Step by Step

Our youngest daughter is in 1st grade and has been working on "First, Then, Next, Last" in school.  We like to quiz each other about how to do things around the house just to see how well she has caught on to the concept!

What I have learned is that it is not my daughter who needs help with this concept-but it's actually me who has no idea what to do first, then, next, and last in the correct order.

I am not alone! I see this all the time in the lives of my friends.

Maybe that is why I feel so normal!?

While it is true, that we can't predict every thing that will happen to us-we can make sure we have a pretty decent plan in place to make sure we are at least moving in the right direction.

I have been counting the chickens before they hatch for years!  I blame it on my emotional decision making and capacity to day dream.

Our generation is known for expecting things to happen out of order.

Failure to Launch

A few years ago a movie came out with Matthew McConaughey and Sarah Jessica Parker  called "Failure to Launch."  Basically, McConaughey's character was a 35 year old man still living at his parents home and sleeping in the same bed as he did when he was 6 years old.

Failure to Launch.

As parents our end goal is the launch. The day we drop them off at college...or whatever direction the choose their lift off...

No-that does not make it easy OR unemotional...but, LAUNCHING is still the goal.

Restless Heart Syndrome

When I was pregnant with Cassity, I began experiencing a feeling as if my legs were trapped.  As it turned out, I was experiencing Restless Leg Syndrome . 

The only way I can explain it is when I was a kid and taking gymnastics, there was this "pit" of foam blocks that we could jump into for fun.  Once, I got trapped.  The pit was probably 6 feet deep and filled to the rim with foam and some how my legs got trapped so far down that I couldn't move.

I can remember feeling panicked and trapped.  It really felt like the walls were beginning to cave in on me.  If I could just move my legs I would be fine!

Back then, my RLS ususally came out of nowhere-but when it came, it usually came while I was in the car.

I can remember riding home one night from Adam's parents and making him pull over so that I could get out and pace until the trapped feeling that I was experiencing was gone.

Now a days, I experience RLS when I am the most tired and lay down to go to bed. 

I know, it makes no sense.

So I get up and pace back and forth and it goes away, and back to bed I go.

In the last few years, it has felt like I have had restless heart syndrome.

God has planted this unrest in my heart and has given me very little guidance outside of it.  I am antsy to get to work.  I want to do every thing.  I want to volunteer in every thing.  I want start programs and new ministries and dream about what could be.  I do not want to be a generation that missed it's opportunity!

I am restless.

I feel trapped by my circumstances.

I try to pace.  I try to stay busy and I also try to rest.  I try to tell myself that maybe if I would just be still, that God would reveal to me what this is all about.

My heart seems steady but the direction seems blurry.

I am trying to keep my hands open with a posture of trust...I don't need to be in charge. (At least that is what I am telling myself.)

I know that God has called me to something.. I just don't see it yet.

So I wait.

Do you ever have those times in your life?  When you just don't know what God is going to do with you? 

How do you wait?  I'd love to hear from you!

Currently Listening to: We are

Sand Trapping

Have you ever noticed that if you pick up a handful of sand and squeeze it really tight it just pours right out?  HOWEVER! If you scoop up the sand and cup it in your opened hand-it stays...

(...and yes, in my picture, it is sugar.  I live in Indiana, people!  Who do you think I am? Jimmy Buffett? ) 

Anyway.

I think the same goes for the people in our life.  If we try to hold on too tight, they can slip away.  Our intentions are to protect the ones we love by being over protective, and maybe a little over possessive, because we love them so much and don't want to lose them.

 The truth is, nobody wants to be smothered or controlled and what we truly fear, ends up happening as our loved ones flee from our tight grip.

We want to be in relationships with people who trust us and give us the freedom to fly and support us even when we strike out.  When we give the people in our lives the freedom to fly, they will feel respected and valued and they will return to us again and again and again.


This is not a revolutionary thought, but paints a very accurate picture of what it means to "catch and release."

We all can think relationships in our lives where we might have held on too tightly.  We did so out of fear, but lost in the long run. Maybe it was with a friend, a child, a parent, a sibling, or a spouse...our intentions were pure, but we held on too tight out of fear.  Fear of losing them, fear of NOT being in control of them and pushed them away.

Dr. Phil says:
"what we fear, we create."

I think he is right.

The things that we usually fear most in our lives end up coming true because we are so busy focusing on the fear-than actually enjoying the time we have.

We all want to be loved but we also want freedom to grow and to breath. Maybe it's time we let go. Maybe we need to open up our hands and let the people in our lives take a breath!  Trust them!  Trust God.

Let's practice!

All This Time.

I can remember laying in my bed, in my college apartment, watching as my roommates were getting ready for class when the phone rang and it was my mom telling me that there had been a plane crash into the World Trade Center.

The first thing I thought was that it must have been an accident.  I imagined something must have gone wrong with the plane!

As I was on the phone, I told my roommates to go turn on our tiny 13 inch television in the living room so that we could watch  the news, when a second airplane hit the second tower!

Our country was under an attack.

In that very moment, for the three of us 20 year old girls standing in an apartment in Indiana and for the rest of the entire world,

things would never be the same.

13 years have flashed before our eyes.  I look at my children (ages 10,8, and 5) and realize that they do not know a life without terrorism and war.  Our kids do not know what it is like to live without Homeland Security.

It's always a humbling feeling to explain to a child what happened on September 11, 2001.
I imagine, as a child, it must feel the same way it feels when I hear about President Kennedy being assassinated, I wasn't born, but the people who were, remember exactly where they were and what they were doing.

We can't understand the logistics.

Why are we hated so much?

In the eyes of a child, it's even harder to imagine the hatred that is aimed toward us.

"Maybe, if they knew our family, maybe they would like America!?" said one of my kids.


The answer is, we don't know why the hatred for us has boiled over for them!

What we can know is that our God is bigger than terrorism, bigger than war, bigger than hate,  bigger than violence and threats.

We can trust that God is compassionate and grieves with us. God is a peaceful God and a God that comforts.

We can have faith, we can have hope and we can have love... and I think that they are stronger than any terrorist group. 
As parents, we don't have to have the answers, when we can point our children to God and direct their hearts to a trusting relationship with Him!


"We don't yet see things clearly. We're squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won't be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We'll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing him directly just as he knows us! But for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly. And the best of the three is love." 
1 Corinthians 13:12-13 The Message Version

Mappin' it Out

Last weekend, I was honored to speak to our Youth at our XP service.  It was the first week of our ROADSIGNS series.


This is the message of Andy Stanley's book Principle of the Path.


(A delicious book that YOU should read....like..yesterday!)


The idea is that it is our DIRECTION not our INTENTION that leads us to our DESTINATION.


The principle of the path applies to every path, whether it's your dating life, your friends or your future.


It's ALWAYS your direction-not your intentions, not your hopes, not your dreams, not your prayers, not your beliefs-that ultimately determine your direction.

As a teenager, you might say, "I am nowhere near sure what direction I am heading...I am just here to have fun!  I will worry about my destination when I get to college!!"

True. Kind of.


The reality is, we all have an idea of where we would like to be in the future.  It looks different for the stage of life you are in..

.......but be real-we can all have the intention to do something, but until we set our feet to action, we will never get there!


I want to go to college:  but I never studied and didn't try in High School.

I want to get a job:  but I am too busy taking selfies.

I want to get married: but I keep dating ANYONE and EVERYONE and not looking for THE ONE.

I want to have a better relationship with God: but I don't pursue it.

I want to be a better friend: but I just don't have time.


Last week, I talked about Solomon, (who was  totally wise! )  and how he was trying to warn a guy from making a bad decision.

Proverbs 7: 7-27

Sometimes, we are  not open to hear what people who are older than us have to say.  "What could they possibly know? "


The truth is...
Wisdom and perspective is earned.  We earn it by living through it!


Listen to those around you-perhaps they see something that you haven't considered.  Ultimately, it's your decision, the direction you go-

Just like I said last weekend, a map is only good to us if we know where we are going!


If you don't know where you are going... any road can take you there.


Intentions are great!  The direction takes work.   Steady your heart.

The Slow Fade: Moving the Line

High School Graduation, 1999

Join me this month on orangeleaders.com as I write a 4 week study of

The Slow Fade by Reggie Joiner, Church Bomar, & Abbie Smith 




Week 1

Week 2

Week 3

Week 4