I Choose Gratitude

One of my recent Christian Women's Job Corps graduates sent me a text at 6:20 this morning to let me know she couldn't come in to volunteer today because she didn't have a place to stay and needed to find a shower before reporting to her part time job this evening.  Her reality shook any thought of grumbling about a short night right out of my head.

I choose gratitude.

The roof over my head isn't mine.  It isn't permanent.  But, it's a safe and warm shelter, a space graciously offered to me by people more dear to me than words can say.
The sun often rises before I'm ready to push back the covers, but there are covers, and there is work, and all that a regular paycheck provides.
My family is not without its share of difficulties, but each one is safe, sheltered, and fed.  Parents and children sleep securely under the same roof each night.
My car is making a funny noise, and I have to manually roll down the windows and unlock the doors on it, but it's almost mine.  Each day, I come and go as I please thanks to those tires.
I'm trying to eat healthier these days.  I'm choosing grilled over fried, water over soda, greens over carbs.  It's not fun, but the question is never when or where or how I'm going to eat, rather simply what I will eat.

It's Tuesday, and I want to just be thankful for Cajun Shrimp nail polish and tweetable quotes from my hilarious coworkers, for Saturdays at the pool and courageous friends who help my faith grow by sharing their own, for that tube of cortisone cream I almost forgot was in my purse till the 11 year old sitting next to me in church needed it, and for babies who call me "Horton".  I am thankful for all of those things.  So thankful.  Yet, today I'm acutely aware of the extravagance of those graces in my life.  Today, my list starts all the way back up at the necessities I've taken for granted.  Shelter. Clothing. Food. Safety. And, the God Who Sees it all.

It's Thankful Tuesday (Get Used to It)

So, it looks like this is going to become a regular thing around here.  It's good for me. Maybe you'd like to play, too!  Link-up here. 

• I''m thankful I was able to stay home yesterday and rest. After two very, very full weeks of fuller-than-usual time ministry, I needed that break. 
• I'm thankful that when I finally came out of the closet last week and admitted to some of my closest friends that, yes, I actually do like cats better than dogs, they gasped,  but decided to love me anyway. 
• I'm thankful for a church that takes off a regular Sunday to worship with the homeless population in our city.  It was refreshing in ways I still don't have words to express properly.
• I'm thankful that Dr. Brad and Stephanie are the kind of friends that even though I've known them for just over a year, I'll miss them much when they've moved.  
• I'm thankful for Joy, who agrees with me that grocery shopping can be a shared activity. Walmart, Costco, and Target are much less daunting with a friend by my side. 
• I'm thankful for birthdays and the annual excuse they give me to celebrate the amazing people in my life.  
• I'm thankful for positive peer pressure and an excuse to practice thankfulness and for how this little exercise always improves my disposition. 
• I'm thankful that D'Ann called Friday afternoon at the last minute to meet up, thankful we were able to sop up every bit of that hour together and didn't have to waste any time getting reacquainted though it's been months between visits. 

Does It Matter?

There are hundreds (if not thousands) of women in this city in need.  Real need.  Need for housing, clothing, food.  Need for medical attention, need for safe shelter, need for spiritual and emotional nurturing.  Hundreds (if not thousands) of women with deep and profound needs.

I've spent the last two weeks of my life pouring all that I've got to give into six of them.  Just six.

On Day One, I read Ephesians 2:10 to them, "For you are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus to do good works with He prepared in advance that you would walk in them."  I told them that they have worth and value.  I wanted them to view themselves that way, and I wanted them to know that I view them that way, having worth and value.

Every day I've learned a little more about them.  None of them has lived a life untouched by tragedy or failure.  Three of them are homeless.  Two of them have been incarcerated.  One of them has been arrested more than 60 times.  All of them have been married and divorced multiple times, one of them to the same man four times!  Three of them have children with felony records. One of them had her first child at 14 years of age -- she's five years older than me, has 7 children, and 6 grandchildren!  One of them is a breast cancer survivor. Most of them are survivors of sexual abuse that began in their earliest years.  I could go on and on and on.

I've been involved with classes like this one for most of the last six years.  The reality is, these lives are messy and tangled and the majority of them won't look any different a year from now once the high of the last 10 days wears off.  Lasting life change isn't easy.  Old habits die hard.  Peer pressure is powerful.

Conversations with others, attempting to explain myself, this ministry, these women often leave me wondering if I'm not wasting my time, wasting my life giving so much of myself to "hopeless" causes.

My alarm went off this morning, and I sat up feeling like I hadn't slept at all.  Tired, spent, wondering where the mental and emotional resources were going to come from to pull off another day of class.  I had a list of errands that had to be run before I even got to the office/classroom.  As has become my habit, I began mentally calling their six names before the Lord, handing each of them over to Him and asking Him to do all that I couldn't do for them, asking Him to bring them here and make this day count.

"God, will it all matter?  Is it worthwhile?"

For she is My workmanship created in My Son to do good works that only she can do which I planned long ago for her to accomplish.

