Reflect

Posted on January 13, 2014 by melissafed

We had the biggest snow fall of the season on Saturday night. Waking Sunday, with the snow so deep the car had to creep. The plows don’t come on time on a Sunday. The plows keep better sabbath then the lot of us.

The day was all white. White on white. The trees layer over the mountains, the mountains onto the sky, the fog creeping over all of it. The heavy flakes still falling.

Did you know that snow absorbs sound? The deafening stillness is not imagination. The snow, takes the noise and dissipates it. It creeps in your soul too if you let it. Quiet down, listen closely. It is poetry too.

Sometimes praise shouts. Sometimes it just whispers so quiet you can barely breathe for fear of missing it “You are free”.

As quietly as the snow began.

As heavy as it fell.

It will stop again.

And peace will reign.

‘Hallelujah’

Video

Choosing Joy

Posted on December 18, 2013 by melissafed

The truth is, I never imagined life would be as hard as it is….even when it is not. I know, that the joy I find in life has very little to do with circumstances and very much to do with the focus of my gaze. I can be absolutely paralyzed when I look sideways, at you, at your hardships, complaints, the wars or rumours of war. I can be absolutely irritated by the mess in my home, the dog that won’t stop barking, the laundry that will not fold itself, the bills that roll in…and on. Even when the troubles are much more complex WE ALWAYS HAVE THE CHOICE OF WHERE WE FIX OUR GAZE.

My son he spends almost every waking minute laying under our Christmas tree, looking up and sighing about how beautiful it is, spellbound by the beauty. The way the tacky coloured lights twinkle. You must understand…it is the ugliest tree we have ever had. There are no branches for the first three feet and then it stands, crooked and broad and sheds needles recklessly all over the floor I just vacuumed. BUT…if you squint your eyes just so, you can see the reckless beauty in near anything. You can choose to focus your gaze on the blessings or on the lack.

This week, this advent, I will gaze upward, keep my eyes fixed on the now-and-coming hope we have. I will spread joy insidiously, laugh loudly, notice the beauty. I will look for opportunities to bless those that are in the seasons when their eyes are glued to the grief. I will mourn with them trusting that joy comes in the morning. To rejoice every chance I get. To stand back from the ordinary of life and see the extraordinary within it. To pursue love and to dwell in it. To choose gratitude and settle into it. To grab onto hope and not release it. I am going to choose JOY and keep choosing it.

Joy is a function of gratitude, and gratitude is a function of perspective. You only change your life when you begin to change the way you see.

-Ann Voskamp

Linking with She Loves Magazine &

Being Peace on Earth (Advent 6, 7, 8)

Aside

Hope and Peace. Is there anything our world needs more than these? So many of us are just plain tired. In this world of chronic diseases, betrayal, brokenness, abuse, a broken heart from a source you could never have predicted, you watch the news for fifteen minutes and you can be horrified.
But it is THIS world that our Jesus comes. Our Jesus, born in a stable, among the filth, the unmucked out animal feces, the hay that makes you itch. Born to a teenage mother, who said yes despite the magnificent mess it would make of her life. This same Jesus who dies in an equally bloody way, a gruesome death on a cross between two criminals.

“God entered our world not with the crushing impact of unbearable Glory, but in the way of weakness, vulnerability need”(Brennan Manning). It makes me mad some days. The scandal of it. I want him to come in a blaze. I want him to be in ease…I want him to give me ease. Ease to the whole world. To the sad and the broken. I just want him to fix it.

