Tag: contentment

This Is The Week

This is the week.

This is the week I’m going to write more.

This is the week I’m going to have brilliant insights.

This is the week I’m going to take better care of myself and those around me.

…the week I’m going to be more intentional about the words of Jesus.

…more intentional about parenting.

…about a child with special needs.

…about my neighbors.

…my friends.

…my spouse.

This is the week.

This is the week that nobody is going to get sick.

This is the week that all the meals will be beautifully home-cooked – even the last minute ones.

This is the week that I’m not going to raise my voice.

…that nobody is going to cry.

…that life isn’t going to seem like such a struggle.

…that the joy will outweigh the hurt.

…the pain.

…the terminal.

…the endlessness of it all.

This is the week.

This is the week I’m going to solve things.

This is the week I’m going to be ahead of the ball.

This is the week I’m going to spin all the plates.

…I’m going to make it look easy.

…find my groove.

…get it right.

This is the week.

This is the real week.

In this real week, I can’t find words that I haven’t already said.

In this real week, I don’t want to write about all the silly frustrations that hamper and shame.

In this real week, I’ve already given up on self-care before I started because there’s just too much to do.

…I already plugged a fiction book into my headphones; reaching directly over my untouched bible to push “play” on my phone.

…And then I yelled at my kids to be quiet.

…especially the kid who can’t hardly control his volume.

…while I closed the blinds to the neighborhood.

…and let resentment fester that work was keeping my husband out of the house and away from the family again.

This is the real week.

The reservoirs of joy, thankfulness, and intentional living are on empty…or beyond empty (if there is such a concept).

This week is dead on arrival and it isn’t even here yet.

Call the code. Throw in the towel. But wait…

There may still be a week.

There may still be a week because it isn’t about me anyway.

There may still be a week because my story is not really my own.

There may still be a week because any good thought I have is a God gift.

There may still be a week because I can ask for wisdom and it is promised to me.

…because I have a merciful high priest in Jesus.

…because the mercy is new every morning.

…because my life is atypical for a glory reason I don’t yet see.

…because I plan things and then Jesus directs it all.

…because while I have breath, I can still surrender.

…my family, my neighbors, my friends, my spouse.

…the pain, the terminal, the endlessness of it all.

This is the week.

This is the week formed by Perfect Love – just like the last week and the one that comes next too.

This is the week with glory purposes that have yet to unfold.

This is the week that dawns moment by moment in grace.

This is the week…

…the day.

…the moment.

…the breath.

…that the Lord has made.

Rejoice.

The story is bigger than the week.

~MbM~

Where Missions And Cancer Meet

“This was one of the first times I made a conscious decision, in the midst of a very difficult situation, to say yes immediately to God’s ways and trust his promise to keep me under his wings.” ~ Connie Patty, on unexpected, frightening hospital days spent awaiting the birth of her first child, July, 1990

Dear Ones,

Today, I want to encourage you with a book: No Less Than Yes.

It is Connie’s firsthand account of her calling to missions in Eastern Europe and her life there with her husband, Dave and their three children. The entire piece is woven together with breath-taking, amazing stories, as only Connie can. Warning: carve out some time, because you’ll not be able to stop turning pages.

But why share a missionary’s story (as lovely as it is) for encouragement on a cancer-dominated blog?

  • This story is unique because unlike many missionary stories (recorded posthumously), this is LIVE! It’s happening right NOW! The book is a spectacular glimpse into a living, working, miraculous God even in the mess of our current age.
  • The heart of this story is one of learning love for and obedience to God in hard things – accepting that He is good no matter what occurs. Um, sound familiar, my cancer friends?
  • And finally, you’ll be able to relate as Connie has had her share of health trials – both as an individual and as mother. Her open heart throughout the book will bless you. She unfailing chronicles not only the hospital journeys (yes, there are more than one), but also the struggles. She doesn’t shy away from being truthful when it hurts to trust God.

