless people who cannot believe in grace for ourselves because we refuse to offer it to others. …nothing could be more damaging to a society than walking away from grace. Because when we walk away from grace, we walk away from the only thing that has the power to heal our brokenness. … we walk away from the only thing that can make us human again.”

Amen, sister! I would go on, but then you would miss out on journeying along with Anderson through this exquisite invitation to your truest identity. Made for More is by far the best book I’ve read about identity – both identity lost through our false image-bearing and identity found in the hope and grace of Jesus as he restores and transforms us to who we were created to be.

Five Minute Friday: “ready”

What a perfect word for this week of readying ourselves as we sink into the September schedule. Three days a week preschool; grandparents newly moved from New Jersey; fall church schedule starting up. Are we ready? Definitely not … but a good refuge is “Five Minute Friday” this week.

*****

photo credit: photographsbypeter.com

photo credit: photographsbypeter.com

“Ready or not, here I come!” Her call echoes through the halls of our home as she eagerly goes in search of her sister (who is likely hiding somewhere fairly obvious). Is she ready to be found? Always. Is her sister ready to seek? Definitely. In this brief interchange, there is a metaphor for relationship with the Divine. With our Creator. I think of the first “hide-and-seek” that happened in an idyllic garden. Perfectly perfect except for the sin that had just clothed Adam and Eve in shame. This time when God comes seeking them for their afternoon walk n’ talk, they hide. They do not run out to meet him, eagerly embracing the God who delights in them as his own image-bearers.

And ever since then, we too have been hiding. Hiding because we never feel ready. I was not ready to leave home for college in the Midwest; I certainly was not ready to be married or to parent twins or for my first counseling client. I am not ready for God to find me as I am. I need to clean up this corner; hide and straighten things out a bit. Smooth over the angry wrinkle in my heart; ameliorate the impatience; cleanse out those dirty stains.

God comes though, and he calls out gently, lovingly, “Ready or not, here I come!” For I cannot clean myself up without him. He knows and sees already the shame I want to hide. He pierces it through with his presence, exposing and healing and restoring in one fell swoop. In a great divine reversal, he makes me ready as I cry out that I am not.

****

Light in our darkness

photo credit: Mary Yonkman @ tulipsflightsuits.com

photo credit: Mary Yonkman @ tulipsflightsuits.com

The world was dark, formless, void. Nothing at all but nothing. Our minds cannot comprehend it. But there was the Spirit. Who hovered above the waters. And He spoke, and what was created first? Light. Imagine the symphony playing in heaven while the first rays of light entered creation. Light was preeminent; everything else would follow – unleashed to dance in the spotlight of the Creator.

Fast forward through a few centuries of redemptive history. There has been sin; Israel formed as God’s people; Israel in exile for their rebellion; Israel rescued and returned; and then Israel awaiting Light again. He came humbly this time. Small, in a manger – the Light of the world. He came to die in darkness and shame, taking on the weight of your sin and mine. After darkness of crucifixion, Light returns in resurrection. He is alive!

And now we come to your heart’s story of light. This same divine power exists to create light in your heart that was so full of sin’s darkness. My heart was dark, formless, void before His light came. He spoke Jesus, and began to separate the light from the darkness within me. He spoke light into my darkness so that I could recognize true Light. So that I could see God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ (2 Corinthians 4:6).

My story of redemption is a story of light shining out of darkness. Anytime I reach out in love instead of curl inward in despair or selfish hoarding of resources, light is shining out of darkness. Each time I am able to comprehend, even for a moment, the eternal weight of true beauty found in my Redeemer and I turn away from the false beauty promised by the world, light shines out of darkness. When I take a deep breath and ask for forgiveness from my 4-year-old twin daughters instead of wallowing in shame that I yelled at them (again), light shines out of darkness. Every moment that I remember I am saved not because I was a “good girl,” but despite the fact that I try to be good without God, light shines in my sin-deceived heart.

