Five Minute Friday

Five minute Friday: “small”

/ Heather Davis Nelson / 6 Comments

photo credit: emilybalazsphotography.blogspot.com

I pick him up from the crib where’s he’s peacefully curled up tight; I cradle this newest nephew. It is his being small that is so inviting. To cuddle, to kiss, to feel reassured as he falls back asleep on my shoulder. The small mouth, nose, hands, feet … it is human in miniature form. And who is not awed by the sight of a baby?

Small is what I try to avoid. I don’t want to need anything or anyone larger than me. I want be big; to write big; to speak big; to be big and help others and not ever ever ever need to return to small, dependent reality.

Cliffs of Moher, Ireland

But it is reality for all of us humans when we see a glimpse of who God is – like seeing a horizon’s edge of ocean meeting sky, or being enveloped by a mountain range, or peering down the Cliffs of Moher on an Irish coast … it is actually in this being small I am able to feel utterly safe, realizing I am cradled in the arms of a God who is big enough to hold me, to give what I need before I know what or how to ask for it, to draw me close to him in love before I even know his name.

As my small nephew cuddled up to his  Aunt Heather last night, not knowing who I am but feeling the love I have, so may I draw close to my God who holds me in his big embrace.

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I’m back for my favorite of blog activities, Five Minute Friday. Write for five minutes unedited on a topic given by Lisa-Jo Baker each Friday. Link up to this community here.

five minute Friday: “visit”

/ Heather Davis Nelson / Leave a comment

My writing/blogging is feeling as little rusty. No better way to get back in than to jump into Five Minute Friday as a start. So here’s today’s word: “visit.”

Maybe it’s an airplane. Boarding alone, with a few books in tow, trying to avoid telling my seat mate my profession as a counselor (if I want to get to read my books). Leaving one place of familiarity, of home, and arriving in another greeted by ones who are also like home to me.

When you’ve lived in four places during your adult life, and really put down roots in each one, and each has formed a part of my story, there are many “homes” to return to. And I never quite fully feel at home anywhere. There are always ones I love who live elsewhere.

So visiting is a part of my pilgrim life. I visit family in three different states, up and down the Eastern seaboard, and we endure the miles and miles of whines and crumbs and fast food stops to get there. To visit. To stay for awhile, or a few days, or a week if we’re lucky.

And I board the airplane to return to a group of college friends for a reunion/homecoming; and I board a plane to see my Atlanta group of close friends; and then I board that same plane to return to the home and family I’ve missed. Visit is always bittersweet. By definition, it’s temporary. It’s a passing through – a stopping by – a gathering of memories and smiles and photos to savor when the visit comes to an end and home is in sight.

Isn’t this also how I am to be living my life here on earth? While I await Home above? This is a visit – a stopping by – a passing through – and home is in sight. 

Five Minute Friday: “reflect”

/ Heather Davis Nelson / 3 Comments

She peers into her new mirror, eager to catch a glimpse of the princess ballerina in her pink dress. Changes clothes again and runs over to see how her reflection has changed.

photo credit: ayearwithoutmirrors.com

photo credit: ayearwithoutmirrors.com

Somewhere along the years, these girls who are delighted to see their indelible God-beauty turn into teens obsessed by the imperfections and then women who never quite like what the mirror reflects. And so plastic surgery is a booming American industry. And clothing and fashion and cosmetics and magazines, as we women seek to change the image reflected before us.

What if, instead, I peered into the perfect word that gives freedom? The Word of God that reflects who I am truly? The beauty that is indelible because of Jesus and because of God’s image stamped upon me, his name written on my identity, his authorship of my story. If I gazed deeply into this never-ending glory of truth that rings real, of promises that beautify, of love that is never-stopping-always-pursuing … would I reflect the Beloved more fully to a world desperate for a glimpse? Whose attempts at this love, this beauty, fall far short of reflecting the Truth they falsely emulate?

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I’m sneaking in my Five Minute Friday post, an hour before midnight, as a way to join a group of writers spontaneously and artfully and freely pouring words onto paper for five minutes every Friday.

Five Minute Friday: “tree”

/ Heather Davis Nelson / 3 Comments

It is five minutes before Friday is over, but I will still post. It’s been a long day, and one which has ended infinitely better than it started [I am at the beach with friends for a getaway; this morning I was greeted by demanding three-year-olds awaking an hour earlier than norm after a night of sleep that felt too short]. The weeks have been full; writing has felt like a luxury I couldn’t afford in between survival and to-do lists and conversations and work.

