Day 19: Smelling Like Smoke

There are some people who reek of their life circumstances, of everything that has seemingly gone wrong in their lives. They can be stressed, anxious, bitter, angry, hurtful, negative, and pessimistic, and they wear those emotions like they wear a pair of adult onesies - covered from head-to-toe. They complain about their past and their present and they assume the worst about their future. You know the people I'm talking about? They are the ones who are a drain on your mind and emotions, the ones you mentally psych yourself up to spend any amount of time with because they just require so.much.energy. You aim to take them in small doses because too much of them just makes you want to slide off the couch and hide in a corner. You may or may not know what fire they've been through, but you know they've been through one because they come out smelling like it, their scorched emotions filling every crevice of the room. 

I know that kind of person because I was that kind of person, in some ways. I just hid it really well most of the time. There was a time in life when I was just kind of mad at the world over a whole host of things that I felt had gone wrong. I look back and marvel that I actually had any friends at that time. God bless 'em, they stuck with me in those frosty, bitter years. I remember a college friend very kindly but very bluntly saying to me, "Courtney, sometimes you're just straight up cold."

Ouch.

That one stung. 

But I took note of her comment and began taking stock. I realized I carried around in my heart and my mind this notion that I had been wronged, that God had taken from me far more than he had given me. This faulty thinking bled over into so many areas of my life - my interactions with friends, how I treated classmates, how I acted within my family, what I believed to be true about God. I reeked of the negativity and bitterness harbored deep in my heart. I was rigid and unbending at times, blunt in the delivery of my opinions without regard to the other person's emotions. There was no air freshener strong enough to mask the smell I left behind sometimes. As my high school English teacher once told me, "You do not suffer fools gladly, Courtney."

If you have read the story of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego found in Daniel 3, then you'll be well-acquainted with the fire they walked through. The king at the time - King Nebuchadnezzar - built a statue of gold and issued a decree that everyone bow down and worship it. Everyone did, except for those three men. In a fit of rage over this insult, the king summoned the men, demanding they bow down and worship this statue. To this, the men very calmly replied:

King Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from it, and he will deliver us from Your Majesty’s hand. But even if he does not, we want you to know, Your Majesty, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up” (Daniel 3:16-18).

You can imagine that response went over like a lead balloon. The king is even angrier after this response and throws the men into a blazing furnace, seven times hotter than normal.

And what happens, to the king's surprise? There are not only three men in the fire, still alive, but a fourth has joined them, a man looking like a "son of the gods." And the king was right - only it was the Son of God walking in the fire with Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, working a miracle to save them from the flames.

But you know what I think is equally amazing? I mean, yes, it's no doubt a miracle that these men could be thrown into a blazing hot furnace and still walk around, but the other stunning miracle is what happens after they come out from the flames:

[The leaders] saw that the fire had not harmed [the men's] bodies, nor was a hair of their heads singed; their robes were not scorched, and there was no smell of fire on them (Daniel 3:27).  

There was no smell of fire on them. 

These men who had just been standing around in flames that incinerated the soldiers who threw them in there don't even have a trace of smoke remaining on them.

Allow me to state the obvious lesson to be learned here: 

Just because you walk through the fire doesn't mean you have to come out smelling like smoke.

When we go through difficult things - even traumatic things - in life, it doesn't mean that we have to spend our remaining days giving off the fragrance of those things. When we go through difficult things, it doesn't mean we have to work so hard at making sure everyone else is as miserable as us. When we go through difficult things, it doesn't mean we have to leave a trail of anger or bitterness in our wake. 

When we go through difficult things in life, when we walk through the fire, it is possible for us to come out smelling like some thing other than the fire itself. It's not just a miracle that there is another in the fire with us, but also miracle that we don't smell like the fire.

If you read through the books of Leviticus and Numbers, time and time again, it talks about the sacrifices offered to God, sacrifices that had "an aroma pleasing to the Lord." These were sacrifices burned in the fire, but with an aroma pleasing to God.

It's possible to go through the fire and not coming out smelling like smoke. You don't have to walk around bearing the scent of the crucible for the rest of your life.

What is the fragrance you leave behind? Is it one of a scorched heart, burned so bad that you're determined to overwhelm everyone else within your vicinity? Or is it one of sweetness, a pleasant aroma? 

Choose carefully the scent you leave behind. And take note that sometimes, the fragrant offering is the absence of the fragrance. 

"But thanks be to God, who always leads us as captives in Christ’s triumphal procession and uses us to spread the aroma of the knowledge of him everywhere. For we are to God the pleasing aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. To the one we are an aroma that brings death; to the other, an aroma that brings life" (2 Corinthians 2:14-16).

Day 18: Long Live Sheldon

Various people have handed me plants over the years as gifts, saying, "Trust me, this is such a hardy little plant. You can't kill it."

To which I lean in close and always say, "Trust me. I will."