What about for the darkness of a world broken and grieved around me? Will there be enough light there, too? In my calling as a counselor and a pastor’s wife, I often have a front row seat to life’s brokenness. This past summer our church community underwent grief of tragic proportion in the deaths of a mother and daughter. In the waves of darkness, of questions without answers and grief without limit, even here there was light to be found. I witnessed it when a weeping father told his distraught daughter after sharing the unspeakable news of her mother and sister’s death – “We are Easter people. We are Easter people.” It was the refrain of his heart in the middle of the darkest tragedy, and his words spoke light into my darkness and that of his daughter and that of all who heard.

How can you survive the worst of the worst? Or walk through the darkest of valleys, the middle of the broken, of the mess we have created from our darkness without Light? It is impossible. But herein lies hope – God has made his light shine in our hearts. It is a light that conquers all darkness, even the darkness of death. This is the light that dwells within –

“In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” (John 1:4-5, ESV)

The light shone into a world that was empty, void, formless. It shines into hearts that are the same. The Light cannot be overcome by darkness, but it will overcome darkness. What a promise to count on today for you and me as we engage in this same journey in our own hearts and in the lives of those around us.

Five Minute Friday: whisper

What a whirlwind of a week! A happy whirlwind: girls returned to preschool on Wednesday and my in-laws moved down to Virginia from New Jersey the same afternoon. I have to admit that I love routine AND I already love having family living locally. For the first time ever in our 8 years of marriage.

Now – for writing this Friday morning, five minutes on a given topic each week. No editing; just writing.

******

He has witnessed one of God’s most glorious mountaintop moments: fire coming down from heaven to consume an altar’s sacrifice, proving in the sight of hundreds of Baal worshipers that he is the True God. No wonder Elijah thought God would speak to him in thunder, or whirlwind. His was a big, glorious God who had stolen the headlines with his other “god”-defying powers. Now that Elijah was listening for God to speak to him, he was listening for BIG. 

But that’s now how God spoke. He was in a whisper. In the quiet. Elijah had to wait. To settle down his soul. To lean in close. For the God of the Big is also the God of the intimate. Who whispers to his people to let them know that he is close and to draw them closer to him. Whispering implies intimacy. It requires more intentional listening.

quietIn my bustling whirlwind, do I have time and space and quiet to listen? To lean in to God’s heart – to open up his word and listen to these words of life? Yes, he will meet me amidst the turmoil and the whirlwind, but what he truly delights in with his own? To draw them close and to whisper peace over their souls and into the crevices of our hearts that only he knows how to touch. 

What will he whisper? I don’t know. We don’t know what he said to Elijah. Just that it was in a whisper. And so quiet down and listen. He still speaks. But he won’t compete with the chaos. He waits for you to step away from it.

*****

what’s your dream?

photo credit: fanpop.com

photo credit: fanpop.com

Last night I threw out this question to a few friends as we sipped drinks on my front porch in celebration of summer’s end: “What’s your dream?” All of us admitted to the difficulty of answering this question. I had mine on the ready (because it’s what prompted me to ask it), and a few of us had some ideas. But we all discussed why it’s hard to dream. And, I need to add, why it’s hard to dream as adult women. To children it comes easy. Astronaut, president, ballerina-princess-doctor (one of my daughter’s current dreams). “I’ll live in a castle!” “I’ll own half the world!” With gleeful enthusiasm, children freely dream. There are no checks to their dreams. No pause to think of the logical details like how and how much and when and what if. Their dreams tend to be fairly easy come, easy go as well. Yesterday she wanted to be a firefighter; today’s she’s going to be an artist. There’s no conflict in her mind.

