The Giving Shop.  Thanks to the little dreams that I can't stop dreaming and the lovely talents of a sweet friend, it's ready.  The Giving Shop is designed to be a win-win.  You buy cards that are meant to be given away: write on them, tell your people that they are brave, and remind them that watching their life helps you to be brave, too.  Send them in the mail, put them on mirrors, stick them in Bibles, or pass them across the table over coffee.  But once you buy them, give them away.  Use your words to spur on the bravery around you.

And the second win, every penny made from the sale of these brave cards goes to charity, to people doing brave work.  Every single penny.  The supported organizations will change quarterly, but this winter, all proceeds go to Wellspring Living, an organization committed to stopping the domestic sex trafficking of minors.  You can read more about them on their website or in The White Umbrella, a short book that changed so much in my own life.

So you see, win-win.  You give twice in the Giving Shop.  And that's really the point: to simply give more than we think we can.

The Brave cards were designed by my friend, Shayla McGhee, who is super talented and loves helping make little dreams happen.

Toddlers at the coolest.  Exhausting, yes.  Button-pushing, yes.  Patience-trying, yes.  But fun, absolutely yes.

Harper is just three weeks shy of two years old.  And at this stage, she is learning.  So much.  She listens when we talk and repeats our words and phrases.  She watches when we pray and mimics our gestures.  She sees me put makeup on then climbs on the bathroom vanity when my back is turned to try it herself.  In her little mind, not much is impossible.  Harper is beautifully undeterred by past failures or mistakes, she just keeps doing, she'll get closer the next time.  

Probably my favorite part of parenting so far is this: the teaching.  It is a weighty responsibility, knowing someone is watching so closely and modeling everything she sees.  But mostly, it is such a privilege to know she is listening, that she is looking to her mom and dad to corral her little steps every day.  And for a hundred missteps and mistakes and messes and sorries and timeouts, there are a few in the right direction, moments when the glue stick goes right on the paper and not on the table, and Harper proudly announces, "I made this for you, mommy!"

I'm learning, too, that motherhood is not about me, it's about a bigger story.  God has given me my little babies and made me a mom, but I am still in every way His daughter.  And I can only hope that for a hundred of my own missteps and mistakes and messes and sorries and timeouts, I make a few in the right direction, towards him- moments when my heart catches a glimpse at his glory and I see every detail of my life in light of his kingdom work.  He is teaching me so much about the word need through my children, and it is such a gift.

As I watch my daughter learn and try things again and again, I am reminded that God wants the same thing from me.  Life will be messy and full of insecurity and regret and apologies, but I know at the end what my goal is: to see God and say proudly, "my life was for you, Jesus."

From a short devotion I gave at Bible study this week...

Today’s devotion is something I am calling “grammar lessons.”  But don’t tune out to your flashbacks of seventh grade English, because these lessons are, I think, something we all need to learn, every single day. 

We use these words and practices and they can seem so innocuous and innocent but in reality, it is killing our spirits.  COMPETITION and COMPARISON: the habit of walking through life measuring and assessing ourselves against others and looking for ways we are just a little bit set apart, a little more worthy of love and affection.

Henri Nouwen says it this way: “When we take a critical look at ourselves, we have to recognize that competition, not compassion, is our main motivation in life.  We find ourselves deeply immersed in all sorts of competition.  Our whole sense of self is dependent upon the way we compare ourselves with others and upon the differences we can identify… It is by our differences, distinctions, that we are recognized, honored, rejected, despised.  Whether we are more or less intelligent, practical, strong, fast, handy, or handsome depends upon those with whom we are compared or those with whom we compete.  It is upon these positive or negative distinctions that much of our self-esteem depends… Thus, we define ourselves in ways the require us to maintain distance from one another.  We are very protective of our “trophies.”  After all, who are we if we cannot proudly point to something special that sets us apart from others?”

I have to tell you, I am the guiltiest of us all in this area.  Especially now that we have this lovely thing called social media (a topic that could probably be a whole other devotion), but we know so much about one another’s lives now it is virtually impossible to scroll through pictures and statuses without comparing and competing. 

So what do these words mean, comparison and competition.  To compare means to estimate, measure, or notice the similarity or dissimilarity between.  To compete means to strive to outdo one another for acknowledgement.  Here is what these things often look like in my life:

1.     My instagram picture/blog post/facebook status got 28 likes and 6 comments.  I feel good right now.

2.     My instagrm picture/blog post/facebook status got 2 likes and one was my mom.  Everyone hates me.

3.     My daughter was so kind today, said hello and goodbye, and held my hand the entire way to our car after bible study.  I must be a really good mom.