My ability to grow or sustain anything green is laughable. My best friend from high school gave me a bamboo plant when we graduated, possibly for good luck. I think the bamboo needed the luck more than I did. I killed it within a year. An ex-boyfriend gave me a little pine tree, saying what everyone always says, "This is such a hardy little plant. You can't kill it." It was a pile of brown needles in no time. 

My friend Cindy gave me a succulent as a housewarming gift several years ago, specifically buying one after I told her I have such a terrible time keeping anything alive. "Trust me, this is such a hardy little plant. You can't kill it," she said. Within mere months, I went to pull a dead leaf off at the base and the whole thing collapsed like a house of cards, the roots rotted. 

I rescued an aloe plant abandoned by a co-worker at the start of the pandemic. I wasn't sure it was going to do any better under my watch than if I had just left it at the office, but I thought I'd give it a shot. It surprisingly lasted for a couple of years and then I repotted it and everything went to hell in a handbasket. I gave it to the guy I was dating at the time in the hopes he could salvage it. He did, of course, and it started flourishing again. 

If you were to visit my house, you would notice there is exactly ZERO landscaping. Not a single flower or hosta or vine in sight. I planted some lavender in two urns by my garage last summer. I'm glad they were only a few dollars a piece. They, too, died. Well, one did, and then I gave the other almost-dead one to my mom to replant. It, too, flourished under her watch. I can't even get grass to grow. Grass, people, grass. I planted some grass seed in some patchy spots in my yard. Nothing happened. I planted some more. Eventually some grew in, but that clearly was just an act of grace on God's part because I usually forgot to water it.

My friend Ruth finally got a clue and just bought me some magnets shaped like fake aloe plants. She's a wise woman, that girl.

And then there's my peace lily.

I've decided to name him Sheldon, for reasons I will get to in a moment.

Sheldon is my miracle plant. He, too, was one of the plants abandoned by a co-worker at the start of the pandemic. I previously had good luck with peace plants - the one and only plant in my life I've ever been able to keep alive for an extended period of time. I was mildly hopeful this guy might make it but he was already in rough shape. I brought him home and generally left him to his own devices. I occasionally remembered to water him when his leaves very clearly started drooping.

And miracle of miracles, Sheldon is still alive - THREE YEARS LATER. 

However, in those three years, Sheldon has never bloomed. 

I would read articles on caring for peace lilies and how to get them to bloom. The articles would say things like, "The pH needs to be just right. They need sunlight, but filtered sunlight, not direct sunlight. They don't like drafty spots, so keep them away from vents. Make sure you fertilize it. Don't overwater it, but don't underwater it."  

Frick.

It's going to take a miracle for this thing to ever bloom again. 

And then I moved Sheldon. 

This is where I explain his name.

If you've seen the TV show "The Big Bang Theory," you'll know where this is headed. Sheldon Cooper is one of the main characters, full of maddening quirks and idiosyncrasies, one of which is that he has to sit in a particular spot on the couch. He explains the precision of why that oh-so-particular spot is optimal: "In the winter, that seat is close enough to the radiator to stay warm and yet not so close as to cause perspiration. In the summer, it's directly in the path of a cross-breeze created by opening windows there and there. It faces the television at an angle that is neither direct, thus discouraging conversation, nor so far wide as to create a parallax distortion."

This is the human version of my plant. I moved the plant version of Sheldon from the far side of the room to the middle, not because I cared about him or his proximity to the vent or whether he was in direct sunlight or not or whether he was facing the TV enough so as to not create a parallax, but because I moved furniture around and he was in the way.

And what do you know? 

Lo and behold, he bloomed last November.

What?!

I had to do a double-take when I first saw the bloom because I thought my eyes were deceiving me. Surely, this can't be! I nearly wanted to start clapping and cheering, rooting for the little guy. You bloomed! Way to go, you ridiculously fickle and persnickety plant! You did it! Against all odds! Uphill both ways! Despite your notoriously good plant-killing owner! Congratulations! You triumphed against all odds! You overcame adversity!

Now, don't die on me, Sheldon.

Day 17: Dead Ends

For years, I looked back on one particular dating relationship with a form of regret that lingered in the shadows of my mind. It lurked quietly, hovering in the corners of my subconscious. The relationship lasted all of nine months before it ended, and I always wondered if it should have ever even started. 

I lived with the notion that I was supposed to somehow get everything perfect right out of the gate, like somehow I should have seen it all coming. I felt there had been a green light to say yes to moving forward with dating the guy - and then a red light came. In the aftermath, I would often ask God in my prayers, "Did I not hear you right? Did I not discern well? Did I miss a step somewhere? Because if that had been the right thing, wouldn't we have stayed together, wouldn't it have all worked out?" 

And I would always pray, echoing the words of Moses from Exodus 33:15-16, "If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here. How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us? What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?” Unless God's presence was going with me, I didn't want to go. I didn't want anything to do with dating this guy if I wasn't sure that God's hand was upon it, his presence going with me. How else would anyone know that I was set apart if God's presence didn't go with me? 