As you read her words, you will be encouraged to persevere in the journey God has for you. So, I’d urge you to pick up a copy of this book today.

Moment by moment,

Ellie

You can find No Less Than Yes on Amazon HERE.

For more on Dave and Connie’s work in Eastern Europe, visit the Josiah Venture website HERE.

The Gift of Godly Contentment

The vase crashed to the floor, shattering the fragile glass. Water and greens tumbling off the wooden table and onto the freshly cleaned carpet as the rolling, tussling boys reversed direction, their war cries drowning out any attempts to arrest their attention.

And the irony was this: as my blood pressure escalated with their fight, I wanted to laugh because I was supposed to be writing about godly contentment.

“Jesus… What am I doing?”

Hannah and Chase

How do I possibly write about something that seems to be disappearing even as I reach for it? No, not even reach…just consider it. The more I tried to put trust in God and the contentment He brings, the more I tried to put that down on a glowing computer screen, the more it seemed to allude me.

And then short days later, we were driving through the dark hills of Pennsylvania with the DVD player blaring Holiday Inn and the unpolished, unfinished words had yet to be fully written and that’s when the panic set in.

“Jesus… What am I doing?”

Karsten and Benjamin
25-year-long friends

And then it was suddenly the morning of getting up and saying all the words – speaking them to people who needed to hear. How do you give help and answers when you’re the weak one?

“Jesus… What am I doing?”

And then the answer; quiet and true. I’m doing nothing. I open my mouth, but it’s up to Jesus to open ears and hearts. And isn’t that just like Jesus…like his written promises stuffed throughout the Bible?

Strength when you need it.

Strength only and best when you recognize your weakness.

Strength to your own heart when you try to help others – so much blessing in service.

It was in laying down the stress of finding the right words, laying down the pressure to be the right person, that God made it right – made it light.

God uses the broken. 

Moment by moment.

It’s far easier to practice contentment if I don’t think about any of it, but that isn’t true peace. At times, it’s almost easier to accept that parts of our stories are random than that the painful chapters could actually hold great beauty and purpose. Don’t be afraid to lean into Him for the hope he’s promised. ~ a brief quote from my time with the ladies of Bethel Baptist Church in Wilmington, Delaware

For the full transcript of the December 3rd Christmas tea talk: “The Gift Of Godly Contentment” (wherein I share what it has looked like to wait for God in our silent and desolate times) – click here.

 

Burn It

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On a recent family walk, we noticed an area around the pond by our house where a controlled burn was taking place. Of course, being close to a fire was thrilling to the boys, but as I watched the gray-blue smoke rise into the sky and its sweet and sharp scent reached my nose, I was drawn into the scene as a good metaphor for my life.

The careful watchers along the edge of the burn area, they burned because there was too much unnecessary and it needed to be weeded out and swept away in order for the area to flourish. I want to be careful in this because I’m probably the least likely person to have a green thumb, but I started thinking about how this plays out. To me, proliferation equals productivity and even excellence. But as a favorite old movie quote of mine goes:

“Sometimes more isn’t better. Sometimes it’s just more.”

And it takes things like ER visits and eye surgeries to burn off all the things I want to hold on to, the things I think make me look better – the things that will only hurt me in the end and keep me from growing deep and healthy. The refining was never promised as a painless process, but it has been and always will be worth it.

So, nothing of great length or depth on this Spring morning… just the simple challenge from my own heart to yours:

What do I need to get rid of today?

What do I need to joyfully say “Burn it!” to in order to thrive?

Moment by moment.

“When you walk through the fire of oppression, you will not be burned up; the flames will not consume you. For I am the Lord, your God…” Isaiah 43:2-3

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Walking Through The Door That’s Been Opened

“On my way to ER. Stopped at cross street for her ambulance…”

The sound of my father’s heart breaking through the text was almost palpable. 

Back in the middle of the day, before my mom’s heart started beating like it wanted to come out of her chest, I glanced at the clock on the dust-marked dashboard of the van and saw I was late…again.