Yet I will come this Friday and join in this weekly rhythm of writing, five minutes on an assigned topic. Here I go …

“tree”

photo credit: http://www.sxc.hu

It stands as a metaphor for life’s seasons and rhythms. Wintry barrenness, stark silhouettes of branches against grey sky remind me of the beauty of winter which can feel so bare yet it so necessary. Solitude belongs here. It gives way to buds blossoming in the glory of spring – of recreation, renewal, refreshment, life after death, resurrection. The life was at work in the barren branches, but that life was hidden until spring’s release. And then summer, ahhh summer. My favorite of seasons. Vibrancy; full green leaf flourishes; verdant. These are the peaks of life when all feels as it should; when life abundant is evident and overflowing.

But what’s most glorious in the life of a tree? It is autumn. Death on display yielding radiant hues of unmatched beauty. As a tree gives up its life; color reigns and the world radiates and shines. Trees take center stage as they move from summer to winter, from life to death. And isn’t it so in the life of a soul? That as I lay down my life, as I yield in the daily death of sacrifice, as I face what feels impossible, I will shine with the grace of my Savior. Whose death yields life for me daily. Whose death set the world aflame with glorious beauty of hope – that spring and summer will always come again.

Five Minute Friday: “truth”

/ Heather Davis Nelson / 3 Comments

“I am the way, the truth, and the life,” claims Jesus, against our culture of relativity where we say there can be no absolute truth. There is my truth; there is your truth; but to claim there is THE truth? That’s heretical to a postmodern way of looking at life. Truth – it’s what my daughter is named for, “Alethia,” the Greek word for truth. With her twin, Lucia, meaning “light,” we pray that they do bring more of what our world desperately needs – truth and light.

True truth isn’t cold, stifling, and dusty – like old books in an ancient library. True truth brings life, hope, joy, as I align my life with it. Truth is meant to dispel the lies I too easily wrap my life and heart around, to free me from such captivity so that I can walk in the truth of who I am. Not covered and hiding by the lies that keep me from truth.

Truth brings justice; calling out wrong for what it is; bringing us to what is right. All of us have an absolute truth we live out of, but is this truth aligned with something deeper – greater – bigger? There is great comfort to me to know truth rooted in the foundation of the world itself – to know truth in a Person, the one who truly knows me and truly knows the world – and then invites me to find the life found in aligning with this Truth. Truth is found in relationship with this True One. Therein is Life and freedom to walk out of the darkness of lies’ deceit.

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Today I’m participating in Lisa-Jo’s “Five Minute Friday,” a chance to write unedited for five minutes on a word given by Lisa-Jo each Friday. Come join us!

Five Minute Friday: grace

/ Heather Davis Nelson / 2 Comments

I used to think of grace as a word lax Christians used to excuse their sin. Did I need grace? Certainly not. As a self-professed “good girl,” growing up as the oldest daughter who kept the rules (at least outwardly) gave me my secure identity as a good Christian who didn’t really need grace. That was for those other “sinners.”

And then my sophomore year of college hit. I tried following the law in ways I hadn’t tried before: one-hour long daily devotional times of prayer and Bible study; leading a discipleship group weekly; seeking opportunities to share my faith with others; trying, trying, striving, striving. Where did I end up? Exhausted. Weary. Literally an insomniac plagued with worry for what if … what if I wasn’t doing enough?

The following summer I hit my knees out of desperation. I remember crying out to God, begging for him to help me because I couldn’t do it anymore.

Enter grace. It flooded in like color into my formerly black-and-white world. Grace was everywhere that summer. In the book of Romans I was reading; in our pastor’s sermons every Sunday; in conversations with my best friend who was also undergoing a “grace revolution.” It was like the advent of technicolor into my Christian life.

photo credit: cultofmac.com

photo credit: cultofmac.com

I needed grace, and that’s when I began to experience it. For grace is generously lavished upon all who know that they need it.

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Today I’m participating in Lisa-Jo’s “Five Minute Friday,” a chance to write unedited for five minutes on a word given by Lisa-Jo each Friday. Come join us!

Five Minute Friday: “together”

/ Heather Davis Nelson / 2 Comments

As kids, my two younger brothers and I would laugh at mom’s desire for “family together time.” We made fun of her for how much she wanted us to be together, even if that together time wasn’t filled with anything “special.” Now I admire her desire (shared and fostered by my dad, too) to be sure that we did share this most precious of commodity together as a family: time. Dinners every night; one weekend night that was devoted to “family fun,” even when I was in high school and rolled my eyes and copped a bad attitude. They were committed to us being together. Whatever that included.

