She happily set free her heart!

I think someone should write a book, Life According to Greeting Cards.   I read another one recently that made me smile.  "And after all that, she was surprised to find that she still knew the words to the song in her heart...and she began to sing along."

I have never owned a bird.  My crazy friend, Ellen, used to have a pet bird.  It loved her husband, hated her, and cursed like a sailor.  They were not on good terms, to say the least.  Ellen is a member of a Red Hat Club.  When her sweet southern belle friends would come over, she would have to cover the birdcage so he didn't humiliate her.

Life threw a blanket over me last spring and eclipsed me in complete darkness.  I could no longer hear the song in my heart.  The words and the tune were both just distant memories.

Slowly but surely, they came back.  Friends have helped me find them and have even sung them to me at times. Tonight I was a bit melancholic.  I was thinking that this time last year, life was normal.  My ex-husband and I joined friends for dinner, and then we went briefly to the Pelican Drop.  It was a little too wild and out of control, so we just came home and ushered in the new year quietly.  The girls were camping with our friends, so it was just the two of us.  I guess it was the proverbial calm before the storm.  My heart sang that night.  I was a soft, quiet song that told a story of a good life.  I had no idea that the song would be silenced in the coming weeks.

Tonight I do not long for that relationship.  I initially thought that I would always love him and never be able to move on.  However, God has completely released me from the relationship.  I wish him all the best in life.  That is easy to do now because I have moved on.  So the melancholy does not stem from longing for "that" relationship.  I am just sad for the loss of our traditional family.  I am so thankful that I serve a God of redemption.  Without Him I would be forever stuck in this state of melancholy.  Through His grace I am able to break free from those moments that would try to hold me captive in despair.  He has already given me glimpses of the life to come.  I don't know what it holds, but I know it will be good.

I allowed myself a few moments of remembrance today, and then I changed my thoughts.  I sang my heart out.  It was a beautiful song with a beautiful melody.  It told the story of a woman who had suffered great loss, but through the loss she gained much.  She has a contentment in her heart because she has all she needs: beautiful daughters, wonderful friends, and family that make her feel very special and loved.  It is a song of triumph!

In the corner of the greeting card, there was a line, "She happily set free her heart!"  I covered my heart last year and tried to hide it away from the world.  I told it not to sing because there was nothing about which to sing.  But the love in my heart could not be locked away.  It burst out, threw off the blanket, and started singing.  I tried to fight it, to no avail.  There was no choice left except to happily set it free.

Happy New Year, friends.  I pray that 2011 is a wonderful year for us all.

I'm Busting Out!

I was at dinner with friends Christmas day.  My cell phone rang once.  I ignored it.  It rang again, so I answered it.  That is the understanding I have with the girls.  If you need me and it is not a good time for me to talk, I will not answer.  But if you really need to talk to me, call me right back and I will answer.  So when I rang the second time, I excused myself and took the call.  They just wanted to know my whereabouts and when I would be joining them.  When I returned to the table, I chuckled and told my friends that it was my parole officers.

Last spring I went to prison.  It was a prison that I created myself.  I locked myself away behind thick walls of self-preservation.  The divorce had almost destroyed me, and I could not risk that ever again.  My life would be centered primarily around my girls.  They did absolutely nothing to deserve the devastation that came into their lives.  It would be a win-win situation.  If I focused my life on them, I thought that somehow I could compensate for the loss they had experienced.  At the same time, I knew that I could pour everything I had into them, because they would never hurt me.  Once, when asked what my hobbies were, I joked and said, "Catering to my daughters' every whim."   It was a joke; however, there was far too much truth to this statement.

This was dysfunction at its best.  There is only One who can compensate for loss in someone's life.  Loss is like a bottomless pit.  The more you pour into it, the deeper it seems to get.  There is nothing on this earth that can satisfy it.  I know this seems hopeless, but it truly is not.  There is one way to fill the void.  It is a deeper, inward relationship with Jesus Christ.

Please take a moment and read the following passage.  Read it slowly and take it all in.

Psalm 139 (GOD’S WORD Translation)

For the choir director; a psalm by David.

O Lord, you have examined me, and you know me.
  You alone know when I sit down and when I get up.
  You read my thoughts from far away.
  You watch me when I travel and when I rest.
  You are familiar with all my ways.
Even before there is a single word on my tongue,
  you know all about it, Lord.
You are all around me—in front of me and in back of me.
  You lay your hand on me.
Such knowledge is beyond my grasp.
  It is so high I cannot reach it.

Where can I go to get away from your Spirit?
Where can I run to get away from you?
  If I go up to heaven, you are there.
  If I make my bed in hell, you are there.
If I climb upward on the rays of the morning sun
  or land on the most distant shore of the sea where the sun sets,
  even there your hand would guide me
  and your right hand would hold on to me.
If I say, “Let the darkness hide me
  and let the light around me turn into night,”
  even the darkness is not too dark for you.
Night is as bright as day.
  Darkness and light are the same to you.