Those same questions came back again more recently after I dated a guy from church. I felt confident about the decision to move forward with dating, to give the relationship a chance, to grant it the margin necessary for it to breath and grow. I discerned green lights again, praying those verses out of Exodus 33 yet again. And within weeks a red light came, a bold unmistakable red light. "God, did I not hear you right? Did I not discern well? Did I miss a step somewhere? Should we have never dated to begin with? Was this a sign that your presence wasn't with me?" The same questions all over again, that same regret and second-guessing lingering in the shadows of my mind. 

I kept running into dead ends, wondering all along if I had taken turns I should never have taken.

And then it hit me, like a bolt from the blue. By the grace of God, it finally hit me:

Dead ends are not proof of God's absence. 

Exhibit A:

The Israelites and the Red Sea. 

The Israelites were the very chosen people of God. Of all the people that should have gotten it right, it should have been them. God commanded Moses, the chosen leader of God's chosen people, to lead the people out of Egypt and head for the promised land. 

Where do they wind up on the way?

At a dead end, running smack dab into a wall of water with no way forward and a pursuing army behind them.

As Pharaoh approached, the Israelites looked up, and there were the Egyptians, marching after them. They were terrified and cried out to the Lord. They said to Moses, 'Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to the desert to die? What have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt? Didn’t we say to you in Egypt, ‘Leave us alone; let us serve the Egyptians’? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!'

Their questions were my questions. God, why? Why did you lead me up into this relationship only for it to end in heartbreak on one side or the other? Wouldn't it have been better if we had just never walked down this road to begin with? Wouldn't it have been better if we had just been kept ignorant?

We are a people haunted by dead ends, wondering why we ever got our hopes up to begin with, wondering why green lights turn red.

But you know what was still with the Israelites at that dead end, facing that wall of water and a pursuing army?

God's presence. 

He was the cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night. 

Then the angel of God, who had been traveling in front of Israel’s army, withdrew and went behind them. The pillar of cloud also moved from in front and stood behind them, coming between the armies of Egypt and Israel. Throughout the night the cloud brought darkness to the one side and light to the other side; so neither went near the other all night long. Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and all that night the Lord drove the sea back with a strong east wind and turned it into dry land. The waters were divided, and the Israelites went through the sea on dry ground, with a wall of water on their right and on their left.

The dead end was not proof of God's absence or that the people had erred.

They were right where they were supposed to be.

When this revelation hit me, it was like scales falling from my eyes. I suddenly saw my past with a whole new level clarity - and whole new level of grace and freedom. Maybe all of those seemingly 'failed' relationships weren't dead ends after all. Maybe they were God's gracious reminders to this striving perfectionist that his sovereignty far exceeded my inadequacies, insecurities, and doubts. Those relationships had purpose and reason, teaching me not only about myself, but God himself. Maybe the dead ends weren't dead ends after all. 

Now, are there times when we have genuinely erred and have walked down a path we shouldn't have? Yes. We're human, we're sinful, and we regularly do dumb and foolish things. There's a reason we are compared to sheep in the Bible. Sheep are not the sharpest tools in the barnyard shed. Like sheep, we do stupid things, and yes, sometimes we do dismiss God's voice and the promptings of the Holy Spirit and choose to go our own way. In those instances, we need to confess, repent, and take good notes on how to not walk that road again.  

But if our hearts are set on God and his will and his ways, if we are earnestly seeking his face, desiring what he desires, then we have to trust by faith that he will make known to us the path of life (Psalm 16:11). This is why discernment is so essential, to distinguish between those moments when the dead end is because of our own sinfulness and when the dead end is the ordained hand of God. "Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit" (Galatians 5:25). It is this keeping in step with the Spirit that will guide our paths, even when those paths lead to seemingly dead ends.

So, for those of you who are second-guessing, wondering if the dead end you're standing at is because you missed a step somewhere - 

Dead ends are not proof of God's absence. 

He's present. 

He's the cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night. 

Besides, your dead end may not be a dead end after all. 

Maybe God is just waiting for the right time to part the waters.

Day 16: Favorite Books

I love to read. I wouldn't say I'm a voracious reader. I'm not consuming a book a day or anything like that, but I do love a good book, particularly a good fiction book when my evening is blank and I have time to curl up in my recliner and read for hours. It's been that way since I was a kid. I remember being on the school bus in elementary school, so engrossed in a book that sometimes I wouldn't hear someone repeatedly calling my name. The bookshelves in my bedroom as a kid were filled with just that - books upon books (and model horses). 

