PearlS | The Average Pearl

Not so alone

The last time I saw her alive and well–well being the more remarkable descriptor–was the day before Christmas break. We were seventh graders sprawled out on the floor of the language arts teacher’s room, eating popcorn and watching Babes in Toyland, a bunch of kids who had known each other since kindergarten. We were all so excited for Christmas we could barely hear the movie over our chitchat.

I don’t know how I would have felt if I knew what was going to happen. It makes me tear up to think about it, even today, over two decades later. It changed my life.

Angela had the biggest, goofiest personality, a space between her top two teeth that could hold a tic tac, and skin the color of caramel latte. On the bus she would scoot down into the seat, press her knees into the seatback in front, and belt out, “I’m a barbie girl, in a barbie wo-orld.” She was hilarious, a crazy jumble of arms and legs that would break out dancing without warning. Thirteen years old. Our school’s most promising comedienne.

Angela’s family was traveling to Texas for Christmas, driving through the night on a twisty road. It might have been icy–I don’t remember the details. I recall my mom getting a phone call that informed us of the accident. It was a semi that hit them on a blind corner somewhere in Arkansas–they never saw it coming. It killed Angie’s parents and older brother and sister on impact, as they were in the front of the van. Angela and her younger brother were presumably asleep in the back seat, and they were taken to a hospital in critical condition.

It so happened that my family was visiting our grandparents in southern Missouri for the holiday. We were only forty-five minutes from the hospital, so we made quick plans to go visit Angela and her little brother, Jean-Paul, who had been a student in my mom’s third grade class a couple years prior.

On that December day–I think it was the day after Christmas–I put on my new black sweater and climbed into the back of the car, scared. We drove in silence and sadness, full of sorrow for what the future held for my friend. This was years before I even knew to consider brain injury–my twelve year old self mostly wondered if Angie would be back at school. Even if she did get better, how could a seventh grader live after two-thirds of her family was gone?

At the door to ICU my dad gently touched my shoulder and said, “Pearl, I want you to be prepared for how they might look. It’s possible,” he hesitated, “…it’s possible Angela or Jean-Paul could be missing an arm or something. We just don’t know how badly they are hurt. Are you ready?”
I swallowed and nodded. Then he pushed a button on the wall and a nurse led us into the room.

Angela and her brother were in two beds, side by side. They were both in medically-induced comas, white hospital blankets covering them up to their chin. We were their first visitors–it was just us and them, a consuming silence within a hum of life-supporting machines. I felt an immediate, unwelcome grief slap my in my face. No preparation was sufficient, nothing would have readied me to see them in this condition. Mom and Dad approached the bed and quietly, gently, tenderly they spoke to Angela as if she were an infant. “Hey there, Angela,” my mother whispered as she stroked her black hair. There were bits of broken glass still stuck to it, road rash on her face, eyes purple and swollen shut. “We came to visit you,” my dad said, leaning toward her face. He coached our basketball team, had seen her long limbs flying down the court.

After a few moments, my mom moved over to Jean-Paul’s bed, so I took her place at Angela’s side.

“You can hold her hand,” the nurse softly encouraged, and I was suddenly aware she hadn’t lost an arm. Words stuck in my throat. I held her hand and tried not to cry, told her we loved her and missed her at school, even though we still had a week and a half before it would be in session. I squeezed her hand, willing it to squeeze back like I’d read about in novels. She didn’t squeeze back.

After a while, we left. There was nothing we could do, it seemed. It was dark in the room; it felt hopeless. On our drive back, I cried hot, angry tears as I stared out the window.

Three days later, back home in our small town, I worked on an art project at our kitchen table. My mom had sketched out an M.C. Escher, Metamophasis, on a 3 foot by 5 foot poster paper, and I glued bits of torn colored paper to fill in the bird impressions while listening to Christmas music. The phone rang and Mom answered. Angela was dead. It was December 29th. I stood up from my seat at the table, went to my room, and bawled on my bed.

I wondered how I would write about the time we lost them. When Christmas vacation comes, I always wait for the lump in my throat to dissipate, and it never does.
I hesitate a bit writing this, because even though time has passed I know Jean-Paul is out there somewhere, undoubtedly swallowed up in loss every Christmas, mourning what he lost as a ten or eleven year old. His privacy matters to me, his story is his and not mine. His pain is deeper. He was a child when it happened, and II think about the trauma compounded by not understanding why this happened–how God could allow all the people he loved most to die over Christmas vacation. How a child could wake up from a coma to his whole world, a heap of ashes. I never saw him again. His extended family took him in and raised him somewhere in the city, I think.

When a person we love dies, we often remember all the good things they did in life, their wonderful qualities. But sometimes the blow is just too massive and the people left behind are stunned. Listing what’s been lost is unbearable. Sometimes the survivor needs a witness more than they need details.
John Steinbeck once wrote a letter to a friend, Ed Ricketts, who was grieving the death of his mother:

The matter of death is very personal–almost like an idea–and it has to be discovered and accepted over and over again no matter what the age or the condition of the dying. And there is nothing for the outsider to do except to stand by and maybe to indicate that the person involved is not so alone as the death always makes him think he is. And that is why I am writing this letter.

