that’s what she said, virgin style

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I’m sitting here with Tavryn Joelle, our miracle born this October, bundled against me, snoozing her content little heart out. The fire is crackling. Lights are twinkling. Dog is prancing. Husband is dinner-prepping. And yes, the stockings are hung with care.

And a woman’s voice echoes in my ear. Faint. Distant. About 2000 years old. Last year her words whispered to me, held my attention, and became a roaring anthem of 2019.

Her story was one I knew. And yet didn’t, too. I’d heard it so many times but last year there was something so new and so captivating to me. I read through Luke 1-2 at Christmas, and then I didn’t leave that passage for months. Instead, I saturated, returning to it day after day indefinitely, taken anew with this woman’s voice when she said “may it be to me according to your Word.”

So basically, you should stop reading this and go read Luke 1-2. Go read what she said.

This voice, this woman, was of course Mary. And those words were her response to the Angel Gabriel announcing that she, a virgin, would bear Jesus, the Messiah. His proof text was that Elizabeth, the barren woman, was also pregnant – yeah, we’ll come back to that.

I was mesmerized by both of these women and their responses to the unexpected.

… may it be to me according to your Word …

These words – this short, simple sentence – contains a lifetime’s worth of wisdom. Of surrender. And of power. You could sum up the Christian call in these words. May it be to me – to us – according to the Word of God.

The Word that is true. That is alive. That is both shocking and comforting. That calls us to things that are daunting and delightful. That asks the impossible – and then delivers it.

Aristotle once said that he would rather the probable impossible than the improbable possible. Me too. At least I like the romance of it. Sometimes the living of it is much harder.

I’ve lived both. And when Mary’s words crossed my path as if for the first time last year, I had no idea the tone they’d set for the year that was to come. I was in the midst of deep grief after the death of a dear friend. I was wrestling against a brutal diagnosis of a loved one. I was asking for impossible things.

And Mary’s words – this simple anthem, this prayer – found deep roots in my heart each day. May it be to me according to your Word.

And you know, that friend is still gone. That diagnosis hasn’t changed. And I’m still asking for the same impossible things.

Because this prayer isn’t meant to fix all, but to surrender all.

All while unbeknownst to me, I was about to be the unexpectedly pregnant barren woman. Get this. Here I sat last year, saturating in this passage throughout the Christmas season and through the whole month of January, just totally captivated by it, praying prayers about trusting God to do the impossible, resonating with a story of reconciliation and surrender. And about a million light years away from the idea that I’d ever be pregnant. That wasn’t the impossible thing I was asking for.

I find so much of God’s kindness in having me saturate in the story of Elizabeth and Mary right before finding out our own impossible news. These women who will forever herald for me the idea of surrender and reconciliation to stories we can’t write. Women who lived the probable impossible.

I stayed in their story for months as it anchored me to my own.

So here I sit, a Christmas later, marveling at how formative this anthem was for 2019. Thankful for it.

Seriously, go read Luke 1-2. Maybe just for the day, maybe for weeks or months. Don’t just read it for the Christmas story. Read it for your own.

Dare to ask yourself what it looks like to echo “may it be to ME according to YOUR word.” I don’t know if there are more vulnerable words that we can be more confident in.

 

 

 

 

P.S. It really is SUCH a rich passage. I LOVED studying it further. If you want to dive deeper with me, I got to unpack it more in a sermon earlier this year – on Mother’s Day, actually. It’s good stuff (not my words so much but His).

Mothers Day 2019 from Saltworks on Vimeo.

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unexpectedly expecting – he gets to be a DAD!!!

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But you guys … he gets to be a DAD!!!!!!

So here has been my absolute number one favorite thing about being pregnant: she kicks to his voice. I know, stop it already, right?

Jason started reading to her each night around week 20 – an early introduction to Aslan.

And right about when my clever little app said she’d start recognizing and remembering noises, I noticed that she would start spinning/kicking within about two minutes of him reading to her.

The first of so many daddy-daughter moments.

I consider myself a bit of an expert when it comes to recognizing a good Dad, only because I have one of the best. A dad who loves being a Dad. We always knew we were (are) his favorite thing about his life – I mean, not a lot of kids get to say that. And yeah he was a workaholic and yeah he wasn’t perfect, but man we never ever doubted where we fit on his priority list. And he made things FUN, taking us on tractor rides (usually in the backhoe bucket), almost daily outings on the boat throughout summer, and bless the man he even tried to learn how to ski to join my brother and I on the slopes – a one day attempt that had all too many comical tumbles involved.