I will confess as an adult, though, I have been less and less inclined to buy my books these days, but rather prefer to simply check them out from the local library. If I think it's good enough to read it again, then I'll buy a copy. If you were to browse my shelves now, you would know that what fills them is generally the cream of the crop of my personal collection (there are a few stragglers, though, I should probably part with). I started winnowing the collection in recent years, mainly because I got tired of boxing them up and moving them from apartment to apartment. So what remains are either a) autographed copies, b) books I've read more than twice, c) theological reference books, or d) books given to me as a gift with an inscription on the inside. Everything else has made its way out the door. 

So what are some of my all-time favorite books? I share the following in no particular order:

A Severe Mercy by Sheldon Vanauken. This book is without question in the top three of my favorite books, regardless of genre. A professor of mine first introduced me to it in college, maybe grad school. It's profoundly powerful and thoughtful. I can't tell you how many times I've read it. And the marked up pages prove it.

The Martian by Andy Weir. Quite possibly one of the funniest books I've ever read. The movie was far more dramatic, so if you've seen the movie, Weir's sense of humor didn't entirely translate. Laugh out loud hysterical. I definitely pick the book over the movie in this instance.

The Lord of the Rings trilogy by JRR Tolkien. This is old news if you've been around this blog, but I love these books. I read them for the first time in grad school and I was incredibly sad when I reached the end of them, I just wanted them to go on forever. Tolkien is a masterful storyteller. 

Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O'Dell. I remember my first grade teacher reading this book to our class and I absolutely loved it. I'm not even sure why, but I was mesmerized by it as a child. 

The Beast in the Jungle by Henry James. This is a fictional short story, written in 1903. It is all sorts of tragic and sad, but for whatever reason, I find it captivating. I first discovered it in a college American lit class. The language is a bit antiquated and it can be a lot to slog through - there's still some passages where I have no idea what he's saying. But man, such a beautifully heartbreaking story. I re-read it every few years. 

True Devotion by Dee Henderson. This was probably the first book I ever read by Dee. A sappy dramatic romance novel. I love it. I can't tell you the number of times I've read it. We could also add Pretense and A Place Called Home, both by Lori Wick. Again, mindless sappy romance I've read over and over again. 

Knowledge of the Holy by AW Tozer. This one is probably my favorite theology book. I first read it in the summer of 2007 when I was living in North Carolina. I couldn't get enough of it. I felt like my head and my heart were exploding every time I finished chapter. It landed in a season of life where I was learning so much about the character of God, and then this book came along and gave words to everything I had been learning and experiencing.  

The Greatest Gift by Ann Voskamp. This is a Christmas devotional, but I read it nearly every Advent and have done so for years. Ann has a very lyrical style of writing that I think is stunning.  

Secretariat by William 'Bill' Nack. It's hard to take a true story, filled with a lot of history and context, and make it read like fiction. Bill Nack pulls it off. Effortless storytelling. 

Any books you would recommend or qualify as your own all-time favorite? Offer 'em up!

Day 15: What Hollows the Mind

We all go a little crazy when someone takes too long to respond to a text, email or phone call, don't we? Or is that just me? We send a message and we have an unspoken expectation about how long it should take someone to respond, and when they don't, our minds start filling in the blanks. Did I offend them? Are they ignoring me? Why aren't they responding? Did they not get the text? Should I follow-up? Or if you're like my mom, you're wondering if your daughter is dead on the side of the road and you should start planning her funeral. (PS: I love you, Mom, and I know it's because you care.) Our insecurities rise with each passing moment and our minds scramble to fill the unknown with the known, making assumptions about why this person is not responding.

My very wise friend, Tim, once told me, "Assumptions are the lowest form of intelligence." 

Don't we do the same with God? When we believe God is a long time in coming - longer than we expected or hoped - in answering our prayers or bringing to pass something specific in our lives, we take matters into our own hands. As humans we do not dwell well in ambiguity and uncertainty, and so we take steps to give definition and shape to that ambiguity, to turn it into something we can touch and feel and know. The unknown is scary, the known is safe. While waiting for the truth to reveal itself, for the facts to be made known as to why the delay, the insecurities, questions, and doubt take root. We begin to second-guess the very nature and character of God. Wait, maybe he can't be trusted like I thought. Maybe his word can't be trusted. Maybe his ways can't be trusted, we think to ourselves. 

The ancient Israelites had the act of making assumptions down to an art form, quite literally giving shape their assumptions. Exodus 32 tells the tale of the golden calf, when the Israelites fashion an idol and bow down to worship it. But prior to that, their leader, Moses, had ascended Mount Sinai to meet with God, and it was there on the mountain that God would deliver the Ten Commandments. For forty days and forty nights, Moses met with God and for all those days and nights, "the cloud covered it, and the glory of the LORD settled on Mount Sinai...To the Israelites the glory of the LORD looked like a consuming fire on top of the mountain" (Exodus 24:15, 16a, 17). 

But down at the foot of the mountain? Assumptions were flooding the minds of the people. Take note of what the opening of chapter 32 conveys:

When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain, they gathered Aaron and said, 'Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don't know what has happened to him (Exodus 32:1).