But our Jesus. He now lives in an even more grotesque place. An even bloodier mess. Perhaps the goriest place you can find. The human heart. Mine. Yours. Those of us that invite Him, have the Holy Spirit in us now. And this holy spirit invites you into the mess of this world. Jesus bids you to step into it with him. He could have done this so many ways, redeemed us, reclaimed us. It could have been so much easier, so much more magnificent. But our God invites us to the depths, to the real, to perhaps the only authentic place where there is no hiding. There is no more facade. There is no social media to bolster you, no friends to protect you, no reputation that proceeds you. No. Our Jesus is willing to get his hands dirty. He draws in the dirt, heals with the mud… Jesus has many things for you in this life. Life to the full and abundant. But it will likely not be a pinterest perfect love story, a picture perfect family, never a problem free existence. Even when things are really falling into place, the monotony of this old world can wear you down (just wait till you have to make school lunches). I was watching breaking bad the other night, and I see why so many are intrigued by it. The truth is people are bored. They are chasing a dream that doesn’t exist. Hedonism for its own sake. Anesthetic to try and drown the mind collapsing from the boredom of it.
Lots of us throw around words like calling a lot. But what I see in scripture is Jesus calling you to be hope, light and peace. Calling you to speak un-retractable hope to the hopeless. Peace to the tormented. To embody joy even in the most broken of days. It is this that a broken world needs. People think you can get it done right and things will just work out. I don’t see that in scripture. I see us stepping into the broken with him. Our spirits softening, our hearts being wrung with his BUT still we cling to hope, to peace. We enter into it.
Nelson Mandela died this week. And we have sterilized him into an icon of peace haven’t we? We trapped his face into quote photos like a cartoon. He was not. There were times in his life were he was named terror. He was imprisoned for 27 years and he let the mess and the torment shape him into a man of Peace. He maintained hope in the face of atrocity. He said
“I am not a saint, unless you think of a saint as a sinner who keeps on trying”. The very worst face of humanity. He found out what it meant to pursue reconcilliation…PEACEMAKING IS NOT SITTING ON YOUR HANDS. It is active and it is hard work. Hope does not flourish when we are selfish. These are traits that we need to pursue.

So tell me church. As you wait for Gods redeeming work to complete where can you join him??? This week…pray about where you can be peace. Look for the subtle cracks in broken relationships, the fissures that could explode into anger. Where can you join in the work that He is already doing? Where can you stand against the gap maker?

“But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving,considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere.”
James 3:17

(My kids lit the advent candles tonight…I near died it made my heart ache in the very best way.)

The first candle of Advent is the candle of Hope; the second is the candle of Peace. We light this candle to remind us that our Lord Jesus brings peace to all who trust in Him.

Let us pray:

Loving God, thank You for the peace You give to us through Jesus. May Christ’s light shine in our lives, showing us the path of peace between God and all people. Help us to prepare our hearts to receive His peace. We ask in the name of the One born in Bethlehem. Amen.

And every time I try and speak someone says what I want to say about 8000 times better. OH Ann Voskamp. THIS.

The Glory (Advent #5)

Posted on December 5, 2013 by melissafed

The Glory
by Madeleine L’Engle

Without any rhyme
without any reason
my heart lifts to light
in this bleak season

Believer and wanderer
caught by salvation
stumbler and blunderer
into Creation

In this cold blight
where marrow is frozen
it is God’s time
my heart has chosen

In paradox and story
parable and laughter
find I the glory
here in hereafter

Today…Just this (Advent 4)

Video

How to Breathe (Advent 3)

Posted on December 3, 2013 by melissafed

It was one of those mornings. You know the ones? You wake and your house looks like this, your children don’t like the homemade muffins you made and it is ‘too cold for smoothies’? You know those mornings? When they won’t get out the door, when the home reading book is missing and the communication books are scattered? You know those ones right? It isn’t just me?

I have 1 million things to do today. Actually.

So as the children leave I start rushing. Running. DO ALL THE THINGS. GET THEM ALL DONE.

But then.

What if advent this season is more than talk? What if I actually join in the waiting? The stillness? What if I hunt beauty instead of burden? What if I slip outside and breathe deep? What if I kick fresh snow and look at heavy branches, the way they shake off that snow before they break under the weight. What if I breathe deep the cold, and think about the smallness of these moments, the way my tiny story isn’t the only one? What if I turn my eyes up, out? What if I can watch the clouds shift and the trees sway?

What if I really can keep my tiny story wrapped into His? What if I can learn to hold this tension with an open hand? The longing for more, the expectation of restoration, the extraordinary beauty of the RIGHT NOW. The now and not yet.