So now JASON gets to be a Dad! And he’s already an amazing one. And she will never doubt if she is loved, and he will have her dance on his toes and ride on his back and with every look make her know she’s celebrated even when she’s exhausting.

There are a lot of paths we thought we’d take to parenting, including some failed adoptions, and then ultimately the release of parenting, at least traditionally. It included stepping into the foster care world through Royal Family Kids and getting our own home certified. Not to mention the countless number of college “kids” that

have been part of our life since our marriage began on the campus of Cal Baptist University all those years ago.

So there’s a lot of Dad-ing he’s already got under his belt. I’m just excited to see it flood him with a new identity. To see her kicks and giggles in real life when he reads to her. To watch her bounce on his shoulders. To see him in her eyes (reallllly hoping she gets his eyes).

There are so many things that almost weren’t. When everything inside me ached in saying goodbye to this man. This man who’s been my rock, my best friend, my co world adventurer, my driveway dancing partner, my safe place.

This man that God gave back so we could shout Amen to the Long Road.

And now, you guys, Amen to the Long Road paved with DIAPERS because HE GETS TO BE A DAD!

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unexpectedly expecting

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So I’m 40. And pregnant. HA! Didn’t see that coming. But then, my 30s did teach me a lot about just how much I don’t know.

Not a story I could ever write, but one I’d like to write down at least a bit of. I mean holy goodness. So much holy. So much goodness.

About 12 years ago we started our journey into unplanned unparenthood. About 6 years ago we stopped all tests and “trying”, found happy again, embraced an unplanned but brilliant life and even adopted the childless fistbump. And then of course 3 years ago we learned firsthand the fragility of life and the power of living a miracle.

So much holy. So much goodness. My 30s brought a lot of life.

And now 40 is bringing a whole new life. What the what? Literally as I sit here typing, with my laptop perched on an ever-growing belly, weeks (days maybe!) away from meeting her, I still have a hard time believing it. Goodness and mercy aren’t just following me, they’re kicking me from the inside out!

From unplanned unparenthood to unexpectedly expecting.

To say this little peanut caught us off guard would be an understatement. Our whole world got flipped upside down when we saw those two pink lines. Immediate laughter filled the room – the laughs of wonder, delight, and pure shock. About five minutes later the terror showed up, where suddenly I felt super responsible for this fragile life, and super vulnerable to what a positive pregnancy test meant, deeply deeply aware of the many directions it could go. Nothing can make you more wary of a pee stick than infertility kicking you in the teeth over and over again.

My first doctor’s appointment was entertaining to the staff because I remained in a stupor, just dumbfounded. One nurse said “you’re the most chill pregnant lady I’ve ever seen” and I looked at her like she’d just told me I was calmly growing a third arm. I mean, that’s how bizarre the whole thing felt.

About a week later we heard a heartbeat. It was at week 10 when she looked like a little person. And waved at us. I just marvel that now we are so close to waving back at her.

Turns out that this little surprise came home with us from a trip to Rome over the New Year – same week that these two little Protestants were blessed by the Pope, actually – do with that what you will. It was our first international trip post-heart attack (complete with my hot-mess tears on the flight). We didn’t post a single photo from that trip. It was just ours. As we rang in 2019, there wasn’t even a flicker in our mind that this little girl would be coming home as our little Italian souvenir.

In the weeks that followed that positive test, my mind and heart did somersaults – which paired nicely with the nausea I was experiencing. We had fallen in love with the unexpected life we were living, and I couldn’t find right side up for a bit as we tumbled into this new narrative. Simply put, it’s disorienting to be expecting so many years after you’ve released expectation.

I think finally, all these months later, I’ve found just a few words to capture this season. Hoping to get some of them on paper in the coming moments before she arrives.

Right off the bat I felt smacked with the word kindness. But by itself it doesn’t tell the whole story. Because kindness came before this gift. Better and fuller is that this is another measure of God’s kindness.

another … this word matters to me, it’s not just tossed in as an extra, it’s there because we knew God’s kindness before those two pink lines arrived, as we lived out the story we were given, as we learned to let infertility describe but not define us. To all hearts still waiting in some season of barrenness: He sees you. Watch for His kindness, I promise you will find it. In the barrenness, not just in the fullness. Actually, that’s not my promise, which is why I can be confident in it – it’s His.