As for this fellow Moses, we don't know what's happened to him.

Ambiguity. 

Uncertainty.

Doubt.

Assumptions.

So, what do the people do? They start filling in the blank. Well, we can't see this Moses fellow, so let's make something we can see. We can't see this God he proclaims or really see how he's working, so let's make a god we can hold in our hands. Let's make the unknown, known. So, they give up all their gold earrings, and Moses' brother, Aaron, fashions a golden calf, to which the people offer sacrifices to, indulging in revelry and general shenanigans to boot.

In the new Amazon TV series (which is amazing, by the way), The Rings of Power, Galadriel, one of the main characters, said in the wake of an unexpected turn from the enemy, when all the people were scattered and they weren't sure who was dead or alive, "What cannot be known hollows the mind. Fill it not with guesswork."  

What cannot be known hollows the mind. 

Fill it not with guesswork.

When we start making assumptions about God's or other people's motives, behaviors, or reasonings, which is to say the "unknown," it hollows our minds. And filling it with guesswork doesn't help. It starts to carve out spaces in our brain filled with doubt, fear, worry, and unbelief.  

Ultimately, hollowed minds lead to hollowed hearts.

"Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done" (Romans 1:28).

To avoid hollowed minds, we have to fill them with truth, with what is known, chiefly "the knowledge of God," as Paul wrote in Romans. Minds filled with the weight of who he is are far less likely to be hollowed out, to be filled with guesswork. A.W. Tozer said in his masterful work, Knowledge of the Holy, "The man who comes to a right belief about God is relieved of ten thousand temporal problems at once..." 

To come to a right belief about God - a belief free of assumptions and guesswork - is to come to a mind that is full rather than hollow, and a heart that is likewise. 

But how do we discover what is known about God, to come to a right belief about him? 

Look to his Word and no other source.

Look to his Word, "like gold refined seven times" (Psalm 12:6), gold far superior to that of the golden calf.

While the Israelites danced and sang around the golden calf, they did so with hollow minds. Little did they know, God had come to fill their hollowed minds - and their hollowed hearts. 

"This is the covenant I will establish with the people of Israel after that time, declares the Lord. I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people" (Hebrews 8:10). 

Hollowed minds hollow no more, filled with the truth of God rather than guesswork.

Day 14: January Detox

I told a friend last week that from the outside looking in, people are probably thinking I've outlawed fun for the month. I'm doing Whole30, which means I've cut out a vast majority of foods, living on mainly fruits, veggies and meat. Goodbye donuts, cake, brownies, cookies, cupcakes, and pretty much anything else I love that contains sugar. I'm spending most of my free time writing or working on various home remodeling projects. Goodbye lounging around. And I also decided to cut out all movies and TV for the month. Goodbye being a couch potato and mindlessly watching movies.

Welcome to Courtney's house of fun! 🎉

But why?

Fair question. 

For starters, doing Whole30 at the beginning of the year has become an annual tradition (although I usually do closer to Whole45 or Whole60). I started it in 2019 and saw such dramatic results that I was sold, hook, line and sinker. I usually do a modified form of it at various times throughout the year, but January/February is my all-in version. I get amazing sleep. I have more energy. My skin looks bright. I feel less stressed. It's.so.worth.it. So, yes, I'm willing to give up donuts for nearly two months in exchange for better sleep and all of these other amazing benefits. It's just a good way to start the year fresh. 

Second, we've already discussed the writing situation. I got lazy. I needed a dose of discipline. Hence, the daily writing.

Lastly, the no-movies situation. Toward the end of last year I felt like I was just spending a lot of time mindlessly watching TV and feeling very unmotivated to do anything else. Yes, fall is a busy time for me for work, and it's easy to mentally check out in the evenings when I'm done, but I felt like my time on the couch was getting excessive. I would sit and watch a few hours of a TV show in one sitting (hello, Sweet Magnolias on Netflix) and then just feel gross, like I was wasting my life and being the world's most unproductive citizen. I did a similar form of a media detox once in grad school, only a little more extreme. I cut out all movies, TV, radio, music, and social media (which I had at the time) for three months. IT WAS AMAZING. I read over 30 books that summer, and that was when I read Lord of the Rings for the first time.

Robyn Davidson, the woman who trekked across the Australian desert with her four camels and a dog in 1977, once said, "I believe when you’re stuck in one spot for too long it’s best to throw a grenade where you stand, and jump…and pray."

It's probably been time to throw a grenade for awhile (although it's probably more of a smoke bomb in this instance). I have been feeling stuck in so many areas of life, bored and restless. I have been apathetic, procrastinating on projects I have had on my to-do list for months. I wasn't depressed (I've been that before and this wasn't it), but I had just gotten so complacent.  

Something had to give. 

