Tag: love

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~

Fighting For Love

Yeah, there’s coffee, and laughter in abundance, but there’s something else too. Something that only comes forged in pain. I don’t have a word for it, but it’s there to be cherished – oddly like a terrible battle wound. See this? We went to war and we survived. Isn’t it strange that the hard things often knit us as close (if not closer) than the happy moments? They say that “love changes everything“, but sometimes I think everything changes love: kids, illness, job changes…and often just the weight of years and the passing of time. Love is not a static, stoic concept, but it is deep, and it’s meant to be unshakeable as it mirrors Jesus love for us and in us.

So what happens when things like cancer come at a marriage? In the video below, we take a few minutes to share a little of what we’ve learned and are still learning today.

Because life is messy, love is going to be messy too – that’s the primary reason we sat in front of an iPhone on a Saturday morning with no make-up, no good angles, or fanciness of any kind.

This is us.

We are real.

We fail more times than either of us would like to admit to each other or you, but we will fight for our marriage. We must fight for our marriage.

And please don’t kid yourselves…this isn’t always self-generated or motivated by flowery love, but rather, determined commitment. We had people during Chase’s treatment actually holding us accountable to talking with each other, spending time with each other, even being intimate with each other…because honestly, truly, and messily…if we hadn’t had someone calling us out and reminding us of our marriage, we would have ignored it and ignored us. This is the nature of stress and real life.

The fact that we’re still together is the grace of God, but dear ones, if there’s anything we’ve learned, it’s that you’re going to fall. It’s a foregone conclusion – this is life. But will you fall away from each other, or towards each other?

Fight for each other. Fight to fall into each other’s arms. Things like cancer will seek to take many, many pieces of us, but fight to make sure marriage is not one of those pieces.

With love, messiness, and a deep-rooted longing for Perfect Love…

Moment by moment.

[Disclaimer: After you watch this, you’ll know why I write instead of talking…or why my spiritual gift will never be filming and editing a cell phone video. Just sayin’…go with your gifts.]

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.

You Are Loved

“The faithful love of the Lord never ends! His mercies never cease.” Lamentations 3:22

“I can’t do this.”

His precious little mouth contorted on the one side – the way it always did when he became scared. “Mom, I’m not a first grader. I can’t do this. I need to go back to kindergarten.”

Behind his back, the window glowed with the last remnants of the sunset, signaling night…the night before school.

Chase shook his fuzzy, scarred head with each new sentence of voiced fear. After months of proudly proclaiming his being in first grade now and – including outrageous claims for privilege (“I should get to stay up late at night and watch Netflix because I’m a first-grader now, Mom.”) – the time had finally come and he felt himself unequal to the road in front of him.

His words flooded my heart as I heard echoes of my own timid voice in memory. Through his cancer, the ambulances, the hospitals, childbirth, even marriage… big things. Life things.

I can’t do this. God, I’m not ready for this.

I’m too young…

Too immature…

Too imperfect…

Too scared…

I need more time to prepare.

To get it right…

To be aware…

To make it count…

But here’s the thing with life… When I am blind-sided with my weakness and need, God is aware of the plan – my perfect life plan. And when things feel underdone and undone, out-of-nowhere, frenzied and stressed, He alone knows the ways to make them count for my good and His glory.

I knelt in front of Chase and put my hands lightly on his arms. Oh, how I wanted him to listen and connect with the words I needed to say. “Chase, you can and you will – because you are ready. It doesn’t feel like it yet, but you’re ready;” I paused, searching for the right words, “And, you are loved.”

You are loved.

In the hard moments when our brains acknowledge our good and His glory, but daily life throws gut punches that leave us lacking, gasping “I can’t do this”, it comes down to those very few words: I am loved; you are loved. These are the conduit from our head to our heart – from knowing what’s true to believing and resting in what’s good: His faithful love.

This had become a key sentence with my darling cancer survivor over the last several months. With his age and progression comes the increasing sense of “other”. He knows he looks different from those around him and often reacts differently too. He is strong, but it takes precious little for the remorse and regret to set in – and the fear too. I watch him feel unequal to the road in front of him and know beyond a shadow of a doubt that only perfect love can conquer this fear. And I know because I feel my own weakness, sadness and fear.

So, in the sunset before that August big day, as Chase lay his head down to sleep in that sixth year of a life we never thought he’d have, I grabbed the first piece of paper I could find (for it’s the words that are most important, not on what they are written) and I wrote what I believe…what I know and too often forget: You are loved. And then I tucked it, folded small into the blue top pocket of the crisp, new backpack to be found on the bus the next morning.

For truly, these words give a strength and joy like none other. And with these words, we are ready for anything life may bring – in His grace – moment by moment.

“See how very much our Father loves us, for he calls us his children, and that is what we are!” 1 John 3:1a

“Repeat them again and again to your children. Talk about them when you are at home and when you are on the road, when you are going to bed and when you are getting up. Tie them to your hands and wear them on your forehead as reminders.” Deuteronomy 6:7-8

 

I Will Always Be With You

He has a new phrase: “I will always be with you”.

When he says it, he is quiet and centered, strangely introspective – unlike his usual energy-filled self and it means his heart hurts. It means he understands separation and he wants to stay together. But in typical childhood fashion and typical outside-the-box Chase fashion, the words come out differently.

He clutched my hand, fighting the drugged sleep threatening to take over his conscious thought and whisper these words to me – “I will always be with you” – as he went in for his MRI last Monday. But it was the night before that the words first stuck to him and he asked if I would write them out, not for him, but for his siblings. Then he put his head in his hands and sat cross-legged on the kitchen counter, just staring at the part of his heart that they’d discover in his absence the following morning.

The kids fight and squabble, and a good eight out of ten times, this bald boy is the instigator, but in the tense times, they rest in each others arms and love and they write out their love for each other because, well because “I will always be with you”. Somehow, reassurance of presence is, in itself a comfort. And somehow, the not quite sense-making words of his hurting heart are the ones that make the most sense – because he dares to stop, breath deep, and say them aloud.

Don’t miss the opportunities you’ve been given to connect with the ones you love.

~MbM~ 

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