measure … blame it on being a PhD wife, as Jason wraps up his doctorate this year, but I’ve learned a lot about measures and metrics as I’ve watched him study. I’ve watched him research and calibrate data, and while I’ve understood less than half of what he’s doing, what’s not lost on me is that the measures are precise and timely. But they also measure only a precise time and space. A good researcher pays attention to what the precise measurements tell him, to be sure, but also to what the whole picture is. So too, as we’ve marveled at this new life, we’ve known it is but one measure of God’s kindness, the one He’s using right now to show us more of who He is, but by no means the only one. She’s not the whole picture – maybe that’s part of the gift of receiving her after all these years, we finally know that while she will add so much to us, she does not have to live with the pressure of being what completes us.

of God’s … no pretending or wondering if anyone but God decided this life would exist. It is against all odds for a couple to conceive after 12 years of unexplained infertility (no matter how many stories you hear about it “always happening”, it doesn’t – the actual math and science of it all tells quite a humbling story), not to mention that this little girl’s Dad shouldn’t have survived by medical standards. So yeah, she’s God’s handiwork and declaration through and through.

kindness … just giggly sweet kindness. Like a ray of sunshine that you can feel. Like a smile from lips etched in cotton candy. Like a stream giggling along the rocks. Kindness that kicks me awake both physically and figuratively. Something He didn’t have to give, but chose to.

I’m hoping to capture a few more thoughts from these past months as we head into the home stretch of meeting this wee face. Signing off with bare feet, white hairs, deeply grooved smile lines, all of it. So much holy. So much goodness.

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365 Because of 1

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ONE YEAR, people. One year of this miracle is upon us.

Jason’s heart attack was February 19, 2016, and we decided the best way to celebrate was to go back to the place where we all gathered those fateful days. This time, to say THANK YOU. And also, this time Jason will be AWAKE.

So we’ll be gathering on the lower courtyard between the two towers of PIH Hospital on Sunday, February 19, at 2pm, where so many meals and prayers were shared that week, to share again. First with each other via hugs and stories and food (potluck style). And then with the hospital as we put together a love gift for our amazing nurses.

If you’re local, it’s open invitation. An RSVP here would be great, but not required. Please bring these things:
– food to share (potluck style)
– your stories/memories
– your praises
– $ to go towards nurses’ thank-you gift (suggested donation: $10)

Another way to say THANK YOU, especially for those that are not local, is to donate to the Hospital directly – PIH is a non-profit hospital, which still blows my mind. We asked them to set up a donation page dedicated to the Critical Care Unit and would be honored if you’d consider giving. 

Because what they do every day is why we’re coming up on 365 extra days.


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2017: Let there be LIGHT

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This is my anthem for 2017. My fight song. Let there be LIGHT. I’m really struck by the word let. Because I wonder how often I just … don’t.

And let here is not about us somehow giving God permission to be God, to be Light, because He already is. No, this song isn’t about that. It’s about letting that Light be true in us. And through us. And me thinks I probably stand in the way of that more times than I know.

One thing I definitely know to be true about light, about life, about good, is that sometimes we have to first face the dark, the loss, the ungood. That’s why I wrote Friday’s Rain – because grief is the way we work out what has found it’s way in.

While Jason and I worked hard together on writing and releasing Friday’s Rain last year – with a chapter in process about Martha and Lazarus when Jason had his heart attack – yes, for reals … sorry, I digress. Anyways, THIS YEAR, we are opening it with new eyes and new hearts and, honestly, new griefs too. Actually, I haven’t yet met someone who isn’t carrying something pretty major from 2016 …

So if you’re like us, and realizing that 2016 brought some stuff IN that you’d like to work OUT, well, I want to invite you to join us.

Grab your spouse, your friend, your best. Every order placed this week for Friday’s Rain will come with a FREE second copy. Because let there be light. And let us find it TOGETHER.

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O Holy Light: The Pell-Mell of Hope

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I can still hear it. Our crashing pell-mell down the stairs on Christmas morning. We sounded like a herd of elephants. I can see my little brothers in their PJ’s. I can feel my elbows crashing into one of their rib cages to ensure I got there first. I can remember racing back upstairs to pick up my baby sister as she whimpered at the top of the stairs because she was both scared and excited at the same time.

And I remember somewhere, at some point, deciding that racing pell-mell was ‘for the kids.’ Right up there with the magic of all things Christmas.

It’s been a long time since I’ve pell-mell-ed.

This year, I’ve recaptured the wonder of pell-mell-ing. And also, a bit of its desperation.

Even this morning, while my body slept in and adulted through Christmas like a childless-champ (including a stocking full of fur baby toys – yep, that’s a thing) … this Christmas my heart was pell-mell-ing towards hope. Towards light.

Because this year I’ve tasted darkness I didn’t know to be afraid of. This year I’ve lived in the shadow of death. This year I’ve seen fears realized. My own. Those of others. I’ve seen darkness come in to steal joy and marriage and money and life itself. I’ve seen darkness flood hearts and minds with doubt, anger, and terror.