I think removing the option of watching movies and TV has freed me up to do all this writing. I'm spending my evenings sorting out my thoughts, trying to get them into a coherent framework in order to write instead of just popping on the TV and trying not to think at all. And knowing that I'm eating well and taking care of my body just adds to the snowball. I haven't felt this productive or energized in awhile, and it has been so refreshing in a way that I didn't know I needed.

Who knows what February through December will look like, but January is no doubt a happening time. At least as much of a 'happening time' one can have without donuts or a good movie. 

So, go ahead, throw that grenade.

Day 13: Regrets

Regret is a funny thing. There is no shortage of perspectives on how to deal with it. Some people adopt a no regrets! policy. You live and learn, so don't dwell on what you didn't get right but instead just take the lesson on the chin and move on. Others drown in their regrets, consumed by them, unable to relinquish the vice grip hold they have on all that they didn't get right. 

I'm probably a mix of both of these extremes at times, and only with age and wisdom am I learning to land somewhere in the middle. On one hand, I'm getting better about simply letting go of whatever it is that I thought I got wrong. I'm getting better at just simply owning it. It happened. It's over. Carry on. On the other hand, it's very easy for me to wallow under the weight of self-condemnation, telling myself all the things I should have done differently or better, a lot of which can be chalked up to my perfectionistic tendencies. If I'm not careful, I can dwell in that space for a very long time.  

If only...

I regret not buying a Russian fur hat when I lived in Russia one summer of college. I tried one on at the market in Moscow and then talked myself out of it. Too expensive, I told myself. 

I regret not taking a single photograph with my friend Jonathan while he was alive. This regret is actually a profound one for me. I have pictures of him, but not with him. After he died, I realized this, and it has bothered me ever since. I also regret the moment I decided not to go visit him in the hospital. A winter storm had rolled in, the roads were a mess, I was a mess. I should have gone.

I regret writing a letter to this boy I was crazy about in college. Gah, do I ever regret that letter. I wish it had spontaneously combusted in the mailman's bag. What I would give to take that letter back. It wasn't anything crazy or over the top. I just should have left well enough alone. But I didn't. It was the beginning of the end for that relationship. 

I regret putting so much pressure on myself to perform and be perfect when I showed horses. Perfection never came and it haunted me for years. That self-imposed pressure robbed me of just simply enjoying the thing I loved more than anything else at that time.

(I may regret the carpet I'm currently having installed in my house. Should I have chosen a different color? Should I have picked a different company to install it? Shopped around more? Gotten more quotes? Did I get a good enough deal? What if I hate it? WHAT IF I CHOSE WRONG? #OhTheAngst #FirstWorldProblem)

The list could go on. And it's not confined to just seemingly inconsequential choices, but also over sin and rebellion and words spoken in anger and pride. I'm sure you could draft your own list of both big and small life choices, whether done in sin or not (or maybe you're one of those people who abides by the no regrets! policy?). 

But here's what I'm learning: 

Maybe we need to allow our regrets to shape us rather than hollow us. 

Teach us rather than scar us. 

Soften the edges of who we are rather than leave us jagged. 

Compel us rather than condemn us. 

Move us rather than paralyze us. 

Because ultimately?

I think regret is just grief masquerading.

Regret is grief wrapped in sorrow and sadness and a thousand if only's. And it's grief that we ultimately have to wrestle down, not merely regret. 

Consider the quote from which I pulled the name of my blog:

"There's a trick to the graceful exit. It begins with the vision to recognize when a job, a life stage, a relationship is over — and to let go. It means leaving what's over without denying its validity or its past importance in our lives. It involves a sense of future, a belief that every exit line is an entry, that we are moving on, rather than out. It's hard to learn that we don't leave the best parts of ourselves behind, back in the dugout or the office. We own what we learned back there. The experiences and the growth are grafted onto our lives. And when we exit, we can take ourselves along — quite gracefully."   

Somehow we have to let go of whatever it is that happened, but not so much so that we deny its validity or its past importance in our lives.

I can't go back to that moment in Russia and buy that hat. But my cousin did get one for me as a gift one year for Christmas, knowing I had this lingering regret. 

I can't go back and take a photo with Jonathan. He's gone and there's nothing I can do about that. But is a photo the only way I can remember my friend? No. I talk about him with his parents and I remember him. I listen to songs by the Civil Wars and I remember him. I drive by a Jeni's Ice Cream or a Jason's Deli and I remember him. A photograph - or the lack thereof - didn't define our friendship. It didn't then. It won't now. 

I can't go back and unwrite that letter I wrote to The Boy. It's spilled milk. The good Lord saw fit that it still be delivered, despite my foolishness, so I am going to have to trust in his sovereignty. The Boy has since moved on and gotten married. We've both moved on with life. I have learned to be more judicious in my letter writing efforts, especially to boys.   

I can't go back and relive my horse show career. But those years profoundly shaped me, sharpened me, made me. Yes, I could have done things differently, but the end result of those years was a perfectionist who has been a little more tempered by prolonged failure.