I breathe. I stop my hustling. God is most pleased with our BEING. Not our doing. Our being that breathes him in…that senses Him. That seeks Him. That settles in on the waiting, the hoping, the promises.

And then this…

“As soon as we acknowledge God to be the supreme architect, who has erected the beauteous fabric of the universe, our minds must necessarily be ravished with wonder at His infinite goodness, wisdom and power” (John Calvin).

Ravished with wonder.

That the earth outside your window is tilted right now at just twenty-three degrees. So there are seasons and the vapors of oceans don’t simply amass continents of ice, so the planet’s bulk of six sextillion tons (that’s twenty-one zeros) spins perfectly balanced on an invisible axis, spinning you around at one thousand miles an hour, nine million miles a year. Hurtling you through space even right now in this sun orbit at nineteen miles per second, 600 million miles a year. YOU held in this moment by this unseen belt of gravity and turning pages slowly…

Christmas begins here. The Christmas story, this LOVE story – the whole blue marble of the world spinning right now on the Cross-beam axis of Love.” -Ann Voskamp, The Greatest Gift p. 13-14

Join me today? Slip outside and go on a beauty hunt. Look up at the clouds shifting, the trees swaying, that gorgeous creation sitting just to your right. Breathe it in deep, it is a gift for you today. Feel small and ordinary, admit you can’t do it all. Don’t even try.

Take a photo and send it to me? Love to encourage each other as we #beautyhunt

Linking with:

Ornament (Advent #2)

Posted on December 2, 2013 by melissafed

(A repost from the archives)

There you go running and tossing and breaking and shattering and I gotta tell you, the way I imagined this day to go is just not what it turned out to be. I wait for Christmas Tree day. I imagine us, in the woods with all our friends, sipping hot drinks, eating too many sweets, finding the perfect tree, taking photos in front of it. Instead, and suddenly, chill settles into little fingers, someone has to poop.

I want things to run on rails. This family, I want it to run like a well oiled machine. Pumping out symmetry, clean edges, pictures perfect. I want this night, gathered round the tree, decorations to hang, carols on, me in plaid, in scarf. I want you smiling demurely, hanging the ornaments gentle. I want mistletoe and candle light, but you keep blowing them out.

All my talk about otherwise? I still want our family to look like an ornament. Sparkled and spackled and flawless. And instead, God keeps whispering something about being an instrument: of peace, of reconciliation. He keeps on whispering about how very broken we all are, how he has plans for us this season it is true, but none of those plans involve our perfection. Just His. Made flesh. Because of our brokenness, like the nutcracker I glue back together (sorry Michelle…). He says “That is the point of this thing child. Relax”. Look for the cracks, the fissures, lean into them. Bring that peace on earth, be it.

I sigh, pull you into my lap and we read quiet and slow and we start our advent readings and you seem to get it. And I do too. The beauty is right here. In your soft skin (because you took off the coordinated outfits I put you in), in the soft glint of Christmas lights I hung (though they are clumped, and cluttered), in the pine boughs on my mantle (that snapped off as we dragged the tree in the door).

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.

Where there is hatred, let me sow love.

Where there is injury, pardon.

Where there is doubt, faith.

Where there is despair, hope.

Where there is darkness, light.

Where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master,

grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled, as to console;

to be understood, as to understand;

to be loved, as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive.

It is in pardoning that we are pardoned,

and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.

Amen.-St. Francis of Assisi

We Wait…And We Hope (Advent #1)

Posted on December 1, 2013 by melissafed

Mary’s “How can this be?” is a simpler response than Zechariah’s, and also more profound. She does not lose her voice but finds it. Like any of the prophets she asserts herself before God saying, “Here I am”. There is no arrogance, however, but only holy fear and wonder. Mary proceeds – as we must do in life – making her commitment without knowing much about what it will entail or where it will lead. I treasure the story because it forces me to ask: When the mystery of God’s love breaks into my consciousness, do I run from it? Do I ask of it what it cannot anser? Shrugging, do I retreat into facile clichés, the popular but false wisdom of what ‘we all know’? Or am I virgin enough to respond from my deepest, truest self, and say something new, a ‘yes’ that will change me forever?