You alone created my inner being.
You knitted me together inside my mother.
  I will give thanks to you
  because I have been so amazingly and miraculously made.
  Your works are miraculous, and my soul is fully aware of this.
My bones were not hidden from you
  when I was being made in secret,
  when I was being skillfully woven in an underground workshop.
Your eyes saw me when I was only a fetus.
  Every day of my life was recorded in your book
  before one of them had taken place.
How precious are your thoughts concerning me, O God!
  How vast in number they are!
  If I try to count them,
  there would be more of them than there are grains of sand.
When I wake up, I am still with you.

I think I know my girls better than anyone else.  I gave birth to them and have watched them grow into the beautiful young women that they are today.  However, as close as I am to them, I can not even begin to understand them like this.  This understanding of our innermost beings is what it takes to fill that endless void. The greatest way that I can help my girls overcome the loss is to encourage them to run to their Heavenly Father.  To find ourselves and be satisfied, we must first lose ourselves in Him.

So, I have busted out of this jail.  Of course, I will be there for my children whenever they need me.  But there has to be a balance.  I have to establish my new life, and they have to establish theirs.  We will walk together as we rebuild.  We will help each other out when times get tough.  But ultimately, we will understand that at the end of the day, when we are all alone, we must run the One who knows us best!

Remaking Memories

I am in Slapout visiting with several of my friends here.  It is always good to see them.  Astonishingly, we were able to reminisce over the year, and we could laugh.  I would have never dreamed that life could still bring me so much pleasure after all that has been said and done this year.

My friend, Sue, looked at me and said, "We have decided we are going to have a do-over weekend this year."  I knew exactly what she was talking about.  Sue, Karen, and Kristy are three of my friends from Slapout.  I love them dearly. It is hard to get all four of us together.  We all have teenage children going in every direction, and life just happens.  However, last January I called Sue and said, "I need you, Karen, and Kristy to come to your mom's condo and see me.  Don't ask why, and there are no excuses.  I need you all there."

They talked the whole trip down about what could possibly be going on in my life.  They came up with all kinds of scenarios from my being sick to a problem with one of the girls.  They never considered divorce.  It was not even the slightest whisper of a thought in any of their minds.  They finally decided that I was just tricking them.  In my past life I was known to pull a prank or two. (That part of me died for a while.  A word of caution to those close to me:  It is being revived!)  They assumed that I just wanted to hang out with them, and I acted like something was terribly wrong as a way to get everyone together.  I would walk in, smile really big, and say, "Gotcha."  We would then spend a weekend together, laughing and making memories.

It did not happen that way.  I walked in and looked at them.  I was about the size that I was in the 7th grade.  Sue looked at me and said, "You are so skinny.  You make me sick.  Why can't I look like that?"  I quietly said, "You don't want to look like this."   They stood there and watched their strong, feisty, and ever- mischievous friend crumble into a million pieces.  It was like Humpty Dumpty's fall.  We all wondered in that moment if I could ever be put back together again.

I shared what had happened, and they were speechless.  This was not happening.  They must be dreaming.  At the same time, I could see fear in their eyes.  Two of them are married.  If this can happen to me, is anyone secure in their marriage?  I cried.  They cried.  We were silent.  No one had any words to offer.  Finally, Sue looked up and said, "Mens are crazy!"  It broke the ice, and we could laugh a little, but a huge black cloud still hung over us, and there was a deep heaviness that made it seem difficult just to breathe.

We were in Gulf Shores, so we decided to shop.  Shopping is supposed to make everything better, right?  Nothing could help this.  Furthermore, the temperatures were in the 30s, and it was dreary and raining.  The climate perfectly reflected my life.  I was so tired.  Now I know that was depression.  Finally, we left and went to get something to eat.

If you are in Gulf Shores, you have to go to LuLu's.  We pulled up into the parking lot, and I don't know how or why, but a wave of grief washed over me, and I went under.  Sue was in the back seat.  I fell over in her lap and sobbed uncontrollably.  I could hear her whisper to them, "What do we do?"   Kristy was in the front seat saying, "Oh, why didn't I bring my Bible?  I could read some scripture to you."  I sat there for well over fifteen minutes, just crying.  I know they were beginning to wonder if we would be sitting there all day long.  I was still clinging to one lonely tissue that had been used up ten minutes earlier. Sue was desperately whispering to them, "She needs tissue."  They are scurrying around in the car trying to find something.  Finally, Sue offered me her scarf!  I start laughing a little.  About that time, Kristy turned around.  She was holding two tampons and she said, "Here stuff one of these up each nostril."  I went from crying hysterically to laughing hysterically.  Isn't it amazing how you can move from one emotion to the other?

The tears were not finished for the weekend.  More came at several other times, but for that moment they passed.  We went inside LuLu's and enjoyed a meal.  For a little while, I was okay.