Thankful Tuesday

As a freshman in college, I met a bright and shiny girl who wore a lot of yellow and was always accosting me in the SUB on Tuesdays asking me what I was thankful for.  (I may or may not have intentionally dodged her a time or two.)  She forever changed my Tuesdays, and gave me a concrete way to regularly practice gratitude.  Now, she's taken her Thankful Tuesday challenge to the world wide web, and invited us all to play.  So, here it goes:

• I'm thankful that every thought and memory of my friend Micha brings such a smile to my heart. 
• I'm thankful for six beautiful women sitting in my Christian Women's Job Corps classroom today, eagerly learning tools for life and employment.
• I'm thankful for funny text messages about boys from friends near and far in the middle of a hectic morning that pull a smile from my frowny face.
• I'm thankful for how selflessly my Mama loves her Mom, setting an example for me to follow.
• I'm thankful that God put the book of Habakkuk in the Bible and that when I most need to be reminded of its lessons He puts it into my teaching rotation. 
• I'm thankful for my church family and how they love me well.  In the last week alone, they've provided lunches for my CWJC ladies, picked up friends from the airport when I couldn't, and come over early on a Saturday morning to cover my pet sitting responsibilities so I could be with my sick grandmother. 
• I'm thankful that Thankful Tuesday and the time it's taken to put this list together has radically changed my attitude today. 

I'm Not Too Cool

My newsfeeds are filled with Scripture, lyrics, and exclamations proclaiming the GREAT news that we celebrate this Easter weekend.  Jesus is alive, and "by His stripes we are healed."  My heart rejoices, my thoughts run gleefully down the path of forgiveness and grace and redemption.  It's wondrous.

I fight this internal battle about posting, though.  Holidays always feel like a bandwagon to me, and I really don't like bandwagons.  Everyone expects me to post something about Easter today, so I think I'll just stay silent.  That's what the cool kids do.

Oh, but I'm not a cool kid.

I'm not too cool to tell you that the resounding thought in my head since I woke this morning has been, "Oh, praise the One who paid my debt and raised this life up from the dead!"

I'm not too cool to tell you that the cross and the resurrection are THE best news in all of history.  Without that, nothing else matters.  "And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain ... If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied."

I'm not too cool to tell you you that the cross of Jesus, His death, burial, and resurrection, the price He paid for my sin, the way He made for me to have right relationship with God and eternal life wrecks me.  In the best possible way.

Waiting for Easter

I  have to be honest.  I was totally skeptical about this Lent thing.  It is not something anyone I knew well ever practiced, nor something I understood.  Anything I might give up would, of course, seem silly in comparison with the ultimate sacrifice of Christ.  How could a few weeks without sodas or chocolate or television really change the way I worship or celebrate Easter?

I believe I was approximately 4 days into this experiment the first time I heard myself praying, "Lord, Jesus, I really do love you more than crunchy tacos and Diet Dr Pepper ... please get me past this craving today."  It wouldn't be the last time.

With over two weeks of Lent left to go, I can say in all sincerity that this often-amusing season of sacrifice has been one of the most revealing practices of my adult life.  I'm humbled by just how weak I am.  I'm amazed by how swift and strong the temptation to trade my worship for so many lesser things captures my attention.  I'm embarrassed that when it came time to decide on what I'd give up, there was such a long list of possibilities.  I am spoiled.

And, I don't remember the last time I was this excited about Easter.  Not because I can (FINALLY) satisfy a silly craving, but because all these revelations have served to continually and repeatedly turn my heart toward my Savior, toward the magnitude of His sacrifice, toward the hope of Easter.  Resurrection. Redemption. Eternal Life.  Because this season of going without has served to stir up a longing in me for the satisfaction only He provides.  Because Easter is a single day designated to celebrate the reality Christians walk in every day.

Six Inches

Driving home last night, on a very familiar residential street, about a mile from my bed, I heard a loud noise and thought something struck my windshield.  I flinched, but continued driving.  A few seconds later, I glanced over my left shoulder and realized there was a dime-sized hole in the rear driver's side window and the entire glass was shattered. Not knowing, what else to do, I continued driving.  As I went over a speed bump, the glass began to crumble into the back seat, and the hole got larger.  By the time I got home, this is what it looked like.

That hole originated just six inches behind my head.  I don't know if it was a sling shot, a bb gun, or what.  I haven't been able to find anything in my car to tell me what was shot at me.

Last night, I was in shock.  As my roommates said, I was "eerily" calm.  My heart was beating with palpable force, but to the outside observer, I was serene.  I called the police, filed a report, called my insurance agent, filed a claim, and calmly readied for bed.  I spoke with four different friends, assured them I was okay, then pulled the covers up, turned the lights out, and allowed myself a brief bout of tears of release.

This morning, I felt like I'd ridden a bad roller coaster.  My whole body ached as though I'd been violently shaken, and my head pounded with remnants of unshed tears.  I walked out to look at the car again, and felt sick at my stomach.  Six inches.

I made an appointment with the glass repair guys, sat down to drink my coffee and read my Bible.  Psalm 139.  "The dark is as light to you."  God knows as though it happened in broad daylight who stood on that curb and what they fired at me.  "You hem me in behind and before."  God chose the impact point.  He measured the inches.  All six of them.  "Every day ordained for me was written in your book before one of them came to be."  I woke up sore, shaky, but alive and well today because "This is the day the Lord has made."  I will rejoice and be glad in it.