4.     My daughter stole the toy, pushed down the child holding it, then screamed in defiance when I put her in timeout.  She then ran the perimeter of the church building after bible study as I chased after her to get her in the car.  I’m not good at this motherhood gig like she is; look how her children behave so nicely!

5.     I served/tithed a little extra/gave something away today.  I am a really good follower of Christ.

6.     She moved to Cambodia and is helping rescue women from brothels.  She clearly has her Christian act together a whole lot more than I do.

And this list could go on and on, and on and on.  Compete, compare, repeat.  So many of us move through the world in this constant state of “never enough or sheesh, I’m awesome” and the basis of these thoughts come from assessments of other people, not really of honest assessments of ourselves. 

So what is the remedy?  Well, I don’t know.  But I think it could be this word: COMPASSION.  Compassion means “a feeling of deep sympathy.”  It comes from the latin words ‘pati’ and ‘cum’, which literally mean “to suffer with.”  Compassion is one of the defining characteristics of Jesus.  He moved through his live with a holy amount of compassion.  But compassion is also found all over scripture:    

-     Pharaoh’s daughter had compassion on Moses when she saw him in the basket

-     The prophets scream of the compassion of the Lord, warning Israel to turn back to him lest God should withdraw his compassion, but encouraging and pushing God’s people towards him because of his compassion

-     Jesus had compassion on the hungry crowd + the widow who had lost her husband and son

-     The good Samaritan felt compassion for the injured man

-     In the story of the prodigal son the father had compassion on his son as he returned

-     We are to have compassion on those in prison or towards those who have wronged us, because we look forward to a time and place where wrongs will be no more

Our English word for Compassion is used as at least four different Hebrew and Greek words in scripture:

kamar: to yearn, be kindled back, grow warm and tender, be emotionally agitated                

chamal: to spare, have pity

racham: to love, love deeply, have mercy, be compassionate, have tender affection

splagchnizomai (splank-nee-zo-my): to be moved as to one’s bowels, hence to be moved with compassion (for the bowels were thought to be the seat of love and pity); this means to feel from the deepest part of who we are

Taken together, scripture tells the story of a God who loves us deeply, has mercy on our fickle and imperfect selves, and who has the ability to actually feel with us, even to the deepest, most unspeakable pain.  Let’s not forget that Jesus’ name is Immanuel, God with us. WITH US: that is who Jesus is.  And when he says in Luke 6:36, “Be compassionate as your Father is compassionate” I think he saying more than just “Give the homeless man a granola bar” or “take you friend to coffee and be a good listener” or “make sure you sponsor a World Vision child monthly.”  I think he is saying to do all those things, but I also think implied in that command is something like this: “Give up clinging to your imaginary distinctions, your false sources of identity and self-esteem, and be with each other, care for each other, love each other in the ways I have shown you how to.”

If Jesus is Immanuel, if he with us, if he is compassion… and if the opposite is comparison, we literally cannot be like Jesus as long as we are comparing ourselves to others.  Our made up competitions and standards are keeping us from Jesus.  The hard work we are all doing here of searching the threads of our stories to lean in to a life that is “on purpose” and for the kingdom, all of that can be undone as soon as we scroll through social media feeds and either feel better or worse about ourselves based on someone else’s life.

So I ask the question again: what is the remedy?  And again, I don’t know.  I think it starts with awareness- at least now when we are doing the whole “sizing up” of another person as we look at our phones we will feel a little guiltier about it! There won’t be a formula for this kind of fight, because we are all wired so differently and for some people this is more of a present struggle than for others.  But I would offer that no matter what it looks like for you to live a compassionate life, it probably involves some combination of time in scripture, social media breaks for a little time for heart re-focusing, service that stretches you and goes outside your comfort zone, and big prayers.  Let’s be on our knees about this.  Let’s together ask God to help us keep our eyes up and on him.

This is the radical challenge of our faith.  But friends, we can do this, we can be for each other in every way that matters for eternity.       

It seems impossible that she is this big.  Sitting across from me at our table in a cozy Starbucks, eating a pumpkin scone, saying "cheese" with all the enthusiasm she can muster for her mama.  Wasn't I just rubbing my belly with the anxious dreams of my daughter, who was busy growing and kicking away inside me?  Wasn't it just a few months ago that we were bringing her home from the hospital?  And now, just like that, she's becoming a little girl.  Her thoughts are her own, her questions come from the things she is curious about, and her words are unfiltered and sometimes just so stinking funny.  I look at her and just marvel that she is my daughter.