So, allow your regrets to shape you, not hollow you. Teach you, not scar you. Soften you, not harden you. And grieve. Grieve whatever was lost or whatever it is you think you lost. And then take yourself along - quite gracefully.

-------

This recent article by Melissa Urban - co-founder of Whole30 - was also a tremendous help to me. "You could not have done anything different. You could not have done anything better. Do you know how I know that this is true? Because you didn’t."

Day 12: For the Love of Libraries

I am convinced heaven has a spectacular library. How could it not? With God being a God of words and stories and parables, how is that we would get to heaven and find that all of those things have ceased? He's the author of the Book of Life, for crying out loud. And what is it that John says? "Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written" (John 21:25). Yes, I do believe heaven will have books and I do believe we will spend our days reading and re-reading the stories of old and the stories of our lives and the infinite ways that God showed himself all-powerful and all-knowing across the arc of humanity.

But in the meantime, I have earthly libraries.

If I were to discover that you were not a card-carrying member of your local library, I would probably give you a solid raise of the eyebrow. I have a t-shirt that says "I know my library card number by heart." And I do know my library card number by heart. Two, in fact, as I regularly use two library systems. I don't have my credit card number memorized, but I do have my library card numbers memorized.

Libraries to me are essential institutions in the fabric of society. A place where knowledge is shared freely without restriction or limitation. A place where the young and old gather, regardless of race, gender, ability, social standing or level of income. A place where you discover new places, new ideas, new authors, new stories, new music. A friend of mine grew in Lebanon in the Middle East and we were recently talking about books. He isn't much of a bookworm and he said he grew up in a place where they didn't have libraries, so he naturally didn't have access to books with any sort of ease or regularity. I was reminded in that split-second what a gift it is that I have access to such a wonder. Could we find new places, new ideas, and new stories on the internet? Sure. But to walk into a library, to see shelves overflowing with stories begging to be read, to hold these treasures in our hands? It's brought me to tears a time or two.

I remember when I was in college, the local library in town was being remodeled and was in a temporary building for awhile. When they reopened the new space, I remember walking up the stairs to the second floor, turning the corner, and my eyes immediately got misty. It was so beautiful. When I went out to Jackson Hole on one of my first trips, I stopped by the library out there. Tears there, too. Just the way it was designed and how they incorporated cut trees into the layout. I loved it. I love the library in the Biltmore mansion in Asheville, NC. And the library on Ohio State University's campus. And the library in downtown Columbus. I will forever love the scene in the original Disney animated version of Beauty and the Beast when the Beast shows Belle the castle's library, throwing open the doors on the nearly cavernous library. I know what her wonder feels like.

Libraries are the keepers of the history of the world, of our lives, of our days. Who will hold the weight of all that we are as humanity, if not them? 

Do yourself a favor and get yourself a library card, if you haven't already done so. 

Don't make me raise my eyebrow at you. 

Nearly $1,000 saved last year by using my library card!

Day 11: Prayers for a Future Husband

I am 38 and single. 

That is a statement of fact, not of lament. 

As Jason Illian says in his book Undressed, "Being single is not a disease and marriage certainly isn't the cure." I have never believed my singleness to be a disease or a deficit, something to grieve. I have relished it. I have celebrated it. I have taken it to be the gift that it is. I have some friends who have been profoundly bitter about being single, and I do not doubt that for some, singleness has been a source of deep pain. I do not want to diminish the weight of their response. Singleness looks different for everyone. But in the same breath, I have often been utterly bewildered in the face of such bitterness because I cannot relate to it or identify with it. Yes, there have been moments or days when I have been lonely or wished there was a mate by my side, but those moments or days have never lingered long or taken root. This is by God's grace alone. 

I want my single years, however long they may last, to matter. I don't want to be in the business of squandering them. I made a deliberate and conscious decision a long time ago that I would not sit on the sidelines of life while waiting for a husband. Because who is to say that one will ever come along? God has never made such a promise to me. I hold my singleness with open hands. If God should ordain that I go to my grave without a ring on my finger or a different last name, so be it. But if he should ordain that there be a partner along the way, then so be it. I will welcome and celebrate either state. 

Because here's what I ultimately know to be true and what I keep my gaze fixed upon: 

I'll be okay if I never have a husband, but I won't be okay if I don't have Jesus.   

That's not a trade I'm willing to make, to say that I so desperately want to be married that I'll give up my faith. That's an exchange that leads to a certain kind of death. If singleness is what gets me more of Jesus, then that is what I will embrace, but if marriage is what gets me more of Jesus, then I will embrace that equally so. But I won't give Jesus up in order to gain a lesser man.