Chase had been able to go back to school a few days after the eye surgery. However, there could be no recess, no gym, and I had to come to the school and do his eye drops every day as the duration of the week required medicine to be administered every four hours.

As I headed into the left turn and the familiar road across town to his school, I felt the grumble rising in my heart. I’d had to stop what I was doing and negotiate a stubborn four-year-old into the van at his lunch time just to go cajole the bald, six-year-old patient into letting me do eye drops…again. 

And then I started thinking about how most days, the hardest part of having a child like Chase post-treatment isn’t the threat of relapse. It’s the day-to-day giving of my time in extraordinary amounts. That would make a good blog post… I thought; Ten Things I Wish You Understood About Life With A Special Child…yes. It’d be trending-ly epic.

I know the dislike of sacrifice sounds a little crazy because as parents, as lovers of Jesus, and as human beings, we are constantly called to lay ourselves out for those around us in extraordinary and unusual ways, but wow, I fight it when it comes to Chase at times and I know it often boils down to secret, shameful, comparison. I look at other families around me and what they’re doing with their four kids or their six-year-olds and I suddenly chafe at my life and my “normal”.

I continued to fight and struggle through the day, mentally laying an inordinate amount of blame on the mid-day eye drops that had seriously taken less than 30 minutes of my time. But of course, I didn’t feel like being serious or literal. I felt like being sorry for myself and how hard things are when life gets interrupted by the constant call of the unusual.

Somehow, the day passed. After hearing about school, administering snacks, shepherding homework, completing another round of eye drops, and having a video conference for the book trailer, I called Bob to tell him my day had gone off the rails and dinner would be super late (again). And just as we were about to head out the door and pick up dollar tacos with friends, the text came from my dad.

The doctors use the words “atrial fibrillation” and then hyphenate it to “A-Fib” and it sounds like a medical drama show, but it really just means that the heart is at war with the body and nobody is quite sure why it starts, but my mom, she lay white as a sheet with her heart rate up at 200, feeling like something wanted to burst out of her chest and finally, when her arms and legs went numb, the ambulance came. In our vapor-short lives, things can change just as fast as a call to emergency response.

And suddenly the eye drops and dollar tacos and all of it disappeared and our kids ended up at another friend’s house so Bob and I could both go to the ER. 

We were given the directions to the room, and as I turned the corner onto the A unit, my own heart nearly exploded out of my chest as I stood in front of the room I had not seen since I irrevocably followed the Lurie transport team out the door with my Chase on Tuesday, July 31st, 2012. The first cancer day.

Feeling physically faint as I had to pass the memory, we entered the sliding glass doors to my mom’s ER bay where my dad, his eyes filled with worry and love, was light-heartedly explaining to the humorless nurse how “You see, when I come into the room, Leslie’s heart goes all aflutter…haha…ha…” My whole life, this has been how he chooses hope and I love him for it.

By the end of the evening, the medicines had done their job, the color was back in her cheeks, and they talked about her “normal sinus rhythms” and used the neon green lines on the monitor as an example of her ability to go sleep in her own bed that night. And she hugged me very close and said “I’m so very glad you came.” 

I carried those words and the joy-feelings of fellowship and prayer around her ER bed with me into the next day of crazy and eye drops and general life and it made me think: My mother’s heart is at war with her body and my life is still getting interrupted by little bodies on the regular, and I may yet write that post about living with special children, but I felt fulfilled despite the piles of undone things standing out in every corner of the house. And it was in this week of eye drops and hospital visits and dollar tacos that never came to be, I realized (again) that what I want for my life and what I need for my life are almost never the same things.

I want stability and normal and quiet days where my average moments could litter a home and garden magazine with their poetic beauty. God knows I need eye drops, special children, ER trips, and facing my hardest memories to keep me real and draw me closer to Him. Sometimes, you just have to walk through the door that’s been opened for you…

Moment by moment.

[Photo credit: Pexels]
[Photo credit: Pexels]

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