Some days are hard.  There are timeouts and temper tantrums and moments when I pray she sleeps three hours instead of two at nap time.  But other days the sweetness abounds.  There are "I love you's" and kisses and snuggles with her "brudder" and coloring cards for daddy.  I had no idea what I was actually signing up for when I became a mother, her mother.  But it is honestly the best, best, best.  God teaches me daily how much I need him through my babies, and gives me glimpses of his marvelous love.  What a sweet gift. 

Jesus, with all my heart, I want my motherhood to give you glory.  May these children of mine always remind me of the costly, but beautiful, love our Father has for us.

I do not think I was born with a natural bent toward domesticity- whatever that word actually means in real life.  For example, I do not know how to iron and usually do one of two things when wrinkles become a problem: throw the clothes in the dryer or wait for my mom to come into town and rescue the situation (thank goodness my husband wears scrubs for his job).  I have never stuck with a meal planning system for more than three days in my life, and my laundry routine is, at best, sporadic.  We are not above pulling clean clothes from unfolded baskets—who am I kidding, I am not above pulling sports bras from dirty baskets, but I do draw the line there, in case there was any question.  Ninety-percent of our furniture is a hand-me-down, so our house is a big collection of tattered and unmatched pieces.

But this is our home.  And gosh, we love it.

I am an easily excitable person, and it would take me no less than five minutes to list all the things I wouldn’t mind dabbling in when I grow up.  I love new subjects, new hobbies, new passions, new service opportunities, and there is no end to the love I have for coffee dates and girls’ nights.  Like so many of you, I can fill up our schedule with a lot of good things and it wouldn’t be hard to do.

But lately, even in the midst of God’s stirring and an unrelenting desire to be a part of his kingdom work, my heart has been drawn back home, to my home, to my three people and our hodge-podge furniture.

My sweet daughter is almost two, and she is acting every bit the part.  Independent, strong-willed, funny, testing boundaries and needing guidance and discipline and love and snuggles every single day.  My son is six-months old, pushing his little arms up so high and kick, kick, kicking his feet as he watches his sister run and play and do all the things I know he is dying to try with her.  And my husband is in the thick of his last semester of nursing school, up until midnight studying at our big kitchen table and back up with the sun with his Bible open.  And me, even as I pursue life-giving and God-inspired dreams, I am realizing more and more each day that of all the things I want to do, see, know, and experience in this world, these three people and their lives are my most important work.  I don’t want to miss it, miss them, miss the opportunity to make a space for them that is a refuge, a place they want to be because love and homemade pizza abound. 

I know God is so very intentional with us.  Our time and places are not an accident, and neither are our passions and dreams.  We were made to do kingdom work, to struggle for justice, to show the watching world a Savior who is alive and well.  We will feel discontent until we find our role in that kind of work, I really believe that.  But… our marriages, our homes, our people, our first place; those are the things that will keep our hearts burning for the right kind of work because they are the best kind of work.  Let’s never neglect the best for the good.  I think even the worst homemakers among us (that would be me) can do this.  We can ask God for the capacity to have a life’s work that includes world-changing endeavors and couch-snuggling bedtime stories.  With our eyes on Jesus, both can have our best.

I think all the best things happen near the ocean.  Love, laughter, friendship, awe.

I just spent 48 hours with my best friend at her home in Santa Barbara.  I met her daughter for the first time, and our babies met each other and we made them hold hands, Ryen smiled and Cannon scoffed.  Boys and girls are cute like that.  But we spent the weekend at the sweet pace where comfort meets honesty, slow but intentional.  We talked about the gospel and comparison and how amazing it was of God to create waves, how their rhythm reminds us that as long as their is life he is at work in it.  

There is truly nothing like friendship, and my soul needs it in the deepest ways.   We all do.  Every bit of how God created us to encourage one another was thought up with attention to every single detail, down to the exact time and places and circumstances our paths would cross and then walk along side one another.  What a gift.  Thank you, Jesus, for big oceans and people to sit in wonder at them with. 

Y'all, I need to talk to you about this pumpkin bread.