Even in these days of singleness, however, you better believe I am praying for the man who may be on the other side of these days. Specifically, I pray for three things:

• I pray he is a man of God's Word. This is my chief prayer. I want him to love the Bible. He doesn't need to be a scholar or a theologian. He doesn't need to have memorized the entire book of Colossians or James or Ephesians, but I want him to be a man in love with the Word of God, someone who is familiar with it, well-acquainted with its pages. Early in a dating relationship once, I asked the guy how often he read the Bible and he said maybe once a week. I was so disheartened by this. Look, I'm not saying I'm sitting over here spending hours every day reading my Bible, getting everything perfect in my own pursuit of the Word. But I want to know that the man I'm with is actively moving toward the Word with regularity and intentionality, choosing to wrap his life in its pages.

• I pray he is a man of his word. I want him to be the kind of man who keeps his promises. I want him to be the kind of man who shows up when he says he's going to show up, the kind of man who honors his commitments, whether big or small, come hell or high water. Again, I'm not seeking perfection, but I want someone who is faithful to his promises. 

• I pray he is a man of words. Allow me to state the obvious: I love words. They matter a great deal to me. They are the air I breathe. Words are in my very nature. I have kept journals for the last 26 years. I've had this blog for nearly 15 years. And I haven't been penning all these words because I thought somebody would read them or because I was trying to build a brand or a platform or make a name for myself. I did - and do - these things because I don't have a choice, because I might explode if my thoughts aren't penned. Rainer Maria Rilke's words resonate with me, "This most of all: ask yourself in the most silent hour of your night: must I write? Dig into yourself for a deep answer. And if this answer rings out in assent, if you meet this solemn question with a strong, simple 'I must,' then build your life in accordance with this necessity..." And books? How many thousands of books have I probably read in my lifetime? I devoured them, even as a child, and still aim to as an adult. Writing and reading represent some of the deepest parts of my identity. I pray the man I marry would at the very least have an appreciation for words. He doesn't need to be a bookworm or a bibliophile or the world's greatest writer of love letters, although I would certainly relish it if he were. 

Some women pray for a man who is a tall drink of water.

Me? 

Just give me a man who is a tall drink of words. 

Yes, and amen.

_______________

If you want to read some additional pieces that echo my sentiments on singleness and dating, see also Grace Thornton's blog post "I Don't Wait Anymore" and her book by the same title. Every time I read that article - and it has been often over the years - I just want to yell "Preach it, girl!" And Jen Wilkin wrote a piece back in 2014 that realllllyy makes me want to get on a soapbox alongside her and preach some more.

Day 10: Recent Tunes

I do not consider myself to be someone who has a very eclectic taste in music. I tend to regularly hover somewhere around the country/Christian/Top 40 genres and may on occasion stumble onto something else, but usually accidentally.  The most played song in my iTunes is "Confident" by Steffany Gretzinger, probably because I listened to it obsessively through a pretty rough patch of life. Songs ranking second, third, fifth and sixth in line all come from the Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe film score by Harry Gregson-Williams. It really is a fabulous score and worth a listen. (And if you're someone like me who naturally gravitates toward melancholy or sad music such as the Narnia film score, give Susan Cain's book Bittersweet a read. You will understand yourself better and you'll find out you're not as odd - or depressed - as you think.)

My latest mix of music hasn't strayed far from my usual tastes, so if you're looking for some new tunes or new-to-you tunes, check out what I've been listening to lately:

• "My Worth is Not in What I Own" by Keith and Kristyn Getty, featuring Darren Mulligan. A friend shared it with me in her Christmas newsletter and it's been on repeat some days.

• Film score from Persuasion by Stuart Earl. Netflix released a new version of the Jane Austen book Persuasion and it is delightful. I immediately noticed the score. It lasts all of 12 minutes, which is the only downside to it. It's too be beautiful to be so short.

• "In Reverence" by David Tolk. This shows up regularly on my Pandora station and it's a fave. And the fact that the album cover is of the Tetons might help. A perfectly sad, melancholy song that I enjoy so much.

• Pretty much anything by Mitchell Tenpenny. This guy has got some great stuff. See also "Truth About You" and "We Got History."

• Adam Doleac. He's up there with Mitchell. See also "Another" or "Coulda Loved You Longer."

• Jordan Davis. I LOVE HIS MUSIC. There are very few songs on any of his albums that I skip over, which is mark of a great album in my opinion. His next album comes out on February 17 and I am thoroughly looking forward to getting my hands on it. See also "Leaving New Orleans," "Detours," "Midnight Crisis," "Next Thing You Know," and "What My World Spins Around." And pretty much anything else he's got.

• "Whakaaria Mai (How Great Thou Art)" by Teeks and Hollie Smith. This is a lovely, lovely, lovely rendition of "How Great Thou Art." I discovered it while watching a documentary on Netflix.

• John Mark Pantana. Where the heck has this guy been hiding? I was at a church event and this guy's songs kept playing in the background. Very mellow, Jack Johnson vibe and I was immediately hooked. See also "Rooftop" and pretty much anything else of his.

Any recommendations of your own? Send 'em my way!