Last night, we relived that weekend.  This time, however, there were no tears, only laughter.  Time really is an amazing healer, isn't it?  We have made a decision.  This year we are going to have a do-over.  We are going to plan a trip to Gulf Shores, but this one will be different.  I am now a healthier weight, but even more important, I am now a healthier soul.

We never know what life holds for us, do we?  But there is one thing I know.  It surely is a whole lot easier to travel the road with good friends by your side.

Romans 12:15 (New Living Translation)

Be happy with those who are happy, and weep with those who weep.

I am so thankful for my friends who can not only be happy with me, but are willing to weep with me as well.  2010 was a year of much weeping with friends.  I am looking forward to 2011 and much laughter together!

I Want a REFUND!

I refuse to go to stores the day after Christmas.  If I have something to return, I surely hope it doesn't have to be returned within the week after Christmas.  I am out of luck if it does.  I will not go stand in line for two hours to exchange a sweater.  Most of the times, I will just deal with it.  However, occasionally, you get a gift that is so unsuitable that you are willing to wait all day and all night if you have to in order to return this ridiculous gift.  

This year I was given the gift of divorce, and I can assure you, I could have lived without it!  First of all, I made a list of what I wanted. I know for a fact that divorce was nowhere on that list.  I just hate it when you tell someone exactly what you want, and then they give you something that you never even mentioned.  Furthermore, on numerous occasions I had specifically said that I had no desire to ever own this particular gift.  But the items on my list were overlooked, and I was given a nicely packed divorce.  

This gift does not even come close to fitting me.  I am a forty-two year old mother of two teenage girls.  I am supposed to be guiding them through the windy roads of dating, not dealing with these roads myself.  Now if I could go back as a teenager and date, I would have this thing figured out.  I would be a pro.  But dating at my age is complicated, to say the least.  You see, as a teenager you just pick out a cute outfit and a matching purse, and you are good to go!  As an adult you pick out the perfect outfit, but then you have to make three trips to the car to carry all the baggage that has to go with you.  Once you lug it all out, you find that it barely fits because their baggage already fills up half the car.

In addition to the gift being something I didn't ask for and not my fit, it was very expensive.  Now while one would usually welcome a costly gift, I just couldn't appreciate it.  I don't mean to be ungrateful, I just would have preferred something like a car or maybe a dream vacation.      

Well, I wanted to return this gift.  I was even willing to fight in the long lines and deal with nasty, disgruntled employees.  I spent a great deal of time waiting just to find out that this gift could not be returned.  It was mine to keep, like it or not.  I argued and even made a little scene, to no avail.  I was stuck with it.  I was forced to keep it and just begin the process of stretching it here and there and making it fit.

I was leaving the store, and I noticed a book, How to Sleep Alone in a King-Size Bed.  I resignedly purchased the book.  If I am going to be stuck with this gift that I don't want, I may as well try to understand how to get the very best use out of it.  Slowly but surely, I am working with the gift and making it fit.  Since it is mine to keep, I may as well do the best I can with it.  While it still doesn't look great on me, I am beginning to make it work.  I just hope that I am not stuck with it forever.  I certainly don't want to give it to anyone else.  Trust me, this gift will not be regifted, but I would be more than happy to retire it at some point later on in my life!

John 16:33 (New Living Translation)
I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world.”

New traditions are the new traditions!

I have made it through another first.  I spent Christmas Day as a divorced woman without the traditional family that I had been a part of for twenty-one years.  There were many phone calls and texts checking on me to see if I was okay. I am so thankful for all these good friends. Amazingly, I was okay. I can attribute that primarily to the grace of God. If someone had told me back in the spring that not only would I make it through Christmas, but I would have an enjoyable day, I would never have believed him.  That, my friends, is God's beautiful redemption at its best!

I spent the day with a very good friend.  (I might add that he has a few kingly qualities about him.)  We enjoyed a wonderful Christmas dinner with very dear friends of his whom I had never met.  They graciously invited me into their home and made me feel like a part of their family.  I think that doing something completely new and different was a great source of comfort during what could have been  a difficult time. 

I love traditions.  There are some that we made this year that I hope we always keep.  I always get my girls a stocking and Christmas pajamas.  This year, they also got me a stocking and Christmas pajamas.  What a fun tradition.  I hope they will continue that.  (I am not above using the blog to drop a few hints.)

As much as I love traditions, when you go through a dark valley and lose someone in your life, new traditions can be a very helpful and healing way to deal with that loss.  So I started thinking that maybe my new tradition should be making new traditions every year.  Even if you haven't lost someone, it is a great way to make meaningful memories.  That was my experience this year.  I enjoyed a great day with a very dear person and made new friends.

I love to look through greeting cards.  I can spend hours reading them.  Recently, I picked one up that said, "Don't let yesterday use up too much of today."  I liked that.  I could have done that on Christmas Day.  The day could have been spent focusing on what was and will never be.  But that is not healthy.  That is allowing yesterday to use up today and keep me from enjoying the wonderful experiences that God has to offer.