What happens to our dreaming capacity as we grow up? I’m wondering if it’s similar to what happens to our creativity. That we begin comparing and analyzing and being “realistic” the older we get. We also go through a fair number of disappointed dreams, and this process starts to tell my heart that it’s emotionally too costly to dream. Then of course, there’s the question of if I dream, then how can I have a chance of contentment in my ordinary here-and-now? I think that’s why dreaming comes especially hard to us as women, many of whom have part of domestic life as our dream and/or our reality. Even if I am living my dream in spending most hours of most days at home with my kiddos, there are other parts to my life about which I have dreams. Motherhood often entails putting my dreams on hold, by choice and/or by force.

As I pursue my dream of writing a book, I am going through all of this (and more). Self-doubt creeps in disguised as “being realistic” and I condemn myself for wanting to write more than cook dinner, clean, or do crafts with my kids. I get impatient because walking towards a dream takes time. It’s slow and uncertain. And there is so much fear lurking just beneath the excitement. Fear that it won’t happen, that I’m not really “good enough,” that I will be horribly disappointed or that it will be too consuming and take away from life and love and relationships (thus=not worth it).

Nevertheless, I am trying to silence all my nay-sayers and live my dream. Have a dream; pursue it; and find out what happens along the way.

One inspiration? My in-laws, who ever since their only grandchildren were born 4 years ago have nurtured a dream of living day-to-day life with their only son and his family. Living in northern New Jersey got in the way, and so over the past year+ they have worked steadily towards realizing their dream and tomorrow will call Virginia “home.” Leaving friends they’ve known all their lives behind, and the only house they’ve called “home” in their 41 years of marriage, they will be traveling down here to be with us. I certainly am humbled to be the recipient of such love, and I am inspired at their courage to live their dream during their sunset years. They’re teaching me that you’re never too old to dream! 

Five Minute Friday: “reach”

A few quiet minutes this Friday morning because my husband has taken our girls on errands with him. Then we will together head to the girls’ new preschool to meet their teachers and other classmates. School starts next week. Hallelujah! We all are ready. And in bigger news, two of the gems of New Jersey (namely, my in-laws) will be moving down to us next Tuesday. We cannot wait for grandparents to arrive into town!

I join in Five Minute Friday – five minutes of writing unedited on a given topic each week.

******

It was the last week of eighth grade, and I had yet to conquer the P.E. challenge of making it to “the beam team,” meaning that I would climb the 30 foot length of rope suspended from the gym ceiling. I was scrawny, not so strong by any standards. But that day, I made it. Maybe it was eighth grade adrenaline – who knows? But I reached the top of that beam, conquering fears and the apparent obstacle of my weakness. To reach the top – well, it surprised me and delighted me all at the same time.

photo credit: theblondecoyote.com

photo credit: theblondecoyote.com

I remember another time of straining to reach a summit. This one was a mountain in Ireland on a rainy, foggy day. I complained the entire time. Hiking just isn’t my thing, and I was out of breath and wondered if it would be worth it. Quite honestly, because the fog obscured any view, it did not feel very worth it to reach the top of that Irish mountain. At least I could say that I did it.

Reaching forward in life towards whatever it is that is your goal can feel similar. When I think of life goals of marriage, motherhood, career, I look back and it seems relatively simple. Like making “the beam team” despite myself. But when I think of looking ahead to bigger, less measurable life goals – like becoming more loving, more sacrificial of my time and resources, more gracious and less impatient – it can feel like that foggy Irish hike. Unsure of progress and unsure of whether it will feel worth it, I press on anyway.