Maybe you have too?

I don’t know your story. But I know OUR STORY. And it’s one that starts in darkness, that feels surrounded by impossible, but has a God racing to us in redemption and light – what if we dared to pell-mell in return? Because the God we celebrate today is the God of the impossible. He’s the one who brought a baby through a virgin. The one who brought a King through a baby. And life through death.

This video captures the story many of you have walked with us this year, where HOPE was found even as it was lost.

So Merry Christmas, friends. The light has come. And in that, we have HOPE. Unexpected. Unearned. And unlimited.

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Thankful fistbumps

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A few years ago we developed (and confessed) our childless fistbump: The fist-bump about celebrating the as-things-are-right-now moments.

This year, that’s how I’m thinking of Thanksgiving. This year there are some big, OBVIOUS things on my gratitude list. Only the easiest year ever to answer “what are you thankful for?” There are also some less obvious griefs. I know Thanksgiving tables everywhere will be filled with equal and sincere doses of gratitude, grief, and granax (Xanax-induced-gratitude). 

My friends at Homefront Magazine invited me to write about how I learned to give thanks in all things, something I had to wrestle to the ground in our unplanned unparenthood – or better said, something that had to wrestle me down. Also, that’s very different than gratitude FOR all things. So very different. Tuck that one in your back pocket because it’s name is grace.

So I thought I’d share the article this morning because maybe as you head into a day of thankful fist-bumping, maybe a little reminder wouldn’t hurt that gratitude and grief are not exclusive of one another. That the thankful-fistbump can be an expression of both. And that practicing gratitude is practice – we get better at it the more we work that muscle.

So, my friend, thankful-fistbump to you and yours, whatever you’re bringing to the Thanksgiving table today. 👊🏻

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Homefront Magazine excerpt (Unplanned Parenthood, November issue)

 She’s got angel’s hair – so blonde it’s almost white. With an angel’s face to match.

She’s four. And precocious. And already carries a fierce stubbornness that is going to make her a challenging teen but amazing woman. She’s in her question-asking stage – Why this? How that? I know some of the answers, but not all.

As we sat together and watched Up, she narrated. He likes balloons, she’d say with a grin. Her giggle was infectious as the love story of Carl and Ellie unfolded.

When they started painting the nursery, she turned to me with a conspiratorial smile and half-whispered she’s going to have a baby. I then saw her head go sideways when the next scene shows Ellie sobbing in the doctor’s office: why is she crying?

Ah, this answer I know. She’s really sad because she isn’t going to have a baby, I answered. Why can’t she have a baby? Well, not everyone gets to. She let that answer sit – I could see that it was brand new information for her brain.

But did she get happy again? Yes. Yes she did.

How? Well, she had a different adventure.

Contended, my niece snuggled in and took a deep sigh, as if the breath she’d been holding had depended on how I answered that question. I marveled (and chuckled inside) at how simply her child-heart had accepted that answer. Because it was an answer my grown-up heart had wrestled with for years.

See, I had set out to be a mom. Instead, He taught me about being His child.

I had waited and watched for the day my womb would be full. Instead, He entrusted me with emptiness.

Owning, living, and braving our story of unplanned unparenthood meant learning how to thank the God who gives and takes away.

Even though I knew I was to “give thanks in all circumstances” (1 Thess. 5:18), I spent many days ready to punch the next person who reminded me. And barrenness can take so many shapes and forms, but mine was literal, and my tears were fresh on the day I came across this odd instruction in Isaiah: “Barren one … go enlarge your tents and strengthen your stakes” (Isaiah 54:2). It sounded kind of, well, cruel. And confusing. Two things that I know God is not. So I simply asked Him “what does this mean?”

I looked at my ‘tents’, the rooms in my heart. I looked to expand when I wanted to shrink. I made more time for friendships. I signed up to be a counselor at a camp for foster youth. I dug into Scripture and discovered loss doesn’t have the last word. I turned to my ‘stakes’ – my marriage. I looked for ways to strengthen it. To invest in it. To fight FOR my man and not with him as our hearts wrestled with an undefined future. I guess you could say I began practicing gratitude before my heart knew what it was doing.

And this passage in Isaiah – this odd instruction to expand when everything in your world says to shrink – goes on to tell us that God has compassion on us the same way we have all the warm feels for newborn babies. [Insert eye-roll about God using a newborn baby metaphor to speak to a barren woman, but I digress.] And THIS is where we find the freedom to give thanks in every circumstance – whether our tents are small or large, our stakes are strong or weak – we are His babes. YOU are His child before you are anything else … before being a wife, or a mom, or a non-mom, or a businesswoman, or a ministry leader, or any of the many labels we can carry.