I was told by many people who have been through losses, whether death or divorce, that the first Christmas is the hardest.  They will only get better.  Well, in spite of everything that has happened in my life this year, I still had an enjoyable Christmas.  If they are only going to get better, then I have much to look forward to!

I ended the evening with my girls and my family in Echo.  There was much laughter, and a good time was had by all.  It was different, yes.  But it was okay and at the end of the day, I realized that I am okay as well.

Allow me to end with one more quote.  "Life may not be the party we hoped for, but while we are here, we may as well dance."  It wasn't the Christmas that I would have ever hoped for in my past life, but dance I did, and it was a wonderful day.

Isaiah 26:3-4
People with their minds set on you,
you keep completely whole,
Steady on their feet,
because they keep at it and don't quit.
Depend on God and keep at it
because in the Lord God you have a sure thing.

The Longest Night of the Year

Tonight is the longest night of the year.  As I reflect, I think about the darkness that has come into my life this year.  We have lost a lot.  There is no doubt about that.  First and foremost, we are no longer the traditional family that God intended for us to be.  My Anna will not be able to get up on Christmas morning and run into the master bedroom and wake mom and dad up so that they can open presents. They celebrated with me tonight and will celebrate with my extended family Christmas night.  They will celebrate on Christmas Eve and Christmas morning with their dad.  That is a great loss for all of us.  I have had and continue to have major financial setbacks.  According to a Harvard University study, divorce is the fourth leading cause of bankruptcies.  When you divorce, you spend thousands of dollars just on lawyer fees.  Then you have the same pool of money that is now supporting two households.  I have been very blessed.  God has provided, and I have used good money management skills.  However, it has not been easy and will get more difficult as I am about to send one away to college.

But I look at it like this.  The bad news is that tonight is the longest night of the year.  We will experience more darkness than any other day in the year.  The good news is that tonight is the longest night of the year.  Starting tomorrow, we will experience more daylight than darkness.

In the same way, I have gone through my longest night.  Yes, I have experienced great loss.  But the longest night has passed, and now there is more daylight than dark.  I have gained so much through enduring the darkness. Like every parent, I knew my girls were wonderful and amazing.  However, I now have newfound respect and admiration for these two precious daughters.  This divorce has woven a unique bond among the three of us that nothing will ever break.  Tonight, they gave me a stocking that they had carefully put together.  They surprised me with a gift card to one of my favorite stores.  Also stuffed in the stocking were four of my very favorite kinds of candy.  It was not an expensive gift, but it was a great treasure to me.  They found just exactly what they knew I would love.  You cannot put a price tag on that.

I have also been given the gift of friendship through the dark times.  I have always known that I had friends, but I now know the depth of their love for me.  I would not fully understand and comprehend that great love and dedication of others had I not gone through this past year.

I have received the gift of laughter and happiness.  Someone once said you don't appreciate your health until you don't have it.  In the same way, you cannot truly appreciate being able to laugh until you have walked through the valley and not been able to muster up even a chuckle at the most hilarious moments.  But when the day came that I could laugh again, it was a wonderful day.  Over Thanksgiving, my dad told us a story.  He said that he missed my mom.  She went to the back of the house and never came back.  He finally went back to look for her and found her asleep on the toilet. My daddy, in his very country accent, said, "I had to wake ya mama up while she was sittin' on the toilet sound asleep." I laughed until there were tears running down my cheeks.  Oh, I do hope my mother is not going to be angry with me for telling this.  If she is, maybe she will forgive me because it was a defining moment for me when I knew that I could experience the wonderful joy of a delicious laugh.

Finally, I have discovered an inner strength that I never knew existed.  I found something within myself that helped me drag myself out of the bed, go to work, and face another day.  Every day that I did that, that inner strength grew stronger.  I know without a doubt that it came from God at work inside me. There were times when I could not even pray, but I knew in my heart that He was with me, and He was giving me what I needed to get through the next day, or sometimes just the next hour.

Last January, I experienced a very long night.  That night continued to grow longer and longer. Eventually, there was little or no daylight left in my life.  Yet by persevering through the night, I gained much.  Now the longest night has passed.  Thanks be to God, my family, and my friends, daylight has come, and with it arrives a new day.

Psalm 30:5b (King James Version)
Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.

I also love the Message paraphrase:
The nights of crying your eyes out give way to days of laughter.

Amen!

New Normal....New Traditions

"I am thinking about you this Christmas.  I know it is going to be a difficult time for you."  I have heard many such comments over the last few weeks.  I am so blessed to have people in my life who love me dearly.  I know that they mean it with all their heart, and they want to share my pain.  However, I am really doing okay.