[photo credit: image from inspiremeheather.com]

Now we live up and down the East Coast – literally from the coast of Maine down to the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains in the Carolinas. “Together” for the extended Davis family is a rare commodity. One we last shared in our annual May beach week; the next one yet to be scheduled since there are two December babies due (my sisters-in-law’s, not mine!); and we Nelsons will be celebrating what’s likely to be the last New Jersey Nelson Christmas since plans are in motion for my in-laws to move closer to us next summer.

Together is precious, as precious as ever, even more so because it is so infrequent. Together isn’t about what you do; it’s about who you are with and what we share: time, faith, emotions, joys, sorrows. Thank you, Mom and Dad, for teaching me the value of “together.”

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Today I’m participating in Lisa-Jo’s “Five Minute Friday,” a chance to write unedited for five minutes on a word given by Lisa-Jo each Friday. Come join us!

Five Minute Friday: worship

/ Heather Davis Nelson / 2 Comments

Sunlight streams in through stained glass on a Sunday morning congregation, hands raised in praise as they worship. Yet it’s oh so much more. A daily direction and orientation of my heart. I am always directed somewhere – something I want, what I fear, what has captured my attention is what I am worshiping.

All-encompassing attention; caught up in what is bigger than me. And when that is God, my heart is happy and right and joyful and full. And when it’s something less than my Creator – a created thing – my heart shrinks to the size of its worship object. I am hungry, never satisfied, always wanting more. More, more, more. For nothing will fill my worship-sized soul space like the God who made me. Who made the stars as they twinkle on the blackest night in the country. Whose vast, immense, eternal presence is merely reflected in the infinite horizon of ocean meeting sky or mountains majestic. Oh, for my soul to meet this God of my heart and our world! It too will rise up in praise with all of its might, joining the chorus creation sings unceasingly day after day. 

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I’m participating today in Lisa-Jo’s “Five Minute Friday” where you write for five minutes on a topic, unedited. Fun way to get a quick blog post and stir the creative writing process.

Five-minute Friday: “Story”

/ Heather Davis Nelson / 3 Comments

Story. There’s a popular cliche that’s well known in counseling circles: “Home is where your story begins.” I love that because it is quite true that every story begins at home – a place of nurture, for better or for worse. Yet it’s also true that the place where you’re able to begin telling your story can become home. Hence my calling as a counselor. I consider it a deep privilege to become “home” for someone’s story. Maybe the first time they’ve shared about deep wounds or fragile hope or shattered places in their heart. And story is what shapes you, as well as what you shape each choice of each day of your life.

Story. To live in God’s story for me is another way of saying to live according to God’s will. Am I living a story of God’s glory or of my own comfort/pleasure/fulfillment? Have I remembered that Christ is the HOME for my story? He is where my story begins, and ends. Christ as the place where I am free to share every detail of my story, and Christ as the ultimate Story-teller. His story gives mine meaning, depth, light, darkness. His presence assures me that my story will never be meaningless or hopeless.

Story is captivating. And it is in daring to share our story boldly, honestly, freely, that we will have connection to others. Community is about shared-story-living (and shared-story-shaping). My story is never solitary. It’s part of a whole, and touches your story in similar ways that your story will touch mine.

There is a beginning. A middle. An end. I can tell you its beginning; the middle is what I wade through daily; the end is a mystery kept by God. Maybe in remembering where I am in my story will I be able to better live out the story of who I am; who God’s making me to be; living true to the story he is writing for me.

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I’m participating today in Lisa-Jo’s “Five Minute Friday” where you write for five minutes on a topic, unedited. Fun way to get a quick blog post and stir the creative writing process.

Five Minute Friday: “Broken”

/ Heather Davis Nelson / 8 Comments

I think of hearts metaphorically speaking. Broken after a severed relationship, severed by grief or a break-up or moving or death or relational discord.

And bones. I’ve had a few in my day – two broken arms when I was younger; a broken ankle when in college. Nothing since. (thank goodness!)

Broken implies a need to be healed. Waiting for restoration. Gently cradling and nursing the hurt place, the hurt bone, stabilizing what is broken so that healing can come. It will come. But it takes time.

It was six weeks of a cast on my arm. And you begin to get used to it before finally you’re free. But being healed and being whole feels strangely light after being broken. The process is painful but the result is beautiful. Getting that cast off my arm, and my arm felt like it was light as air. Same with the one a few years later; and then several years later at college. I was only too glad to say farewell to the cast and the crutches.

Now as to hearts after being broken. Well, that’s a different story. There is no six week cure. But the healing is just as sure. Just as certain. There’s simply more waiting involved.

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I’m participating today in Lisa-Jo’s “Five Minute Friday” where you write for five minutes on a topic, unedited. Fun way to get a quick blog post and stir the creative writing process.