Words come to mind from Paul in Philippians, and I feel like I may not be as alone and the goal may not be as unattainable as I feared:

Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.

on my bookshelf, summer’s end edition

Way back in June, on the 12th to be precise, I presented my (ambitious) list of summer reading. It included the following:

  1. The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness by Timothy Keller
  2. Crazy Busy by Kevin DeYoung
  3. Stitches: A Handbook on Meaning, Hope and Repair by Anne LaMott
  4. Perfecting Ourselves to Death by Richard Winter
  5. Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
  6. The Emotionally Destructive Marriage by Leslie Vernick
  7. Counterfeit Gods by Timothy Keller
  8. Death By Living: Life is Meant to Be Spent by N.D. Wilson
  9. How To Talk So Kids Will Listen and Listen So Kids Will Talk by Faber & Mazlish
  10. Running on Empty: The Gospel for Women in Ministry by Barbara Bancroft
  11. Sparkly Green Earrings by Melanie Shankle
  12. Simplicity Parenting by Kim John Payne

Here’s what I’ve read of the list above:

  1. The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness by Timothy Keller
  2. Crazy Busy by Kevin DeYoung
  3. Stitches: A Handbook on Meaning, Hope and Repair by Anne LaMott
  4. Perfecting Ourselves to Death by Richard Winter
  5. Counterfeit Gods by Timothy Keller
  6. Sparkly Green Earrings by Melanie Shankle

Six out of 12 isn’t bad … at least for a mom whose summer was far from those of my youth when I would spend hours upon hours holed up in my room or out on the beach reading novels to my heart’s content.

books

I do have a few new ones on my current shelf, which perfectly illustrates my ADD tendencies when it comes to reading. I’m always hearing about great new books, or running into them at the Barnes & Noble or my Amazon “recommended” list and I can’t resist. Almost *every* time, I succumb to the allure of the fresh, new, yet unread book. And I add it to my ever-overflowing bookshelf.

I will give you a review of my current ones:

1. Made for More by Hannah Anderson – I had the privilege of meeting Hannah in Orlando at The Gospel Coalition Women’s Conference. She is warm, inviting, and was incredibly encouraging as I asked her questions about her path to publication of this book. I’m only a few chapters in, and I love what I’m reading so far. It’s a fresh approach to the identity question we all struggle through as women. She wisely says in her introduction, “good times can initiate the search for identity as often as the bad,” and goes on to lay out how searching for identity is a search that will land us at the feet of our Maker, Christ himself. I can’t wait to read more!

2. Surprised by Motherhood by Lisa-Jo Baker – My latest in the favorite of new genres of mom memoirs. So many, and so many good ones. Lisa-Jo’s stands out from the rest in her poignant descriptions of her reluctance to be a mom and the grief of losing her own mom years before becoming one herself. Beautifully written and heartfelt. It’s a page-turner for this mom’s heart! A favorite thought from yesterday’s reading – “Becoming a parent is a lot like breaking up with yourself. … Children arrive and blow through what used to be your routine.” 

3. Anatomy of the Soul by Curt Thompson, M.D. – The professional book on my shelf recommended by several people. The thesis in the intro says it all: “I believe our lives will be abundant, joyful, and peaceful only to the degree that we are engaged, known, and understood by one another. I also believe we cannot separate what we do with our brains and our relationships from what we do with God.” Amen!

4. How Toddlers Thrive by Tovah Klein, PhD – Oh, yes, added to my very-long-list of parenting books, this one I picked up on a whim from the shelves of our local library and it’s a fascinating developmental study with practical tips on connecting with my seemingly inexplicable preschoolers. For example, she suggests the best way to conquer meal-time battles is to stop talking or focusing on what your child is eating and use meal times as a time for conversation about the day (novel concept, ha!). A good summary of what she says is helpful to remember in parenting preschoolers is to remember that, “Every time your child takes a step forward toward growing up more …, they are also reminded of how much they need you.” 

5. The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt – My novel I’ve been enjoying this summer. A bestseller that I’d heard a lot about before beginning, and I have not been disappointed in the writing itself. The story itself has a tragic beginning and some dark places in the middle, but I am hoping redemption is coming (about 2/3 done … we shall see). At 771 pages, the only way I could stick it out is with the writer’s compelling style. And the plan to meet up with a few friends to discuss it. 

Anything you’re reading now? Have you read any of the above? Leave a comment – I’d love to hear from you.