Early on, a dear friend who had been through a similar journey explained the concept of a "new normal" to me.  Basically, nothing will ever be the same.  As soon as you can accept that and start establishing a new normal in your life, the better off you will be.  I fought that for months.  I loved my old normal.  I can remember that I would sit in front of the computer and just look at old pictures of our family that no longer existed. The last thing on earth that I wanted was a new normal.  As long as I fought that, I could not move on.  It was like I was stuck in quicksand.  I wasn't dying.  I had a rope tied around me, and it was safely secured to a tree.  But I could not go anywhere.  Going backwards wasn't an option because that life was no more.  Going forward wasn't an option, because I could not let go of the past.

I don't know how it happened, but one day I broke free from that land of limbo.  I think if I could sum up how I pulled out, it would be three simple things:  faith, family, and friends.  Simple, yet profound.  First of all, I have my faith.  I have a Bible full of promises that He gave to me.  Then I have family and friends that grabbed hold of that rope and pulled with all their might.  Finally, when I got to the edge of the pool of sand, I had to walk out.  I had to make a conscious decision to put the past behind and move forward in this new life full of new normals.  It did not happen overnight.  It took months.  And, of course, God continues to work and mold me every single day to fit into this new life.  But I am no longer stuck.  I am moving forward.

So what does that mean this Christmas Season?  With my new normal, there will be new traditions.  Some of the traditions are the same, just with a little twist.  Christmas Eve will come for me and the girls on December 20.  They will get their "Christmas Pajamas" that they have gotten every Christmas Eve since they were born.  But then on December 21, I will kiss them goodbye as they leave for their grandparents.  I will not see them again until Christmas night.  Do not be sad for me.  I am okay.  I am actually looking forward to some time alone.  I am surrounded by people and teenagers almost every day of my life.  So my new normal before Christmas is going to include quiet time for me.  That is a good thing.  I have so many friends.  If I get lonely, I can always go spend time with some of them.

I will go to my family in Alabama on Christmas afternoon.  The quiet will be over at that point.  The girls will come storming in to my parents' house along with my other six nieces and nephews ranging, in age from twelve to twenty-four.  It will be loud.  We will play games.  We will sing.  We will celebrate.  We will enjoy one another.

Christmas morning will be very different, as I will not be with my wonderful and amazing girls.  They are very concerned about me, but I have finally assured them that I am okay.  Last night I was at a Christmas party.  We had so much fun.  I wore an elf costume to the party.  The girls couldn't believe it.  Lily looked at me and said, "You know, normal people would wear Christmasy sweaters and jeans to a Christmas party."  But this is my "new normal," and if I want to dress like an elf for the party, well then, I am going to dress like an elf!  The party was a success.  We laughed and enjoyed each others company immensely.  My friend's husband looked at me at one point and said, "It seems like you are really content with Amy these days."  I think that sums it up.  I am content, and I am beginning to enjoy this new normal that life has brought my way.  It surely isn't where I wanted to be, but it is where I am.  So I am going to hang on and enjoy this ride and live life to the fullest every minute of every day.  And, yes, sometimes living life to the fullest means slowing down and enjoying some quiet time.

It is fitting that as I finish this blog, I am at my friends' home, the Shirers. Christmas carols are playing in the house as I watch Lily and Mrs. Leigh make cookies. It is much different from Christmases past when I was running from one party to another.  Actually, I like this better.  Enjoying quiet nights with good friends is the way Christmas should be celebrated. Yes, this new normal is a good thing.

Isaiah 43:17-19
This is what the Lord says:

Forget what happened in the past,
and do not dwell on events from long ago.
I am going to do something new.
It is already happening. Don’t you recognize it?
I will clear a way in the desert.
I will make rivers on dry land.

Once Upon a Time...

Once upon a time there was a kind, dashing young king. Okay, maybe the king was more middle aged, but he was kind and extremely dashing. Early on in his reign, the king had a kingdom that he loved and cherished so very much. One day, an evil dragon came and destroyed the kingdom. The king was devastated. He moved far, far away and built a new kingdom. He surrounded it with walls off the strongest black and gold materials known to man. Then he built a moat around the kingdom. He filled the moat with dangerous alligators, which occasionally he would hunt when the population grew out of control. Yes, the king spared no expense in securing this new kingdom. He was going to make sure to keep this kingdom intact.  There was only one lonely drawbridge with which one could gain entrance to the kingdom.

The king would go out and visit with the townspeople, but it was only on the rarest of occasions that the king would lower the drawbridge and let someone in. He was determined to protect the new kingdom at all cost.

One day when the king went out to visit the townspeople, he ran into a fair, young maiden. Okay, so she wasn't so young either. She, as well, was more middle aged. And she wasn't exactly a maiden as she had been married to her own king, but fair young maiden sounds so much better than middle aged divorcee.  (This is my fairy tale after all, and I choose to call her a maiden.)  The maiden had also experienced great loss in her life. She too had encountered dragons that had destroyed her kingdom.  She thought her life would never be the same again.  She was surviving the loss and was surrounded by many wonderful friends, yet deep down inside, she battled new dragons in her life of insecurity and fear.  She always felt that if she had been a better queen, she would not have lost the battle and her kingdom.

