Lessons and Reminders

I just finished an allegory, 'Hinds' Feet on High Places', by Hannah Hurnard. I've read a few allegories before, besides 'Pilgrim's Progress', but this struck a stronger chord with me than the others. I took away a lot more from it than I expected.

1. My God is sooo much more merciful than I let Him be  -

I don't mean that I am in the position to 'let' God do or be anything or not do or be anything. I mean that some of my ideas or thoughts regarding Him aren't true, and then those false beliefs keep me from fully experiencing God and all His attributes. Now back to the statement - Seriously, I grind myself to powder when I mess things up, even about the simplest things. I demand a lot higher level of performance than God does of me because I keep demanding perfection of myself. God doesn't demand perfection. He knows my frame. He knows that I am only dust. He knows that I will fail, but He also is willing to forgive me, if only I humble myself before him. Yet, so much of the time, I don't accept His mercy. Long after He would forgive me if only I asked, I keep smearing the same things in my own face.

2. He is so patient with me -

I don't have a courageous heart. Sometimes I pretend I do. Actually, a lot of the time I pretend I do because ever since I was little, it has felt like I was dying inside as I did the simplest, simplest things that everyone else did in a breeze. And when you think you're weak, everything becomes hard. There's so many things that scare me. Some days I'm left with the greatest fear - that fear will keep me from doing the things God has for me. In this allegory, the main character is Much Afraid.

"She did not realize that the Prince of Love is 'of very tender compassion to them that are afraid.' She supposed that, like everybody else, he was despising her for her silly fears."

But that right there. 'Very tender compassion'. I cannot hardly fathom the whole meaning of that, but even in its vague immensity, my heart quakes. He has given me this weakness so that I might turn to Him every passing moment. He does not despise me.

3. It made me realize there is more importance to the whole 'one day you will receive new names and crowns' -

I never really thought much about that part - the crowns and new names. I mean...maybe they spoke of the crowns because of how we then will give them to Jesus. And a new name? I hardly knew what that meant, but in this allegory, the new name part fit. Much Afraid became Grace and Glory. Maybe ours will not be so drastically different, and maybe I still don't understand the 'why', but I know now there is significance. In the story, Much Afraid collected these stones every time she sacrificed her will for God's or did the thing that was most against her nature to follow God's command. When she reached the High Places, the Shepherd took the stones and turned them into jewels that He placed on her crown. Maybe that isn't exactly the purpose of the crown, but it is a beautiful thought.

4. When God looks at me, He already sees who I will eventually be -

In the Bible, it says when God looks at us, He sees what Jesus did, but the idea that He sees us as the individuals we will be in Heaven? It's such an incredibly humbling thought. Sometimes I get all befuddled because of how God is all around time but not confined by it. He knows we are simple humans full of faults, and yet He sees our beauty. He sees our potential as if already reached, but of course He can. After all, He created us.


Other Quotes:

"Always go forward along the path of obedience as far as you know it until I intervene, even if it seems to be leading you where you fear I could never mean you to go."

"Even their wild, mournful cries and the moanings of the water stirred in her a sorrow which was strangely beautiful. She had the feeling that somehow, in the very far-off places, perhaps even in far-off ages, there would be a meaning found to all sorrow and an answer too far and wonderful to be as yet understood."

What books have you read that really struck a chord with you? What do you think of allegories? What do you think of these quotes and ideas?

You saw me,
And that was strange.
You saw me
As I played my part-
A small portion in your pretty life,
In your perfect life,
And yet, I've seen you.
I've watched you silently
From a safe and intimate distance
Of my invisibility.
My hands have lingered
Where your hands have stayed,
And sometimes I see your soul
In the creations you have made.
Our eyes meet,
And I wonder what you see.
Do you look down upon my work
Because I only wipe away
The filth that stays behind
And stains your perfect view?
My work is invisible.
I disappear behind the scenes,
But that doesn't make me less than you -
However humble my job may be.
"Who is she?" You ask,
As I float away.
"Just another part of the whole"
Is the answer you receive.
Do you think the world is yours?
Is that the whole of which you speak?
My life is my own whole,
And you are just a piece.
Your pride must sting a little -
Oh imagine, my life is more than you,
Your money, your house, your time,
But you saw me,
And that was strange.
You saw me, and you asked,
"Is it you who I've heard sing?"

Let Me Tell You A Story...

It began 17 years ago on a warm, July afternoon in a mobile home up a dirt road. There lived a family in that house. A family of seven. Three boys and two girls, all homeschooled, with their mother and father. The youngest was only three and a half, and I remember that the best out of all the children's ages; though the eldest must have been around fourteen or fifteen.

The time was shortly after a lunch - the food being a big pot of spaghetti. The mother had gone to lay down because she didn't feel well. The father was at work. The children were gathered in the living room as they watched Reading Rainbow. There was something funny, but when the children paused it for their mother to come and watch, the mother said she didn't feel well enough. Then she was leaving out the door with their grandma.