I am not a food blogger.  Hardly consider myself a cook.  But I do love food, and I do eat quite a bit of it. So I believe that qualifies me to tell you when you absolutely must bake something, and this bread is one of those things.  I have made two batches in two days.  The first batch was supposed to be for neighbors and we accidentally ate the whole thing.  But we did give most of the second batch away to friends, people we still want to get to know on our street, and people we are praying for, in cute miniature bread pans, just because.

Sometimes it is the littlest things that make me so happy.  This pumpkin bread makes the list.  Trust me, you really should make it, love it, then share it.

October Bread

1 and 3/4 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp. allspice
3/4 tsp. salt
2 eggs
3/4 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 can pumpkin
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/4 cup orange juice
3/4 cup white chocolate chips
*Adapted slightly from this recipe

Set the oven at 350 and then mix all the dry ingredients in a bowl.  Beat eggs, sugars, pumpkin, oil and orange juice until well blended.  Add the dry ingredients until combined.  Fold in white chocolate chips.  Bake in mini-bread pans 30-35 minutes (regular bread pan 50- 55 minutes).  Keep the oven rack low to keep the top from getting too dark.

Sit back, let your whole house smell of heaven, and then eat a warm slice and thank the good Lord above for creating the pumpkin. 

The cool fall weather is settling in around here, and with it out come the leggings, boots, sweaters and scarves.  I did not truly experience a real fall season until I moved to Pennsylvania at twenty-two years old, but since then my home has been in places that are true four season locales, and I could not love this beautiful one called autumn more.  I love the warmer, cozier clothes.  I love the pumpkin candles and burnt orange leaves.  I love needing a sweater and warm socks in the morning.  Everything about the fall feels comfortable to me.

This weekend, Alex and I did a big closet clean-out.  We filled seven grocery bags full of clothes to give away, and filled a huge plastic bag with clothes that had simply run their course and should never been seen on a person again.  It felt so good to make space, to simplify, to give myself a little shaming for ever thinking “I don’t have anything to wear” because yesterday’s deep dive into drawers and back ends of closets proved that I do, indeed, have plenty to wear.  Thoughts of wasteful consumerism certainly filled my head as I put things in the donation bag that I remember needing when I bought them, only to think now “did I ever really like this?”  But what struck me the most was that I have held on to clothes for years, like eight to ten of them, since I was a college student.  And as I held them up to assess their wear and damage, I remembered clearly the insecure young girl who wore them all, who lived in a body every single day that was anything but comfortable to me.

I really did love college.  I played a sport that I loved, met my best friends and grew spiritually more than any other season of my life.  But I hated my body.  I desperately wanted the flat and defined stomach so many of the girls on my soccer team had, and I wanted to wear a tank top more than anything in that 100 degree-plus heat.  But I only ever saw huge arms as I walked by windows and I was certain that everyone had to be thinking the same thing I was: she should cover those things up.  So I did, my arms and my whole body.  I wore big baggy t-shirts and athletic shorts in the summers, and big baggy t-shirts and way-too-large sweat pants in the winter. (It should be getting clearer to you at this point why I had exactly two dates in college).  I hid what I was afraid of, even though my heart truly wanted people to see past it all.  And I did crazy things like work out three hours a day or take a laxative, but these only exacerbated that binge-starve cycle and my poor body never changed. 

It has been eleven years since I started college.  I had ten surgeries on my left knee in six years.  I then had two babies in less than two years.  And this weekend, I threw away remnants of a girl who hated her body.  Finally.  Because I don’t hate it anymore.  It has taken a lot of years of scripture and an unbelievably affirming husband, but I really don’t hate my body anymore.  It has done amazing, miraculous things for me.  I even wear tank tops now.

I think about all the things I have let hinder the woman God created me to be, and I just want to throw them all away: poor body image, low self-esteem, even singleness for a season.  And like most women, I will always be insecure about my physical self—which I think is a symptom of longing for heaven more than this earth.  But I don’t want to spend another decade of my life hanging on to things: to lies or sins or hang-ups that are so clearly not from God.  I want to be a whole lot better at throwing things away.  Over and over again.  We can only make room for the things we use and need in this life if we clear out the space where we kept the junk.  And junk is not from God.  He made us and it was good.  We are good.  Sometimes it takes the hard work of cleaning up and throwing out to live in to that goodness, but it is worth it every time.             

Silence.  It is not something I deal well with.  I’m a filler, an out-loud processor, someone who likes the television on while I cook dinner and only turns the music off in the car if my phone rings.  I’ve always preferred conversation to quiet, crowded beaches to places of solitude.  The introverted pieces of my heart work themselves out with time alone, but not time in silence; like reading in coffee shops, or people watching at airports.