The new king took an interest in her. To her wonderful surprise, she felt things for the him that she had thought she would never feel again. She felt alive again for the first time in months. However, she began to get frightened. When she lost her first king, the battle was long, and it almost destroyed her. She began to worry. What if she falls for this new king, and she is not enough for his kingdom either? Could she bear that heartache again? No, she could not take that chance. The king had just begun to lower the drawbridge ever so slightly to let her in.  But one fateful night, she met the king and told him that she just could not take the chance of even the possibility of finding another kingdom to call her own, only to lose it.  So she ran away, and the king ever so quickly pulled the drawbridge closed.  He placed an extra lock on it to make sure that it was secure.

The maiden was very sad and distraught.  She had really enjoyed her time with the new king.  She wondered if she had made the right decision.  She finally went and spent a great deal of time with the Emperor of all the kingdoms.  He was a very kind Emperor who loved all the kings and queens with all His heart.  He gave them everything they needed to live a complete and satisfied life.  The Emperor took her in and showered her with His Fatherly love and affection.  He reminded her of her worth in Him.  He also talked with her for hours on end about trusting again.  She was so afraid of opening up her heart to that.  He assured her that if she would follow His guidance that she could learn to trust again.  It didn't mean that she would never be hurt again.  He wisely told her that any time we open up our heart to another, we risk being hurt.  But He assured her that He would always be with her.  And, He also affirmed that the new king was a really good man who had always been a faithful and devoted king for the Emperor.  She realized then that she had made a mistake in running away from the new king.  She wondered if he could ever consider lowering his drawbridge again.  She surely hoped he would.

She went back to see the new king.  When she returned to meet the king, she was like a different person.  The Emperor had killed her dragons of insecurity and fear.  The king met her in town.  He certainly wasn't going to invite her into the kingdom at this point.  The kingdom must be protected at all cost.  She explained her fears and concerns to him.  At first, he refused to even consider allowing her entrance to the kingdom.  She went away sadly but continued to talk with the Emperor.  The king was consulting the Emperor as well. In time, the king began to open up ever so slightly to the maiden.  The drawbridge is still closed, but he has taken the lock off.

The maiden is patient.  She is not in any rush to establish a new kingdom.  She is enjoying her life and all the townspeople that the Emperor has brought into it.  She will wait in hope that the king will lower the bridge and once again allow her entrance into his kingdom.  She simply wants to spend time getting to know the kingdom and enjoying the company of the dear king.  She doesn't know if she would eventually be a part of the kingdom or if she is just there for a season.  Only the Emperor knows that, and she trusts Him with all her heart.  What she does know is that while walking away from the kingdom was a mistake, much good did come from the circumstances.  When she returned from her time with the Emperor, she was bold and confident.  The Emperor had helped her slay a few dragons, and she knew that the next time one tried to attack, she was prepared with the finest armor and would be ready for the battle.

How does this fairy tale end?  The maiden does not know.  The king is thinking about lowering the bridge.  She hopes he will.  You see, she is not above swimming with the alligators to cross the moat.  Yes, it is dangerous, but after battling the dragons, swimming with a few gators would be like a walk in the grassy meadow of fairy tale land.  This king is worth fighting for, and the young maiden is ready and willing to fight.

To be continued...hopefully!

If the Lord Reminds You....

Me and my precious Elizabeth.
I still miss her terribly!

When I was twenty-six years old and a new mother with two babies, I developed an amazing friend.  Her name was Elizabeth.  She was sixty-eight when we started pastoring a little church in Seale, Alabama.  The girls and I lived in the parsonage there.  Their dad traveled every week to Atlanta to seminary.  Elizabeth took me under her wing, just like she had done with so many before me.  She left imprints on my heart that will be there forever.  Truly, she made me a better person.  I could write an entire blog about the lessons I learned from her. From her I learned many of the wonderful dishes that I now cook.  She taught what a good price was for different meats. She helped define my parenting skills.  However, the one thing that I never could master was her yeast rolls.  If you wanted just a little taste of what heaven must be like, all you had to do tear one of those rolls apart just when it came out of the oven, slap some butter on it, and watch it cascade down the side of the roll.  Nothing was left to do at that point but enjoy!

Of all the things Elizabeth taught me, there is no doubt that her lessons in living a life of faith had the greatest impact on me.  I can close my eyes, and in my mind I can still hear her voice as she imparted great words of Godly wisdom.  Whenever she would ask me to pray about something or someone, she would always preface it with, "Amy, if the Lord reminds you, would you please pray for..."  I often wondered why she said that.  Maybe this is the reason. If we are all truthful with ourselves, we know that many times we tell people that we will pray for something or someone, only to forget about it thirty minutes after they have asked us.  We get busy with our day.  We didn't write it down, and we simply forget.  It is not intentional.  We wanted to pray for them.  I think Elizabeth knew this.  Here is something interesting.  Rarely did I forget to pray for the things for which she asked me to pray.  Maybe just hearing that one comment jarred something within me.  Maybe, subconsciously, it made me think about what I was thinking about throughout the day, rather than just getting caught up in the busyness of life.

Saying all of that, I would like to ask anyone reading this today, "If the Lord reminds you, please pray for my friend, Karen Boyd."  She will be going to MD Anderson in Texas for a consultation.  Cancer has taken over her body.  There is an experimental treatment in which she could possibly take part.  They will be discussing that with the doctors today.  I would ask you to please pray first and foremost for a healing in her body.  Secondly, pray for wisdom for Karen, her family, and the doctors as they discuss treatments today.  She has precious young grandchildren, and she wants as much time with them as she can possibly get.  However, she wants to have quality time with them.  There are just so many decisions facing them.  My heart is very heavy for the entire family.  So I am asking the Lord to please remind you so that you can lift this family up to Him in your prayers today.

At the same time, let it be a reminder to all of us to cherish every single moment that we have with our loved ones this Christmas.  Never take a second for granted.  There is fairly new song out called Blink.  Take time to listen to this song, and let it remind all of us to slow down and love each other this Christmas season.

Facebook Etiquette for Old People

I overheard a comment the other day by a young college student. "These old people on Facebook are getting out of hand.  My widowed grandmother just updated her status to "in a relationship."  If that wasn't enough, her seventy-five year old best friend commented, "You go, girl!"  Now that just ain't right!"

Yes, it does appear that Facebook has been taken over by the "olds."  That is the nickname that my girls and many of their friends give us.  Who are the "olds"?  Well, it depends.  Basically, they are people on Facebook over the age of thirty.  Now there are a few exceptions.  My girls don't consider my friend Blair, who is thirty-three, an "old" because she is cute and stylish and fun.  They don't consider my friend Bobbie an "old" even though she is fifty-two.  You see, Mrs. Bobbie carries a concealed weapon, and she is not afraid to use it!  That makes her cool in my girls' eyes.

Now there are certain things that we "olds" do that irritate the younger generation to no end.  We don't have simple status updates like they do.  We post quotes and inspirational thoughts.  And if that isn't enough, we feel compelled to let everyone know about all the latest accomplishments of our children, what we had for breakfast, lunch and dinner yesterday, how we feel about our significant other at the time, how our day is going, and all that is just our morning status.  I read a status last week that said:  "Who needs memoirs these days when we have Facebook!" 

Well, all of us "olds" need to remember that the young ones owned Facebook first.  Originally, one had to have a college e-mail just to get an account.  So, if we are going to invade their turf, we need to abide by certain Facebook etiquette rules. 

1.  Let them request you as a friend.  If they do, consider yourself blessed.  You know they really want you around.
2.  If you do feel compelled to request them, don't get your feelings hurt if they don't accept your request. They are not being mean; they just don't necessarily want the whole world knowing that you changed their diaper when they were little.
3.   If they do accept you, chances are, they just did it out of politeness, or they had a mother like me saying, "You better accept that nice lady.  She changed your diaper when you were little."  Once they accept you, they will probably hide you so that you don't show up on their newsfeed.  That would not be cool.
4.  Speak when spoken to.  Okay, here is the deal.  If a group of teenagers are standing around talking, we wouldn't just go up and jump right into the middle of their conversation.  So we must refrain from commenting on their status, unless we are able to come up with something incredibly witty that makes them look good.  Let's face it.  Most of us "olds" just don't have the wit to pull that off., which leads into number five.
5.  Understand your "cool" factor.  Now most of my students think I am pretty cool most of the time.  They are okay with my commenting on their statuses.  Sometimes they will even post pictures of us together on their Facebook.  However, if my "cool factor" with my students is about a six, then it would be a negative five with my daughters.  I get that.  I am not cool to them at all; therefore, it must be a matter of life or death for me to comment on their status.  Chances are, within forty-five seconds of my commenting, they will delete it.
6.  Finally, go easy with the acronyms.  They don't like to see "LOL" overused.  However, they are just fine using acronyms with expletives!  I actually have my own Facebook etiquette for my students.  If you post on my page, you better keep it clean!

These are just a few violations that I have come to understand.  I will admit that I am guilty.  I have committed such heinous acts at least once or twice in my Facebook endeavors.  Thankfully, I have two amazing, sensitive and understanding girls that are quick to put me in my place.  Truthfully, they don't think they are being mean, they are just sparing me from embarrassing myself by appearing to be an obnoxious "old."

In all sincerity, I do enjoy Facebook.  It has been a wonderful way to connect with others in my life.  I have reconnected with friends from the past, and they have been such a source of encouragement to me over the past year.  In addition, I do enjoy the fact that it is a way for me to express my faith to the 700+ friends on my account.  Many of those friends are of the younger generation.  I have always had such a passion in my life for youth.  One of my greatest joys in life has been watching preteens grow into amazing young men and women of the faith.   If I can use Facebook as a method of sharing my faith with them, then it is a good thing.  So I will abide by their silly rules and play the game their way (with the exception of those foul-lettered acronyms.)  If it allows me a small corner in their world where I can be an example of the faith, it is worth it.