From that moment on, nothing made sense. It didn't make sense for nine long months, and even after that, I don't think it made sense until all the children were grown. And by that time, it was hard to comprehend the depths of what happened. Time numbed the urgency. Time numbed the sorrow. Time numbed the loneliness, but time didn't entirely take those feelings away. There was always something in the bottom of the children's hearts when they thought about that July afternoon 17 years ago.

17 years ago on a warm, July afternoon, a church was burning. Most of emergency personnel were downtown at the scene. When the mother called her brother-in-law who worked for the fire department to ask what she should do, he told her to drive to the hospital. It would take too long for an ambulance to get there. It would take too long...

Because the mother was having a heart attack. Not just a light one where you go the hospital. They give you medication. They help you, and then you get to go home to your family soon.

This was the kind where you almost die. Where your heart gives completely out and can't work on its own. Where machines keep you alive as you wait for a completely new heart - somebody else's heart.

This was the kind of heart attack where you almost die again and again. And again. And again. And again. And again. And again. This was the kind of heart attack where you spend nine months away from your family.

The mother was gone. The father was gone, to work and then to the hospital on the weekends.  For the children, it was somebody different or the somebody different but the same every day. People became adopted aunts and uncles and grandparents. It was meals brought by strangers and church family. It was every other weekend over the mountains to the big hospital in the big city where they ate bacon, cheeseburgers in the cafeteria and watched cartoons in the hospital waiting room. Sometimes they'd get brought popsicles. Sometimes they'd get to see their mother. Sometimes they'd get to hug her. Sometimes...

Sometimes they could only look through a window and wave and say 'I love you' in sign language.

But at night, back at home, after the father had sang hymns in the hallway till he hoped they were all asleep, the youngest would cry. She would cry herself to sleep, keeping her two older siblings who shared the same bedroom awake, because she missed her mother so much.

There were comings and goings. There were almosts and not quites. There were Christmas presents from the church. There were people who showed overflowing love. And praying. There was lots and lots and lots of praying. And there were miracles. Miracles like how the local hospital had just trained people to use the machine which saved the mother's life two weeks prior to that July afternoon.

And then there were sad miracles. In early March of 2000, a man who was studying to become a pastor was driving home with his fiancée from college. They were hit by a drunk driver. The fiancée was killed immediately, but the young man lived a couple days in the hospital before he died, but he had chosen to be an organ donor. His heart was the one which perfectly fit what the mother needed.

The heart was Jesus' heart already. And that was a bittersweet thing.

On March 7th, the mother was given a new heart. And every March 7th is a Birthday, of sorts. A celebration of another year of miracles.

I have a vague, 3 and a half year-old's memory of those nine months, but there are still things I remember quite clearly. And since last Tuesday was March 7th, I wanted to write something about it. I wanted to put into writing how broken everything can be without a mother. I wanted to remember how lucky I am to have had a mother these 17 more years because no matter how common transplants might become - they will always be a miracle.


We met the parents of the donor. All seven of us. They love Jesus too.

Stuff (aka, It's Already the Beginning of a New Week, and I Didn't Plan Another Post)

Winter is almost over, or at least that's what I've come to believe. The snow is finally melting in a flood after three consistent months of a white covering (pretty much unheard of here). We have ponds and creeks just about everywhere, and I'm amazed at the system this world has for water supply. It's so simple and yet amazing. It's always amazed me how the snow melts in the mountains, comes down the hillsides and swamps our yard, then just keeps on going. I wonder why there has to be so much water now when I know in the Summer, everything will start turning brown, but that's just the way it is. Sometimes I think this is as close as a person can come to living in the desert without actually living in one.

I'm usually ready for Spring most years, but so far this year hasn't been the same. Usually I'm roaring to get out of the house and back to digging and planting and weeding. Maybe that enthusiasm will come eventually when the last of the snow has finally melted from my garden and the sun is a little warmer. But for right now, the idea exhausts me.

Each year I tell myself that I need to work better on time management. I tell myself that if I get up earlier or do this or that, I'll actually get everything done that I need to do. I tell myself that if I do this or that, I won't have to smack the same question over my head so many times - what is the priority?

But a day only has so many hours in it, and there is no humanly way to get everything done every day; so you have to ask yourself that question: What is the priority? And so much of the time, I don't have the answer. And I start to stress out and panic and get a stomach ache, even though all I can do is tackle the day and pray that God will give me the wisdom needed. That He'll send me in the right direction and bless the fruit of my labor.

And then you just have to trust Him, and that's hard.

Because I always feel like I need to know exactly what I'm doing each and every day, and if I don't accomplish it in so many hours, I just keep going because it has to happen now. Already, on the 5th of March, I have awoken from a hibernation of sorts and started asking: What is the priority? 

How do you figure out your priorities? Any advice for a stressed out me?