And then… these words from a wise man: “Only speak if you can improve the silence.” Profound, really.

The trouble for me is that I have never thought of silence as a good starting place.  (Unless there are sleeping children, as any mama knows there are few things more glorious than a perfectly quiet house in the middle of the afternoon). I am not someone who naturally appreciates the absence of conversation.  In fact, most often I seek out conversation rather than sit alone with my thoughts.  But that’s just the thing; maybe people like me really do need a little more quiet.

Because it is when I am finally quiet that I realize how much the world is already screaming at us, “Be this!” “Buy that!” or “Look like her!” It is when I’m quiet that I can hear the passions of my heart speak out rather than have popular culture or well-intentioned advice from others tell me what they should be.  It is when I’m finally quiet, still, that I notice how much my soul really needs it.

Since hearing those words, I’ve been thinking a lot about all of the beautiful things that silence really is for us. It is space for the Holy Spirit to speak, time for the rhythm of our lives to find its best pace, intentionality to listen to someone else without thinking of our next words, and it is rest, beautiful, peaceful, rest.  If we all thought of our words as something that could improve the silence, I wonder how much less we might actually say and how much more we would hear.  And while words are beautiful and encouraging and absolutely life giving, sometimes, so is the silence.  As much as I love life’s soundtrack of good conversations, laughing children, beautiful music, dinner cooking and footsteps all around our house, I also love the peace of hearing nothing.  Because sometimes, that is when I hear the most important things.    

I remember this time last year all too well.  I was newly pregnant with my second baby, we had just taken in an eight-year-old girl for three months of respite care, my mother-in-law was recovering from surgery to remove a cancerous kidney, I was teaching a new class for the first time and I was Overwhelmed.  Capital "O."  And zero fun to be around.  My journal from that season of life is mostly empty, and I know for sure my Bible sat unopened on my nightstand (I vaguely remember moving it to a place I wouldn't see it every day and feel the knowing guilt that I was supposed to be looking there for peace, for rest, for anything to take the edge off the anxiety).  In the exact season I needed Him most, I made no space for Jesus.

As I sit here with the back door open, feeling the cool breeze of the end of this lovely Indian Summer we are enjoying, life feels so different than just twelve short months ago.  And I know that is because I've been reminded to make space for Jesus.  And I have.

What none of us need are more words, more lectures telling us to have our "quiet time."  We don't need to be told again that Jesus prayed and so should we.  We know this well.  We don't need guilt, or shame, or to lie about how deep the roots of our spiritual lives are growing because of our time in study (I may have done this once or twice.  I've been a Christian long enough to know how to fake it).  But we do need truth.  And the truth is that even when every single thing in life fights against it, we have to make space for Jesus.  Nothing will be more important. 

We need friends to text us scripture, quotes, anything that is breathing life in to them so that we can feel the warmth of their fire and borrow it's heat.

We need to set the alarm.  But if we miss it or if the babies wake up with us (and so often, they will), we need to play the grace card and push back the belief that if it doesn't happen in the morning quiet then their is no redeemable time for Jesus in the day.  Take back the car rides, the dinner preparation time, the shower, the instagram browsing, and there is time.

We need to weave prayer, God's word, and good people to talk about it all with into our lives.  Our every day, folding laundry, pushing strollers, checking email lives.

For me, the combination of a 5:15am alarm + the accountability of friends + Trader Joe's cold brew coffee has been magic.  And I'm saying this from the deepest place of my soul: it's working.  God's word is changing me, my marriage, my parenting, my eyes towards the world.  I'm dreaming and thinking and getting excited about things and actually doing them.  I've missed joy and presence during entire seasons of my life because of anxiety, because I haven't made even just a little bit of margin for Jesus.  And now I'm finding that when I start to make that space, all of a sudden I don't want to simply fit him in on the edges but to start with him at the center and build life around him.  And he is making me different because of it.

There is no question that life will surely scratch away at this bit of a "sweet spot" I have found.  I'll forget the feeling of excitement to open God's word early in the morning.  I'll get busy or stressed or feel like I have to handle more important things first.  And then once again, someone will remind me that there is no more important thing, that we won't take anything with us home to heaven but the beautiful, living words of God.  Let's do this for each other: point one another back to the Source consistently, daily, without reservation.  The world needs followers of Jesus to come alive, to seek their calling with passion, to know scripture and to live it.  And that starts in the space where it is just you and Him, working it all out together.