1 Corinthians 9:19-23 (The Message)

Even though I am free of the demands and expectations of everyone, I have voluntarily become a servant to any and all in order to reach a wide range of people: religious, nonreligious, meticulous moralists, loose-living immoralists, the defeated, the demoralized—whoever. I didn't take on their way of life. I kept my bearings in Christ—but I entered their world and tried to experience things from their point of view. I've become just about every sort of servant there is in my attempts to lead those I meet into a God-saved life. I did all this because of the Message. I didn't just want to talk about it; I wanted to be in on it!

Let's Make a Deal

Mrs. Bradley and her two sons

I visited with my dear neighbors yesterday.  Lamar lost his mother unexpectedly two weeks ago.  She was 81 and had a wonderful life, yet it still happened too soon.  We are never really ready to lose someone that we love.  I listened to Lamar talk about his mother.  She was an amazing woman who raised two remarkable men on her own.  As he stood there with pride and tears in his eyes, I was reminded of a comment C.S. Lewis made following the death of his wife, Joy. “The pain I feel now is the happiness I had before. That's the deal.”

If you want to watch a true love story, watch the movie Shadowlands.  It tells the story of Lewis' marriage to Joy Gresham.  It started out as a platonic relationship, but over time the relationship developed into a deep, committed love. The movie portrayed Lewis as guarding his heart ever so closely because he did not want to experience the pain one day that love can bring.   However, there was no barrier strong enough to protect his heart from the love that he was to experience with her.  Honestly, who would want to border up their heart in such a manner?  Lewis obviously realized this when he said, “To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket - safe, dark, motionless, airless - it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.”

Lamar and his beautiful mother.

I have thought about this statement a lot.  When we love someone, there is a chance that we will end up with a broken heart. Hopefully, we will all find a love that is true, perfect and complete.  But, even then, are we protected from pain?  No.  Death will come one day to us all.  And like Lewis and my friend Lamar, we may one day have to stand by the casket and say goodbye to that someone whom we loved ever so dearly.

If we don't open our hearts to love others, we will not be hurt.  No one would argue with that.  But is sacrificing the happiness that loving others can bring worth the emptiness of an unbreakable, impenetrable and irredeemable heart?  I don't believe that it is, not for one minute.

I have a whole lot of love in my heart.  I plan to pour it out on others.  I will love my family and my friends deeply. One day I will lose some of them. And one day I will leave some of them when I leave this earth.  That will hurt.  I also hope one day to take the chance of pouring out the love in my heart to another man who will be my partner and soul mate.  Will I get hurt along the way?  Possibly.  But the alternative is locking my heart away in that casket to watch it shrivel up to nothing.  That is not the life for me.

So here is the deal, my friends.  We can love deeply and experience all the happiness that comes along with it.  One day that love may bring us pain when we experience loss.  That is just the way that it works.  In spite of that, it's a deal I am willing to take.

1 Corinthians 13:1-3
If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing.

From the Ferris Wheel to the Zipper

I love the fair. We anxiously wait for it to come around each year. My favorite ride is the ferris wheel. It is a nice slow ride. When you get to the top, you have the picturesque view of the entire fair. I see people riding the zipper. They are screaming and squealing at the top of their lungs. I am so glad that is not me.

My life was somewhat like riding that Ferris Wheel. It was pleasant and enjoyable as I cuddled in my seat of life with my partner while my legs dangled, happily swinging back and forth. I watched other people screaming wildly as they rode the zipper. I did not envy them one bit. Granted, at times they looked like they were having fun, but they also looked scared half to death, and some were getting sick. Nope, that life was not for me. I was happy on my ferris wheel, and that was where I chose to stay.

To my great chagrin, my ride on the ferris wheel came to a sudden and complete stop when my partner wanted off. I was sailing over the top when it jerked to a halt. "What in the world was happening?" My cart rolled to the bottom, and I had to step out of my comfortable seat. I did not get off without a fight. I kicked and screamed with all my might. Nonetheless, the attendant took my hand and gently led me away as I watched my partner go in another direction.

He led me to the zipper. I stood in front of it, frozen in fear. I am terrified of the zipper. My heart is pounding wildly. There is no part of me that wants to get on this ride. What if I get sick? What if I cry? The attendant smiled kindly and said, "You will be just fine. I am buckling you in tightly. I will be in charge of the controls. I know you are afraid, but if you will just relax and trust me, you will have the time of your life."

This is the story of that new, crazy ride.

Hebrews 12:1-2
A huge cloud of witnesses is all around us. So let us throw off everything that stands in our way. Let us throw off any sin that holds on to us so tightly. Let us keep on running the race marked out for us. Let us keep looking to Jesus. He is the author of faith. He also makes it perfect.