I love that we get to practice gratitude even before we understand it – and even on days we want to punch the next person who suggests it. That we can encourage each other to ‘enlarge our tents’ and ‘strengthen our stakes’ because we know that fullness and emptiness can exist at the same time, and that we don’t have to carry empty, barren spaces silently – be it an empty womb, an empty heart, or an empty place at the dinner table.

You mamas amaze me. You have been entrusted with the sacredness of fullness, even when it means nights empty of sleep. Your tents are stretched and pulled on a daily basis (and I’m not just talking about breastfeeding). Your stakes are tested by the hour. And they hold. I think most of you know what a sacred role you’ve been given as MOM. I love that we get to remind each other that the sacredness is there with or without that title. Because before we are anything else, we are His beloved littles. Having all kinds of different adventures.

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Amen to the Long Road, America

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Last night took us back to a hospital hallway. ER this time. Before I continue: *Jasons fine* – an ultrasound and ekg later, we were probably experiencing a reaction to a drug change.

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So that hallway. I actually spent most of yesterday writing out some big feels about “that other” hospital hallway, because watching the post-election response felt a lot like being there, where trauma can breed trauma. Where hearts are on the line and you can’t believe some of the things that people will say, like they’re missing the whole point.

Hospital hallways trigger me now. There are things I heard in them that I can’t unhear. Things like alarms and bells and monitors yes, but words too.

I think this election cycle is our country’s hospital hallway. Where alarms went off and fears were identified – some fears realized and others averted. And where words have been said that can’t be unheard.

And in moments we least expect, we might find ourselves back in another hallway, and our PTSD may trigger, and even if *everythings fine* that time, we might still shake and quake.

Healing is the long road. Can we amen it? I hope so. I choose so.

Amen to the long road, America.

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Holy nap-time

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Holy end of September. I feel like I’m just waking up from a nap. One of those crash-your-face-into-the-pillow and wake up chagrined by the drool kind of naps.

And actually, August and September were filled with a lot of those. I’m real sad I was such a jerk to naps when I was a kid. I guess I’m making up for that now.

Recovery is no joke. Right now I’m in the tired phase. I mean, we’re talking exhausted on a level that is totally foreign to me. But also in a way that is just real. And just recovery.

See, crisis immediately slows down and shrinks your world – in a good way. It instantly becomes obvious what needs your time and attention and what does not. Coming out of crisis means expanding that world – also a good thing, but tricky too. Finding a post-crisis-pace requires new definitions and new priorities, but the old ones are the habits that already know your name. And they taunt and test and sometimes trick you … thus commencing the drool-inducing-naps.

It’s no mistake that my current reading includes Present over Perfect, The Year of Living Danishly, and a novel about knitting (that I’m actually enjoying!). I’m learning the sacredness of slowness in a fast world.

A few weeks ago Jason taught on a passage in 1 Kings – I love me the Old Testament, but I haven’t hung out there in awhile. He taught through the passage where Elijah stood on Mount Carmel and tested the Baals – the false gods – in an epic dual with the true Living God. He literally saw fire rain down from heaven.

And then … he took a nap. No, for real. The day after he lived a miracle, Queen Jezebel threatened his life and Elijah ran into the desert to hide. He was wiped out, and there in the desert God met him with kindness, and food … and naps.

This is the amazing God I’ve been cuddling up with the last few months. The one who is all-powerful and all-kind at the same time, whose glory is seen not just when He allows us to have a front-row seat to miracles, but also when He cradles us as we collapse.

So be your fall fast or slow, may you find Him near, whether you’re standing on a mountaintop proclaiming glory or snuggling in the shadow of His wings.

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Wonderland

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We did it. We took a vacation. In a post-crisis reality, this is a big deal. You better believe there was some big celebration of what before was taken for granted. Because post-crisis, there are a lot of things you say goodbye to. Some forever, like naivety. Some for a short while, like vacationing. And because of Hank, this much-hoped-for vacation was not green-lighted until the day before we actually left. And oh my goodness, for those who didn’t see the update ala Facebook and Instagram, Hank is a wuss and NOT a cancerous tumor!

So as we come up on the six-month mark after Jason’s heart attack, we jumped a flight to Alaska and joined up with besties to explore Wonderland. It delivered. We rested. We played. We danced in the rain and shine. And I only had 2-1/2 panic attacks.

But seriously, what a wonder-full world. And even on the rainy days, we carried the sunshine in our pockets.

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