(This post inspired by a beautiful piece by Kathleen Norris, and especially this quote from “Watch for the Light” p. 44)

We hop onto the quad, all four of us. We head out into the woods, we find new trails, spot the tracks of rabbits in the stand of birch trees. There are spots on the trail that surprise us, dips in the road, the cold wind whips our faces, all of us turning our faces skyward to the pines, the breeze blowing them and we feel small. We sense the mystery of this place, how anything could be just around the corner, the elk I passed on the highway, the wolf our neighbor spotted, the moose tracks we’ve passed here before. We know this and we chase out anyways; the adventure is in the mystery.

We say yes, even when we don’t know what is before us. We, as the Christmas people, we choose hope OVER fear and we chase the hope bringer down paths uncharted. We trust Him enough with our lives that we say YES even when we are unsure what we are accepting.

This is the season we think about Mary, “let it be to me as you have said“. Without any assurance of what is to come. Even if the path before us is unmarked. Even when we are uncertain of what we are saying yes too, we go.

This first Sunday of Advent is named HOPE. We are the hope people. We are the ones waiting what is to come. We step into and wait on the mystery of the God incarnate. We don’t understand it all. We join in the mystery anyways. We become HOPE to the dark world. We walk in the mystery and we say YES to the things of God. We choose the adventure of life in Christ over the stagnancy of life unmoved. We choose the HOPE of the world over the anaesthetic that so many of our generation choose. We let that hope infiltrate us and change us. We push that hope past our usual boundaries into the dark spaces. This advent we wear that hope like a merit badge…despite how foolish we may seem.

This month, this advent, we move into the mystery of Christ, and we plan to say YES every time. We plan to choose hope every day, believing that,

“He begs us to spend the attention of Advent on the little, the least, the lonely, the lost.” –Ann Voskamp

We are the hope people. Tell me how you hope?

Country Chronicles: What I’m Into November 2013 Edition

Posted on November 30, 2013 by melissafed

I’m into the sun setting in splendor and three elk crossing my path on my way home from school. I am into comet sightings and the first snow falling.

I’m into slouching into a posture of listening, of holiday, of waiting. I’m into slowing my steps and retraining my eyes to notice the miraculous ordinary.

I’m into finishing my first class towards my graduate degree and loving every minute of the learning. I’m into my work again too, and the way my voice sounds like passion and I feel like this might be a good part of my call. I had a quick trip to California early November and I met some inspiring people, made some amazing connections, ordered room service, sat beside a pool. Sometimes there are just reckless blessings, my eyes are being opened to the fact that they don’t always look the way I think they might.

I am into the seasons changing and fall giving way to winter. I am into the way cold air feels on my face and the way my house smells when the firebox gets refilled. I am into the peace of snow and the way we all slow in the presence of it. I’m into the new movement of God in my heart, the way my words feel powerful and spirit filled and I sense Him again, just there under my skin. I’m into lessons learned. Like how my destiny is mine alone, how there is no one else who can live it. Learning that no one can take the place at a table that HE has set for me. That even when it seems that a dream has been lived by another? There is room at the table for me too. I’m learning what can be stolen are my quiet moments and secret places with the Lord…these are the only things I need to fight for my place. I’m learning that truth is in the subtleties; sin is in shift to the right or to the left, the corruption of the best and beautiful things (like friendships turned to interest of self, like motherhood turned to show).

I’m into the kitchen again now that the weather has cooled and am loving this squash soup, these naan and chicken sandwiches (with chutney and curry yogurt dip).

I’m into ‘too much television’ and making all sorts of hibernation plans. My reading pile is growing. My writing plans are deepening. December…I love you.

I’m into her highland dancing, his reading improving. I’m into the way they are both growing and thriving and the ways they challenge all I thought I knew about myself, what I believe about parenting.

I’m into preparations for advent and slowing my heart and picking up some books. (Watch for this blog to become a bit more active over the advent season. If you want to join me in the readings that will inspire it pick up this and this).

What were you into this November???

Linking with Emily for “What I Learned in November” and Leigh Kramer: