filth and the forest

 by Alanna

This morning was pretty much all ugly, and even though in the beginning I tried to blame it on the lost hat and the sandwich helpers, really it was just me. I chose sin, ripping into all of you with ugly words, rough hands, sarcasm, hurt and pain. None of it you deserved, painfully obvious to us all after even the lost hat turned out to have nothing to do with you. My negativity and complaining knew no bounds and mingled with my tears of supposed remorse was more pessimism. Lord, Hosanna. Save me. 

For some reason though, I found myself shortly thereafter in a forest with you. It was the plan for today and we had to go. Good thing because otherwise my guilt would have tied me home in a black cloud. The trees were all changing color and the yellow carpet crunched under my fallen feet. I tried not to look because I knew in my heart that none of this beauty I deserved. But You were persistent. You put on this beautiful show, these leaves and this air and these fallen logs. These friends and this sunshine and this autumn. All this glorious dying all around. And this beauty reminded me that this grace is undeserved. Of course I don't belong here. But I, wretched, pitiful, abounding in sin and anger, get to be here and breathe in this air and this beauty because of your death in my place. Now I could weep tears of awe at your love for me.   

Later that evening I found myself back at the same forest. Silly plans that I'm sure the Lord knew long ago. This time I spent a good chunk of the party in the bathroom, cleaning filth off of toddlers who should know better by now and babies just new born. And this is grace too. And even as the smell makes me wretch, I could weep with awe at your love for me. Because this is me. In all my filth, helpless to help myself, helpless to change, helpless to grow apart from your grace. And you meet me here in compassion. You don't reprimand me, you don't speak sarcastic words to tear me down, you don't sigh with a really, again? You, the Holy One who inhabits eternity and everlasting light, are somehow not repelled by my filth. You are moved with pity. You cleanse and heal with tenderness. It's like in these stories of You from long ago, how You saw and loved. You see and love still. 

And when I crawl under the covers in the dark tonight, it will be into peace and not into guilt. Because You already felt all that guilt and bore all that punishment in my place. And when I wake tomorrow it will be into grace. 

so much grace...

 by Alanna

Thank you Jesus for this gift. For this baby snuggled against me now. For all the time you gave him to grow inside of me. For forming perfectly every part of him. 

Thank you Jesus for his birth. For an easy labor, an easy delivery. For medicine and midwives and a beautiful place for him to enter the world. For my supportive husband and his hand to hold. For music to help my heart worship you in the midst. 

Thank you for a vehicle to bring him home in. For a carseat to keep him safer. For roads to drive on and for a country not at war. Thank you for a house to carry him into. For heat and walls and windows to let in the light. 

Thank you Jesus for his siblings. All six of them eager to welcome him, eager to hold and love. Thank you for his grandparents, who love you and will pray and sing blessings over him in the coming weeks as they give selflessly of themselves to love us.

Thank you for his father, a man I can point him to as a servant leader who loves you and wants your glory. A man who treats us all well and is ever patient with me. A man who will take on more responsibility gladly with the coming of this new one. 

Thank you for forgiving me my doubts, my anxiety. When I failed to trust you, you proved yourself again.

Thank you for giving us another child at the exact time that you did.   

Thank you for entrusting us with another son. I feel keenly how little qualified I am for this tremendous task. My failures replay before me, all the ways I have let them down. But you have cast my sins into the depths of the sea. And the ocean of your grace never casts them back up to reproach me. You are all good. Merciful and abounding in steadfast love to me. 

the golden forest

 by Alanna

I recently breathed in the air of my favorite place on earth. There is something so deeply mysterious about those woods. In the distance they were misty at the ground level, but where we walked just a beautiful clear view through an endless forest of gold. The trunks dark, the leaves shimmered. It's ancient, that place. It takes my breath away every time, but I think this time was like none before for me. It made me want to cry and laugh, sing and dance, fall on my knees and worship. Everyone worships something. I'm just so thankful that I get to worship the Creator of this forest. The Maker of the whole incredible place we get to live in. This beauty leaves me speechless, and I know that it's just a tiny taste of His glory. My little song of praise, my small whisper of "Thank you Jesus", is swallowed up in this vast place.  All creation shouts His praise. I needed these reminders here. That God is powerful. Creative. Immense. Full of wonder and awe, mystery and beauty. Eternal. Unchanging. Beautiful. Glorious. And that He loves us enough to give us this incredible gift. Kept my heart beating through the night. Opened my eyes today. Gave me two legs to walk through this forest and two eyes to see. Made all these colors to delight me. Blessed me with this husband and these children to walk with. Their laughter. Their faces. Their delight. This day is a gift. This forest is a whisper of His love to me and I feel wrapped up in His presence. Reassured of the reality of His bottomless goodness and generosity and grace. 

celebrating life

 by Alanna

We found out this summer that we are expecting our seventh child. Similar tides of emotion always wash over my ankles on this sort of discovery. This time the initial moments felt more like a wave threatening to take me under. But always too the beauty of the shoreline and the crisp air taking my breath away. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above. Sometimes it takes a little time to process; then I learn also to think less about how we will homeschool come February and more about the grace given me in this moment. Today. I am gifted to be the bearer of life. I get to be this door through which a human soul is to enter the world. I get to experience in my own body something fearful and wonderful being knit together. To house another human heartbeat. To be the first to whisper God's love to them. I get to sacrifice convenience and ease for a house full of laughter. It's counter cultural, this having children thing. In the world yes, and sometimes this unbridled reckless trust feels lonely even in the church. But God is the creator of life. It was His idea, His delight. Behold children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward.  I never fully feel the emotional and spiritual weight of shepherding the baby until I see them on the 20-week ultrasound. Tonight was that night. Tonight we found out we are having another son. One daughter and six sons. Lord willing, my oldest son will turn eight just a few weeks before this baby arrives. What a trust we have been given. I stagger under the weight of it but I know my Savior upholds me. Raising sons in our age feels like a meaningful mission. To teach young men how to love well, how to be strong defenders and leaders with servant's hearts. To battle sin, to think clearly, to find dependence on the Lord to be their strength and not a fault. 

Strangers always comment on how I must be a saint or how they could never do it or how I am such a good mom, as if having so many kids so quickly automatically translates to me loving them well. Truth is most days the word that would most readily come to mind to describe myself is inadequate. Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God. But despite all I feel, I love this. I love being a mom, I love teaching them, I love being with them. I love the work that God has given me to do. To display to the world the truth that life is beautiful and precious and that every individual is a gift to be celebrated. Made in God's image, fearfully and wonderfully.

your hurt and God's glory part 2

 by Alanna

God help. Bring safety. Bring belief. Bring freedom. Bring provision. Bring shalom. My faith is so small and the darkness feels so big.

When the servant of the man of God rose early in the morning and went out, behold, an army with horses and chariots was all around the city. And the servant said, "Alas, my master! What shall we do?" He said, "Do not be afraid, for those who are with us are more than those who are with them." Then Elisha prayed and said, "O LORD, please open his eyes that he may see." So the LORD opened the eyes of the young man, and he saw, and behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha.

I think I've been seeing myself as a necessary medium between God and those I love. If I don't remind Him maybe He will forget. If I don't worry and strategize and plan and wear myself out than maybe nothing will change. But no. Jesus stands at God's right hand interceding for me. He knows. He sees. He has not forgotten and I truly believe in the depths of my being that He has a plan and that it is good. 

The reminder I held on to from today was that we need to look not so much at the overwhelming needs as at God's absolutely glory and ability. His glory fills us. We have all we need. He already knows that we are broken and weak tools and He is not surprised at my inability to save anyone. He is the Savior. He is the rescuer. The redeemer. The protector. The champion. The provider.

I know all these things but tonight my faith feels so small. LORD. I am yours. Help. 

your hurt and God's glory

 by Alanna

I remember sitting out on my front porch with you in the dark last summer. I think that's maybe when we really became friends. You still make my kids laugh and hold my baby but things are different now. I see the pain in your eyes. I feel it when I hug you. That afternoon you stood in my kitchen and when I hugged you goodbye you crumpled in pain. Hurt. Again. Your mind. Your body. Your spirit. Broken. I want so much for you to know that your Creator made you for more than this. Your broken texts and your quiet words echo in my mind too much. If I could hold the feeling of immense worth and love in my hands and pass it into yours I would close your fingers around those feelings so you would never let them go. I want so much for you to believe truth. I want the lies and the fog to clear. I want you to see. I want you to be safe.

You shed tears that day. The one I will never forget when you sat at my table. The bread between and the holy moment quiet and unbroken. Where did you go? I cried so long and I pounded so hard on that door. And time passed and my heart grew numb with the hurt. I want you to know grace. To know how loved you are. To know the King of the universe and that He never expected more from you than just quiet trust. For all the unanswered questions that I never had an answer to. You changed my life in so many ways. And in the car that day when we spoke of goodbyes. And I saw in my son's eyes his heart brimful, but the tears didn't spill over when he whispered those awful words. I was so thankful that day to be able to face forward and cry and cry and he never knew. How can I give him answers to a reality that breaks me to pieces. I want you to believe.

You are precious and valuable and I wish I had spent more time in our childhood rehearsing those truths over and over to you. How to deal with the regrets now. You ran to so many things except to the one place where you would find true healing. I'm sorry I haven't loved you better. I never knew the right words to say. But my heart broke when you called me. It breaks for you still. All that pain in cycles you can't escape on your own. I see in you a reflection of where I would be if He hadn't chased me down.  Your Creator made you fearfully and wonderfully beautiful. I wish I could take your sorrow from you. I wish you could see that your Savior bled for all that hurt and sin so that you wouldn't have to. I want you to be free.

I pick up the pen to write you and it's always a complicated dance. There's so much in my heart that I want for you. So much healing and hope and peace. Deep down and rock solid. But I struggle too. I know the dark days. The clouds feel like a blanket today that suffocate me and the snow coming down just makes it that much harder to breathe. I have to fight for joy too. I want you to be whole.

In a mysterious way that I can't comprehend, you hold my heart still. The green mountains and the rocky paths. Your people's greetings in the streets. How can one small place hold so much human suffering. I'm so sorry for all my country has done to you. I'm so sorry for all of your hunger and your orphans and the occupation and the army's brutality over all these years. He promised, when the poor and needy seek water and their tongue is parched with thirst, that He would answer them. Sometimes I confess with Lecrae that He feels far away. In all the rubble and chaos. It feels jarring to me that I can sit and type these words from a safe house with a full belly and electric lights. I can't pretend to know all the hurt you hold. I want your people to be well. 

  

the days to come

 by Alanna

Tomorrow my mom will fly home, and about a week afterward my brother will go too. My husband and I will be the team that keeps on here, in this place where God has sovereignly placed us. This morning I cried for a moment because I am anxious when I look forward. How will we take on all of these responsibilities? How do I start daily caring for 6 small people age 7 and under? Homeschooling, laundry, meals, cleaning, heart shepherding, changing nappies, doctor appointments. How will my husband hold up with full time seminary, part time work, and all that he does here morning and evening and all his spare time devoted to his children and me? I fear sin conquering me in these long days to come. I fear my impatience and my temper and my murmuring and my discontentment.  The Lord knows. 

He is a God who sees. He saw Hagar and called to her, not the once but twice. And He opened her eyes too- to see the well of water that was already there. "Fear not...up! Lift up the boy, and hold him fast with your hand, for I will make him into a great nation." (Genesis 21:18)

He is a God who multiplies. Broken fragments of bread, totally insufficient. ("There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish, but what are they for so many?" John 6:9) In His hands, fragments become baskets of excess.

He is a God who is with me. "Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand." Isaiah 41:10

He is the bread of life, the living water, the One from whom when we drink we will never thirst again. 

He is the light of the world. Those who follow Him will not walk in darkness. Those who hope in Him will never be put to shame. 

He is a promise keeper. "And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ." He is able. 

I may lack what I need. Energy, strength, patience, love, time. But I will not lack Him. And in Him is everything. My sufficiency. His name is a strong tower. He is enough. Not just today in my quiet house while the baby sleeps, but in a month when two are fighting and three are hungry and one poops up his back and the other needs a nap. When I feel sucked dry, He will be enough.