Our small town held a memorial for Angela’s family before school started up in January. The high school gym was packed with red, teary faces. I witnessed the adoration the community had for this family, expressed with a sorrow so heavy it hung in the air like fog. We were too late to tell them we loved them; we were too stunned at the permanence of death.

If it finds Jean-Paul, I hope he knows I remember. I’m counting: it’s been exactly 23 years. I’m still discovering the pain over and over, too, every December 29th, still reliving a tiny fraction of his despair. His family isn’t forgotten. I’ll remember them with words and the grief that rushes in every December.

I hope it makes him feel not so alone.

Encouragement to Public Schoolers

Frequently I see these types of articles written–books as well–that are all about motivating and encouraging the home schooling mother (and father) to be steadfast in their convictions. I know people are buying these books, because as a Christmas present to myself, I purchased software that tells me the exact number of people, per month, are searching for key words on Google and Amazon.

I’m no creep, just a nerdy wannabe book writer looking for my niche.

The funny thing is, there are next to zero books encouraging the public schooler to stay the course. Homeschoolers have a great cloud of witnesses–mostly from their co-op and Facebook groups. I say this with respect, as some of the people I love most in life homeschool: Homeschoolers seem to have the added veterans’ benefits. Their service, as any good Christian homeschooling book will tell them, carries significantly more meaning. A holy calling, perhaps.
Public schoolers, the less anointed, are simply hacking their way through the bush.

I’ve been thinking about this for a long time, partly because I want to sell my books on Amazon, but mostly because I think there is some serious puzzlement surrounding the conservative Christian parenting community today. It’s an elephant in the room sort of dispute, one with firm, heart-burning convictions. Stepping on toes is rude, but I am afraid not speaking honestly is infinitely worse. I’ll attempt to drag the beast into the light.

A week ago, per usual, another man from our church congregation approached my husband, motioned to my family, and asked my husband if we homeschooled our children. Per usual, I needed to walk away. I, too, have firm, heart-burning convictions. There is a sense that, if your children are well-mannered or well-behaved in any way, it must be owed to the fact that the man is an excellent father, leading the home in all integrity while the mother is at home patiently working algebra equations with obedient, above-average children. Sometimes I think judgment weighs heaviest in a place where we feel enlightened. Encourage one another! The good book says, and we hold our superiority (false wisdom wearing church clothes) over another’s head, ready to drop it given the chance.

Rarely has anyone in the church assumed in my presence that we are public schoolers, that my husband is a workaholic, that we struggle daily to ask for forgiveness and say kind words to each other.

The sweetest of souls at church (and I encourage you to seek them) are generally happy to see a small boy resting his head on his mother’s lap in the pew beside them, or the tiny girl spinning in her Elsa dress and sparkly reindeer antlers. They pat me on the shoulder and remind me time will fly by and to enjoy every minute of it. Sure, they forget the monotony and wear and tear of minions, but these dear ones never mention the educational path we are treading. They only remark on the loveliness of children, the glory of youth, the fleeting aspect of time. They lean forward and see my babies in the moment, never prescribing methods of enlightenment or discipline. “Keep at it,” they say, and this is the limit of their exhortation.

And so I have been keeping at it, and outside of church I do not offer anything more as far as advice goes. What is one supposed to say to the man (who hasn’t asked me, but rather my peacemaking husband) who queries if we homeschool? It is trite to say, “We’re trying to be in the world but not of it”–my husband’s go-to, church-acceptable answer. It gets us out of the sanctuary and home to lunch on time, so it will suffice. But let me explain why it is trite:

It barely scratches the surface of conviction.

Our intent, actually, is to be incredibly peculiar, even more so than your demure, denim skirt clad homeschooler with braids. We want the world to see Jesus, only Jesus, and marvel at a love that never gives up and never walks away. A love that sees and understands where the need is and wants better for children–all children. An honesty that demands integrity, but also compassion. We want community that stirs other parents to understand the value of their child. We want families who are hurting to behold a God who made them for a purpose, no matter their circumstances. A God who is very near to the brokenhearted in a broken world. A God who is near to us is God who can be near to them.

It has been a year and a half since we came back to public school. I knew I was again a legit public schooler when I dropped Jubal off and tossed out last minute warnings, “Don’t forget your snow boots! And don’t let the chicken leg fall out of the door when you shut it!” I am back to chauffeuring and kids eating grocery store deli meals in the car before cello lessons. It is its own kind of wild and free.

A year and a half–this is enough time for the fire in my belly to have died down to embers. It’s no good to cook immediately over an open flame; the temperature is too erratic–scorching, at best. I’ve had more time to roll it around in my mind, and now it makes better sense. I can write about it without feeling too touchy, without risking scorching others. I admit, I was hurt by the insinuations of homeschoolers and the continual belief that they had a holy calling, a higher purpose. The lowly public schooler was on her own, at the mercy of liberal leftists and mandated curriculum.

I’m relieved we gave it another go. Over this past year and a half we have built an excellent relationship with school. Surely it is maturity on my part, coupled with the freedom that children sleeping through the night offers. There are some things we are working on, things we will forever be working on. But I have not handed my parenting over to the school. In fact, our school, a Title I school, encourages as much parental participation as possible. Recognizing that kids need strong home support to succeed, our local elementary flings their doors open.

Because of this I have been able to volunteer in a number of capacities. I’ve been made privy to the needs of families, and fortunate enough to lend a hand. I’ve been invited to teach English to non-English speaking families. I helped to hire a wonderful new principal. I even built gingerbread houses with the front office team the week before Christmas! To me, this is infinitely better than trudging to the Christmas finish line as a homeschooler. I am energetic and fresh-faced, happy to collaborate on finding pieces of missing homework or researching fossils. I love being a part of an advisory committee, and I’m the first to bring pies in to the teachers. Because of our presence in school, our church has been able to fund and distribute school supplies and engage with the surrounding community. Best of all, I can have a meaningful, equal conversation with the 95% of the American population who doesn’t homeschool. I’ve made friends, by George! Maybe it’s a weird character flaw, but with someone else handling the majority of schooling, I can relate to them, invite them over without feeling like they are trespassing on my head space.

My experience in public school isn’t equal to a life calling, nor do I treat it as such. It’s simpler now, I can be myself and not worry what I’m missing on a checklist. I can once again be all things to all people. Mom, wife, friend. I can wear my sweatpants to Walmart (heck, anywhere!), walk the kids to school with my unbrushed hair. I can commiserate with flag football parents, loathe Pokemon and video games, wonder aloud if I will ever have a paying job again (my stay-at-home years are underwhelming on a resume). My kids are seeing me write, walk the dog, and clean the car (for the record, I don’t usually find chicken legs in the car door pockets).

It is a real gift that our taxes actually pay for something valuable. I think this was the goal of public education as it was born of Christian mercy–to notice the least of these (children), and to pool resources into the tool most instrumental in affecting their future (education). Of course if we walk away, it will crumble. Of course if the foundation is leveled it will be rebuilt on nothing more than good intentions. This is why I am here. This is why, as long as my children are thriving, we are staying.

Homeschool isn’t for everyone. I’ve heard that a million times, but when said it has certainly been carried by an aloof tone. I can tell you this: public school is for everyone. It is incredible the level of help I have gotten with my older kids. They are tested and re-tested. I receive phone calls and emails. Concerns are voiced. We can’t meet his needs here, one teacher told me. They pulled strings and transferred him within the district in a matter of days–the call was mine. You see, teachers are interested in parents who care! For the most part, you doing your job (being a parent) makes their life as a teacher easier. There is sometimes headache, sometimes frustration, but talk to any homeschooler and see if she doesn’t have the same issues. The point is, I have way more people on my side.

But aren’t you worried about the other kids at school? The bad influences, the worldly exposure? In life, there is no sliding scale of morality. One cannot be more moral or less moral. One can either be moral or immoral. The confusion stems from regarding one schooling option–homeschool–as moral, and public school as immoral. Indeed, this is wrong. Public school is amoral for the time being. Amoral, meaning with no promotion of moral values whatsoever. Sure, there is a push to be kind, eliminate bullying, prevent violence–but there is no why explained. Until this point, I haven’t encountered any specific, offensive perversions. I agree, these are strange waters. Why wouldn’t I rather have them home, under my thumb and tutelage, promoting my own agenda? It’s a valid question.

Indeed, public school has potential for immorality–subjected to more local laws, and possibly headed down a sticky path, but homeschool could as easily fall off the tracks for self-righteousness factors.
Here’s what I want my kids to ultimately gain from public education: a bigger view of the world, and a bigger view of God. The world is hopeless without Jesus. Go ahead and let them see for themselves.

Public schoolers, I say this to encourage you: Despite what you might be hearing via social media, your favorite Christian writers who happen to blissfully homeschool are a teensy, tiny minority. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that the straight and narrow path is lined with Charlotte Mason ideology. You aren’t going to hell for putting your kids on the big yellow bus, even though there’s a book out there that claims you will. They are less than 5 percent of people who can financially, practically do it, typically with immense spousal support. Do not stress yourself out over this decision–God’s got your back! When we first began school with our oldest, I felt like I was facing an identity crisis. I will either set them up for success or failure. This is it, it’s up to me. Well-meaning voices in my circle confirmed this notion, and it scared the pants off of me. Let me toss in another well-meaning voice, mine:

You are not immoral for schooling your kids the way you see fit. You are not amoral. You are every bit as responsible as the next parent who loves her kids. You have a huge, massive, unprecedented opportunity to rock this world through public education. You have the outrageous privilege of standing up and being brave in a time where your kids will witness what it means to take a stand for Jesus. You are capable of making your children behave. You are not facing a losing battle. Your words matter, your presence matters. Stick your foot in the door and win over the office ladies. None of this signing up to bring the napkins to the school party and then backing out business. Show up! Listen. Speak. Be heard. Notice those kids who hang out with yours. Sneak a teacher their favorite candy bar. Buy them a gift card to a fancy restaurant. Send thank you notes incessantly. Do it again and again and again until it is second nature, till the love of the Father is fragrant to them, till they are asking, why in the world does this lady care so stinking much?

Love others big. I promise–your kids won’t just notice–they’ll never forget. And that’s an education worth giving them.

Bad King Good

Today my five year old listened to the story of King Herod (the man who killed baby boys in the time of Jesus because he felt threatened) and asked me if he ever turned into a good guy. Previously we’d studied the book of Daniel, so I’m sure he was thinking about how King Nebuchadnezzar had a come-to-Jehovah moment. A bad king turned good…Did Herod also bow down with the wisemen at the feet of the King?

Since no one sprinkles blood around their nativity scene or depicts the slaughter of infants ordered by Herod (he didn’t want to risk any baby boy growing up to take his place), I realized this was a fair question. Jesus and his persecuted family had to run and hide from an evil man. We don’t usually display these facts as we celebrate hope, joy, love, and peace.

No, I told him. Herod didn’t bow. Jesus and his parents lived hidden lives, hoping for anonymity and waiting for the king to die.

Then Foy, my budding kindergarten theologian, popped another chicken nugget in his mouth and said, “Even kings have to know God.” What he meant, in so many words, was that even kings and rulers, no matter how important, are subject to Someone higher up the ladder.

We sure expect a lot from world rulers, even though I’m afraid we know how corrupt they are. It goes without saying that absolute power corrupts absolutely. Why, if your success balloons into god-level stratosphere, you are bound to believe you have created it yourself. You have hitched your wagon to your own neck, and the blood and sweat and muscles and gold towers alone surely prove you are worthy.

I have been thinking about impeachment matters. This is something I haven’t thought much about since ninth grade government class. But I have been listening to the Hamilton soundtrack on repeat to break up the Christmas music monotony, and I don’t believe our forefathers had prophetic foresight when they drafted the Constitution. They simply knew evil was at the heart of man, so the more direct their corporate vision, the more checks and balances in place, the better chance it had for serving people long term. One person in charge=no bueno.

It isn’t blind luck that we’ve had any virtuous man historically in office. We might act surprised by the actions of men, but God is never surprised. There is a proverb that says,

A king’s heart is like streams of water in the hand of God;

He directs it wherever He pleases.

Proverbs 21:1

It is odd to me that we expect a corrupt man to show virtue, and yet every time we elect a new official, they come with a rap sheet. I cannot name one man or woman who hasn’t fouled up their record with their mouth at one time or another. Trump might be outrageous, a liar, idiotic–whatever one may scream, but cannot even an idiot, tempered by other idiots, be willing to preserve my right to think, speak, work, live as I see morally fit? Why aren’t we reveling in the fact that our president doesn’t have the power to take our babies and slaughter them outright, as China did for thirty-five years? I am treading lightly, but why is it that we look at issues such as abortion or gay rights and let them stir us up to boiling point–when freedom, though born of good will, ultimately gives people the license to choose as they see fit?

I admit it is fragile. I want to live uprightly; I want to speak on behalf of the innocent and spend my life showing mercy. But I cannot direct another person’s heart like streams of water in my hand. Only God can do that.

A president will always raise hackles. What is intolerable is dismissing virtue as nothing more than an asinine opinion, hate at best. We must not look for a relevant creature, but a warm blooded one. One that can listen, slightly wiser than a fool. I’m waiting for them to queue up, but these type seem to stay out of the spotlight.

I do not think any public servant has ever cared or thought about me. I don’t even believe they are public servants. I only hear from them every so often, like a stray dog being called to eat when they want my vote. I see them on TV when the news anchors apologize for them, for everyone, for overspending the budget. By the time they are elected, they no longer are looking out for my best interests. They are too busy slapping the biting mosquitoes at their neck.

We are compelled to look elsewhere if we are in need of a savior.

Good news–he came, born in Bethlehem.

He, Jesus, is the one who provides the heart surgery we need. He emphasized our humanity in the face of God. He showed us what true freedom is–the choice we make when we ask him to release us from our chains. He offers peace and turns our eye away from public mayhem and inwardly to the corners of our heart. Let me tidy up this place, he whispers. I’ll give you my perspective.

God came low. He is infinitely more interested in the man or woman who is serving our country in the unseen places, the folks who do not need Twitter or any platform to blow off steam. The grassroots folk who are still trying to figure out how to love a neighbor, wrapping their mind around what it meant “we hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal.” (Thank you, Lin-Manuel, for putting it into song.)

We had another conversation, my kids and I. “What’s freedom?” the five year old had asked. It was too hard to explain unless I tried to frame it as what freedom isn’t. “There are countries,” I explained, bluffing as I went and hoping it made five year old sense, “where you are not allowed to have more than one child. You must work at the job someone else chooses for you. They don’t want you to have a religion, follow God, or go to church because they want you to treat your country as a god.”

“Oh,” he nodded, solemn. “I’m glad we have freedom.”

I am, too. Freedom is a gift from God. It’s garden of eden level good. Freedom is having the choice to walk in the light or eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil–and reveling in it.

We taste a glimpse of freedom just living in a country where we can impeach a ruler and disagree with one another at the water cooler tomorrow. Where we can write articles and publish them, not fearing recourse or imprisonment. Freedom, like it or not, is the ability to stir up hate or love, to sway others to your way of thinking, to try and persuade a man he is a sinner in need of a savior.

Freedom is praying–and optimistically hoping–for bad kings to turn good.

Where Santa fits in

As you probably know and remember (or don’t, because why would you?), I cannot keep up with marking Advent or any sort of Jesse Tree devotional nonsense. The young mom in me still has hope she might erect a Christmas tree after she’s found a clean, empty spot for it; the older mom knows of no such living area. The young mom thinks candles are terrific and cozy; the old one has scraped melted, dumped, poured, played-with wax off a bevy of wax-unfriendly fabrics. I tell myself I will just live in a constant state of wonder, rather than save it all up for the twenty-five days leading to Christmas, when presents must be wrapped, holiday concerts must be attended, and influenza, ear infections, and pink eye must be fought with all diligence. Our small, weary world rejoices in antibiotics and ice-free driveways. We marvel at the excitement of Santa visiting at the public school PTA dinner, because a miracle is born on Friday nights when different languages and cultures bond over pajama-clad kids and lukewarm baked ziti.

December begins just like every month. All the single digits fly by and I really don’t even recognize it for a new month until I’ve paid my trash bill and signed the date on the check. December sixth, yes–ok. I suppose I ought to start thinking about the school coat drive and all the Giving Tuesday emails I ignored until now. It feels excessive to pack more charity into one month when we could spread it evenly over twelve.

I guess I’m trying, without much luck, to convince the world it needs to be more realistic. Steadier in her convictions. Practical. How did Christmas come to resemble something so ultimate, so fantastical and outrageous with hardly a pinch of Jesus? Ought we not speak his name on the daily so it doesn’t come as such a surprise when December hits? I find I marvel on the daily–every time I open the Bible, as constant as a steady diet of Truth reorganizes my worldview.

For one to truly marvel, he must know his truth, that something can be born of nothing. That love can find a home with the homeless. That wrong can be made right. That the impossible isn’t wishing on a star–rather it is a Someone who was born under one. The absolute miracle isn’t that a virgin gave birth, but that God Himself came down to dwell with us.

I hesitate to sound too Ann Voskamp-ish over the wonder of Christmas–she certainly has a corner of the market, same as Harry and David have their annual, festive buyers. If Christmas is for generosity and rebirth, it’s as good a time as any to join in on the wonder. I love the poetic and lyrical, tradition and holy-days. I love the shimmery gifts stacked in perfect symmetry. But I’d also like to stick up for the less qualified, the less-experienced beholders of beauty and the amateur package-wrappers.

I thought about this as I snapped photos of Santa and the various families that came and visited him on Friday night at the school. For five dollars (paid to the PTA), they came in one at a time and chatted with a stranger, a bilingual jolly old elf, and walked away with a small framed picture of the moment. Some bigger kids had been sent with a crumpled five dollar bill and a miniscule hope that Santa would listen to their plea for the new iPhone 11 (I suppose the odds are akin to buying a lotto ticket). It was an eye opening reminder that some children find their safest, warmest, happiest Christmas experience among their school family. Even if there isn’t a new phone under the tree, it’s nice to have someone listen when you talk. Santa can feel like home in that way.

I used to be a person who rolled her eyes at the silliness of standing in line to visit Santa. As a child I only ever did it a couple of times, and never when it wasn’t free (always present: a clearly fake, overly white synthetic beard), so it seemed insincere. He never brought me anything close to what I wanted as a child, and I wasn’t about to be made a fool every year. As a grownup under the influence and wisdom of more experienced parents, I too made a vow to purge the nonsense and return to the “true meaning of Christmas”. My kids and I– “as for me and my house”–we would be intentional.

I won’t get into Santa (my oldest kid, at the age of four, announced to everyone he knew, “Santa was a man that died hundreds of years ago” even as I tried to slap my hand over his mouth to preserve their innocence), but I think we’ve all probably been bashing the wrong man. The point is, we are all people made to marvel. Christmas is a match that sparks a thrill of hope.

In no way should the professional, pinterest and popular celebrity celebrators dampen the spirit of we who are plain, non-matching in our sweatpants or stuck in the house with a bunch of sick kids, watching Frozen for the third time today. Your average Joe, the kind who barely know what boughs of holly are or how in the world to deck the halls. Blue collar saints and stocking fillers who hope a child lights up for joy over new toothpaste and socks on Christmas day. The hope of an iPhone, the reality of Pillsbury cinnamon rolls from a can.

We are celebrating humility, after all.

It is the hallmark of Christmas, and we skip right over it in our quest to “be more intentional”–a privileged person’s perspective, to be sure. Our best intentions sometimes indicate our sincere belief we have something to offer. The truth is, we don’t. This is what humility is–admitting I have nothing, absolutely nothing to offer. I’ve read somewhere that humility isn’t thinking less of oneself, but thinking of oneself less. I’m not sure I agree, because Jesus “considered equality with God something not to be grasped.” (Phi.2:6)

He thought less of Himself. He thought on his Father, and he thought on us. He humbled his infinite self to the confines of time and space, to a gravity-bound world full of disease and suffering. He humbled himself to the helplessness of a newborn baby, Holiness dependent on sinners and a teenaged mother who didn’t have a clue what she was doing. He humbled himself to a life where clean water, vaccinations, and school wasn’t available, where the crippled, deaf, and blind were laid along the dirt road, waiting for someone to see their awful state and take pity. Jesus humbled himself to befriend people that betrayed Him, people who asked dumb questions and didn’t want to hear his answers. People who wanted to trap him like a wild animal to be killed. Even though He was outside of death, he humbled himself, even to death on a cross.

He was from Heaven where tears were not shed and death had no sting, yet he was humble enough to experience it for Himself, the pain and anguish that lived here below.

And I used to think I was too proud to stand in line for Santa Claus!

Maybe I could stand to be a bit more intentional–intentionally humble.

Maybe the ticket to our kids recognizing Jesus–the reason for the season–is our very own, everyday, attention to humility. The way we respect people who don’t look, dress, or behave the way we do. The way we don’t avoid hard conversations and pain and death. The way we go about in the world, yet not of it. The way we lower our expectations on how Christmas ought to be celebrated. The way we acknowledge this whole world is walking in darkness, that Jesus also put up with people who acted ugly and unfair, and Heaven is on the horizon.

It’s okay to put up stockings and go hog wild at the cookie exchange. It’s okay to sit on Santa’s lap. It’s okay to switch up traditions and make the elf on the shelf disappear. It’s okay to be sad and disappointed and cry–Jesus, too, was a man of sorrow. It’s okay to see humanity for what it is, to be thankful God sent His baby boy to the manger, to the cross, to celebrate Emmanuel, God with skin, just like us.

Tied to the altar

Over the past year of thinking, writing, and the regular old raising of kids, I’ve had to make a handful of changes in direction. Oftentimes, I feel like I’ve walked myself right into a corner when I thought it was a clear-cut path, exactly where I was supposed to go. I thought I was doing all the right things because it seemed good and noble and required a bit of sacrifice. Then, alas, the door slams shut and I’m frustrated at my lack of clarity. I think I should be further down the road than I am right now, like I ought to have met more goals and checked more off my life’s to-do list. If only I knew what God wanted from me.

When we lived on the mountain, I met Kendall. She’d just had her third baby and, via some online meal-sharing website, I signed up to take her a meal. I didn’t know her, but her address was familiar and she seemed like a real, live human after I verified her personhood on Facebook. She lived on the mountain north of me. On a Tuesday, I strapped my babies and teriyaki chicken in the car and drove up the gravel road, tires spinning out on the steep, winding path that turned into rutted dirt. The house sat at the top of an even steeper driveway. Even my sturdy Subaru didn’t trust this incline as I pointed it up at what felt to be a 45-degree angle, our heads pressing back into our car seats.

Kendall and I crossed paths again several months later at a park. We became fast friends. Our upbringings were similar, and we had both found ourselves on a mountain because it offered affordable housing. We shared a lot of the same struggles–loneliness, raising babies, runaway strollers, losing every ball and toy our kids ever chucked down the mountain never to be seen again. But we also lamented on the more practical, serious hardships of living on a mountain, and her problems outweighed mine by a landslide. Her husband worked crazy shifts in law enforcement, leaving her worrying about his safety. She didn’t have studded tires–she had to chain up everytime she wanted to leave the house. She had a washing machine that lived in a little room on the outside of her house, no dryer. She draped wet clothes around the house, waiting for the heat from the woodstove to dry them. We both had to chop and stack wood for the pile in the winter, but she had the additional burden of hauling potable water and keeping the cistern full. It was inconvenient to drive all the way into town. We debated the merits of public school (where we would need to move mountains to catch a bus) versus homeschool (where we would undoubtedly feel even more isolated).

I suppose misery loves company. We forged a friendship in the wilderness and we can both laugh about the memories now. They are golden in our minds, wonderful times spent together keeping our gaggle of kids from falling off rocks, in streams, down rough terrain. We always had at least one child strapped to our back or front, always hollering for the more independent-minded to slow down and wait for the rest of us. We were young moms cloth diapering and commiserating our era of long-suffering. We were in the same boat and somehow it made it all bearable, and (dare I say?) enjoyable.

Eventually, we were able to move off the mountain and away from those primitive cabins that every man who ever watches Alaska Survival dreams about. Now when we talk on the phone, we reflect on our time on the mountain. How, in the moment, we were sure we were made for the struggle because that’s what we both understood as our calling. Frankly, I thought I had it figured out. God put moms like us on the mountain for some purpose, so we were going to struggle well. We were in it together.

Slowly, as our kids became school aged, each of us realized our unrealistic expectations of making it work. Kendall left first, a job opportunity moved their family to another town. Then our family sold our house and moved closer to civilization (at least closer to a gas station and school). Life suddenly became easier. I’d never been more thankful for pavement instead of mud and a garage to park my car. It was an abrupt, welcome, and sometimes guilt-inducing change of environment. The first winter I was giddy as I watched snow fall, unlike the pending sense of Donner party doom I’d had on the mountain.

This shift, from mountain to town, is the situation I remember when I get stuck in times of decision making. Should I stay right where I am, settle in to the wrestle, or is it time to pack up and leave the mountain? There is a purpose in struggle, but no struggle is the ultimate purpose. Sometimes God tells us we’ve done enough here and it’s time to move on. Could it be a hint of pride or self-assuredness that makes us want to stay and dig in our heels? We press into that hard spot, thinking we might make a dent in the rock, or at least prove to ourselves we have what it takes, that we are faithful.

Who knows why we do it, but I think maybe I often confuse endurance with obedience. I think if it is difficult, it is probably a sign that I’m doing the thing I was called to do. A touch of the martyrdom complex.

Maybe I fancy myself an Abraham, faithful, and God has led me up a mountain, asking me to put to death what I hold precious. I stand there and wait for the sacrifice to be slain, but God has already provided a different way and I refuse to go back down the mountain. I wait and wait and wait, thinking I’m on the mountain, doing everything God asked me to do…but when he points the way back down the path, I refuse to follow because I’ve tied myself to the altar.

I don’t want to be misunderstood–I’m not saying I think this is a typical scenario–after all, He told us we have crosses to bear. But He–Jesus–also advised on how we are to act in this world, being wise like serpents, innocent as doves. We are to be discerning and not carried away by what feels right. He told the parable of a shrewd manager, a guy who was worldly, lazy, and selfish–then proclaimed this guy was more discerning than people of the light (Luke 16).

Yes, he wants our obedience. To obey is better than sacrifice (1 Sam. 15:22). Obedience relies on our constant listening, asking, seeking, knocking. We are to pray without ceasing. But we also must realize we are in a world that throws wrenches in well-wrought plans. We are sometimes dominoes in a chain reaction. We get trapped in a cycle of people pleasing or cultural expectations. We know it isn’t good to overpromise–we are to let our yes be yes and our no be no, but we can convince ourselves that it won’t sync with our idea of Christian generosity or suffering, so we ignore the warning signs of overdoing it. We pave a path to martyrdom when God has never asked us to suffer for the sake of suffering.

He has shown you, O man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.
Micah 6:8

We are well-meaning in our pursuit of righteousness and good deeds, but acting justly and loving mercy go along with walking humbly, which seems to be the first thing we kick out of the way. We swell with pride when others praise us for doing it all and keeping it all together, for staying on the mountain. However, it is the walking humbly part that might be key to understanding why Jesus ever brought up the shrewd manager as an example for us.

Our lives are really just a breath, a small matter of inhale and exhale. Gone. This is humbling to the point of disbelief, don’t you agree? Breathe in, breathe out. That is you, in the grand scheme of things (and sometimes I think my laundry pile is insurmountable).

Yet we waste away our days trying to insert meaning and a touch of suffering, martyrdom. Our lives are such small things and we try to fit enormous plans inside them, agendas that will fulfill our calling, whatever that is. Who hasn’t held their baby in their arms and hoped the child might grow up and change the world? What baby has ever changed it? Are we dreaming away our purpose?

Many of our days are wasted, even with good intentions. Jesus, speaking of the shrewd manager, said that only whoever is trustworthy with this tiny breath of life, with this tiny bit of worldly money, will be trusted with heavenly riches and real reward. Even people of this world are humble enough to admit our days are finite (both Tim McGraw and King Solomon suggested one ought to “live like you were dying”), but “people of the light” don’t seem to act so shrewdly. We imagine we are limitless just like God is limitless. We look for that ultra-special calling, and a touch of suffering seems like an indicator that we are on a higher path.
Our first mistake is forgetting our smallness. Our job isn’t to honor or wow Him or anybody else with our big plans, our big personalities. In fact, it is the opposite of honoring him when we try to attain something spectacular for even a smidgeon of our own glory.

In other versions of Micah 6:8, the word is “mortal”. Adam.
He has shown you, O mortal, Adam, what is good.

You and I, we are very tiny things. To recognize our smallness within the vastness of God, to lose our pride and allow Him to provide another way–sometimes this is the hardest part of faith to swallow.

Abraham didn’t stand there on the mountain, urging God to kill his son even after a ram was provided in the thicket. Abraham believed with shaky knees, lifted Isaac off the altar, and headed back down the mountain. It was the next step of obedience. It was a humble move! God wasn’t after Abraham’s suffering, He didn’t say I’ll really nail this old fool! He was after Abraham’s obedience. Do you trust me even if you might suffer for awhile? Do you trust me if I take the suffering away? Will you follow me, humbly, wherever the path leads?

May we struggle well when it is time to struggle.
May we be shrewd enough to recognize when it is time to leave the mountain.

what is truth

I have a child in the fourth grade. He is pensive and silent when I pick him up from school, simultaneously deep in thought and happy to be free. His feet are long and stretching longer. His teeth are half tiny, half huge in his mouth. In his face I can see equally his smiles and coos as an infant and his future countenance as a man. His mind, independent of my own, is grasping new concepts and holding them in court, judging right and wrong based on what he’s already been told.

Fourth grade feels like the beginning of middle childhood, when self-awareness blooms alongside great possibilities and doubt. I remember certain feelings in the fourth grade. In particular, I remember certain conversations with a fellow fourth grader who enlightened me on new vocabulary since I wasn’t in love with any of the boys in my class.

“Well,” she said, “you’re a lesbian, then. A gaywod.” She laughed and I laughed along with her, because she was ten and clever and I wished I had half her confidence. We were friends but I was certainly the shorter end of the stick. I’m not sure why she had befriended me in the first place. I never offered more than pure awe at her maturity–something she, no doubt, took as a huge compliment. If she were making fun of me, it still felt like a pretty cool insult. I put it in my back pocket to retrieve at an opportune time.

My parents weren’t so impressed when I repeated gaywod at home to my brothers.

When I returned to my friend and finally had the nerve to ask her to explain the vocabulary to me (proof that if kids don’t get their questions answered at home, they will find out elsewhere) I had to stop and consider. Who was I? Did I like girls or boys? Was it even up to me? What a heavy question for a fourth grader, for the beginning of growing up years, the crisis of identity.

What is truth? I wondered, and what is mine?

Jesus, before he was hanged on a cross, found himself dragged before the Roman governor, who asked this very question. What is truth? The man, Pilate, surely uttered these words with rhetorical contempt. Jesus had just made his last statement before he was beaten, before the crown of thorns was pressed onto his head, before they mocked the king of creation.
“..the reason I was born and came into the world is to testify to the truth. Everyone this side of truth listens to me.” (John 18:37)

Pilate was astonished–here was a man with a chance to defend himself (he had done nothing wrong, after all) and all he did was defend Truth…whatever that was.
To the discerning, this is propaganda. So, in fact, was the life of Jesus. But isn’t every word ever uttered, every life lived, an airing of opinion? The choice is yours, we all pick a master.

Propaganda, perhaps, but Jesus was all I knew as a child. I knew He was right and perfect because no one ever caught him in a lie. He was humble and he didn’t give a rip about what people thought. He was the way, the truth, and the life, and even as a kid this never failed me. He was rogue, he was right, and I knew Him. Because of this, I knew who I was created to be, even when introspective questions started popping up in the fourth grade. In my deepest parts–even when I couldn’t put a finger on the why–I knew there was only one way the Father, whether I liked it or not. Whether I agreed or not. Whether I ran away or stayed. Whether I liked boys or girls.

My parents wisely stopped letting me spend the night at my friend’s house. They pulled me away from her influence without me detecting too much insensitivity on their part. They didn’t sit me down and explain heavy matters, they just set up some safer boundaries to contain my curiosity. They faithfully kept walking in the light and leading us kids in the same direction.

I am so thankful. So, so, so thankful. Because I wanted attention and I would’ve looked for it anywhere. I did, for a little bit, before I was drawn back into His arms. But without my parents there would be no internal compass, no installation of Scripture in my head and heart to bring me home. The wandering would’ve been heartbreaking. Not all who wander are lost, but many who wander are in deep, deep woods.

Imagine, as a child, the hunger to be known by another person. Attention. It is no different than how some people hunger for money, success, power. While we live in these bodies of flesh it is so easy to justify our wants as our needs, simply because it feels like hunger. And when our bodies say we are hungry, we eat. We can rationalize any number of habits and persuasions, but as we lack restraint they quickly turn into unhealthy cravings and addictions. Our Creator knew we would get hungry, but he also offered us a compass to guide us.

Do not let kindness and truth leave you; Bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart. Proverbs 3:3

My faithful parents put this compass in my hands, the hidden Word in my heart. Without this compass, I’d be lost.

And today many are wandering, lost. They have no compass, they have no moral weathervane pointing left, right, up or down. Maybe they’ve only ever been around people sneering, “Truth? What is truth?” They send out questions into a void universe that only echoes back its own emptiness. They are the most susceptible, the kind that need rescuing from the darkest of dark places.

Now that I know what truth is and Who truth is, I cannot think of anything better to do with my life than make it available to those wandering in the dark.

When Jesus spoke to the multitudes (it seemed he had a well-waxed sermon, judging by the detailed, word-by-word gospel accounts) he wrapped it up with a little parable. He said,

“Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock.” Matthew 7:24

This is the truth we may choose to believe; the propaganda that can rightly influence our lives and the lives of others who are looking for a solid rock on which to stand. It’s truth that helps us avoid certain heartache and is firm enough to support our entire future.
Without it, parents choose distraction over discipline. It matters because young men are bringing guns to school to shoot children and teachers. Teenagers are slitting their wrists and starving their bodies. Children are encouraged to experiment with gender identity and perverted lifestyles. It matters because the because this world is an awful mess and we know the Truth that can set them free.

All of us harbor disdain for God’s eminent order and purpose in the world. We find ourselves lacking in every way possible, proud yet hopelessly incomplete.

This is the mystery–that we are unbearable yet Christ bore our burdens in his body on the cross. In his crucifixion he crucified our old nature. He put to death our penchant for self and all its temporal desires. For the believer, our taste for the things of the world has dimmed, turned metallic and foul. We find ourselves hungry only for His words, satisfied only with the hope He is making all things new. Fighting like hell against the old man, the old nature, and the world that wants to make us check one box.

I look at my boy, almost ten years old, and I know (achingly so) I won’t be able to keep him out of the woods much longer. The world is full of perversions and half-truths, trees ripe with forbidden fruit.

But he has been fed a sturdy diet of the Word. The compass is in his pocket should he feel lost. There is the full armor of God, and we’ve been trying it on since he was little. The shield of faith that is heavy in his small arms is getting easier to hold.

We bind kindness and truth around his neck and pray it becomes graven indelibly on the tablet of his heart.