Author: Caroline

When I'm not riding in the backseat of my Grandpa's restored vintage car "Mable," I'm doing other things like... rising to most adventure occasions my husband proposes / chasing our toddler around Brooklyn / enjoying neighbors, strangers, and friends / making countless trips to the laundromat / writing for various publications and for personal reflection / loving and serving our local church / cleaning the bathroom / hosting small and big crowds in our home / meeting up with a friend for coffee / thinking Vocation is my strange frenemy. Though I have worked and existed in many stations/places, I am convinced that each day has good work to be done and that I am equipped and prepared to do that good work. This blog explores the tension and the intersection of a constant vocational call - to good work, neighbor love, and living in the kingdom come. My favorite things are coffee and creating and laughing (preferably with company). I love to listen to sermons and read biographies and make tea before going to bed.

the storm is passing over

This song appeared on a compilation CD to benefit those affected by Hurricane Sandy and I’ve been playing it a lot the last couple weeks. Hurricane Sandy is still a nightmare for some – struggling to put back the pieces of their lives after houses caved in on themselves and memories washed away with several feet of water. It’s not as newsworthy because there have been tragedies since that won out the airplay.

So many storms, this world has. So many storms.

You know what I love, though?

I love that my Lord promises the storm is passing over and I love that I can trust Him.

Because the storms, they just keep coming.
Death and destruction and disease – it all looks so relentless and it’s tempting to fashion our lives out of fear.

My Lord has a plan for redemption that defeats destruction and He invites all to let Him fashion our lives out of freedom.  

(Get the WHOLE cd for free and then leave a tip to help out the people in NYC)

let LOVE fly like cRaZy

 

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All Glory Be to Christ

What a wonderful thing to sing.

This morning, reading in my advent devotional (Good News of Great Joy), I wondered again at the miracle and mystery of Jesus’ birth. A magnificent story because it is true and it started before time began.

The mystery of the birth of Jesus is not merely that he was born of a virgin. That miracle was intended by God to witness to an even greater one—namely, that the child born at Christmas was a person who existed “from of old, from ancient days.” from Good News of Great Joy

This mysterious, miraculous birth changed the course of history because One who had always been entered in to our chronological timeline, just as it was prophecied in Micah 5:2, “But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming forth is from of old, from ancient days.”

All Glory be to Christ, the Ancient of Days.

let LOVE fly like cRaZy

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adventures in stairwells

One of the strange and beautiful things about human nature is the way grief and sorrow can live next to joy and laughter. I don’t mean to say things that grieve us also make us laugh. I don’t mean to say that at all.

What I mean is the way one can get into a helpless state of the giggles on the same day one feels helpless about the state of things in the world.

I say all this because yesterday was my first day to “have court.” This is what all my co-workers say when they go to the courthouse, so I say it now too. When we “have court” we sit behind the DHS worker and the child’s attorney, available for information about the case.

It all sounds really serious because it is. You would be shocked to know what children face. You probably don’t want to know any more than that – just that it’s devastating.

So, here I am driving around downtown Des Moines looking for public parking so that I can “have court.” I’ve had problems with parking garages before, but I wrongly assumed Des Moines would be an easier animal to wrestle. I found a parking garage in plenty of time, but when I slung my briefcase over my shoulder and flew down the stairwell I decided I should be in a hurry.

Coming out of the parking garage was like someone had spun me around and set me down facing a different direction (which is actually exactly what a parking garage does). I didn’t know which way was North and what historical building to walk toward.

So, I picked one and hoped it was the courthouse. I got close enough to see “POLK COUNTY” written on it but as I was walking up the steps, a lady taking a smoke break said, “You don’t look too happy to be coming here. But, hey at least it’s not the courthouse!”

Yeah.

So, I walked in one door and out the other where I promptly asked a parking meter officer to point me in the direction of the courthouse. She looked at me, smiled with all kinds of pity, and said, “Just walk up Court Avenue right there and you’ll run right into it.”

Right. Court Avenue, silly me.

So, I got to court with time to spare (thanks to my enormous cushion I operate with due to my Latin tendencies). Everything went well enough and when I left I felt good about things.

And then I met the sidewalk and realized retracing my steps would lead me in all kinds of circles. Everything looked familiar because I had passed all of downtown on my adventure to the courthouse.

So, I did what any new-to-downtown would do – I walked briskly in the direction of a hunch with my briefcase slung over my shoulder and my heels clicking professionally on the pavement. I saw that nice parking meter lady again and gave her the grandest smile.

And then I walked in every parking garage stairwell I came to until I found the one that was just right. I can’t be sure how many stairwells I walked up, but I kept the brisk pace so anyone around thought I was going someplace important. I finally found the stairwell I was searching for – one with no numbers, partially inside/partially outside, and with my little car Eddie waiting on the fourth or fifth floor (no numbers).

And so my adventures in stairwells gave a different kind of ending to my first court experience – proof that a helpless state of giggles can live inside the helpless state of the world.

let LOVE fly like cRaZy
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what is it that makes it beat?

This one line in a new song by one of my favorite singer/songwriters, Sandra McCracken is enough to break you or melt you or stitch you back together. This one line, I don’t know… it’s enough.

“to bend the will you first must change the heart”

So many times I look at the news – and not just in the United States – and I grimace. It’s almost better to not know the extent of the damage human beings can have on one another. Almost.

I’ve been thinking a lot about what people are capable of doing and how to harness our capabilities into something productive and beautiful. And the conversation will always dabble in bandaids until it engages with the heart.

The heart is alive behind bars and at parks and in mental illness and in gun stores and at family dinner and on Sunday morning.

The heart is alive, so what is it that makes it beat?

let LOVE fly like cRaZy

Get the song, Dynamite, for free here.

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flash flood prayers

Dear, Father
I just-
Lord, be with-
Oh, I just lift up-
There is so much-
Lord, you know-
There is just so much-
I don’t know-
Help me to-
God, please-
You are good.

This morning, my prayers got jumbled in a bunch of starts like water rushing a roadblock – just a massive surge leaving no time to consider convenient direction or map a course that makes sense.

Sometimes my soul wells up like that.
Sometimes my prayers swell in a most inconvenient and nonsensical way.
Sometimes my prayers sound like a flash flood.

And those times I rest in the knowledge that God hears my heart. God sees the needs I can’t express. God knew before the flash flood hit my morning news bulletin that the world needs Him.

He knows better than anyone knows the depth of that need.
God sent His Son to stand in the unfathomable depth of that need so now there is hope for flash flood mornings.

let LOVE fly like cRaZy

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threading the needle of His mending

I woke up feeling the ugliness. It slipped out my eyelids as I was doing laundry and felt like a freight train as I read my Advent devotional.

It was unnerving yesterday to see people jumping on platforms to make the tragedy in Sandy Hook political. This is a time for weeping and just that. Grief serves as a great reminder that the world is not broken because of systems or structures but because of people. The world is broken because people are not inherently good.

We are broken. We are wayward. We are disasters making disasters.

And so, this morning, when I read these words I remembered why it is important that we understand God’s law. When we look at His commands – at the weight and glory and perfection of them – we know what a mended world would look like.

Now the God of peace, who brought up from the dead the great Shepherd of the sheep through the blood of the eternal covenant [this is the purchase of the new covenant], even Jesus our Lord, equip you in every good thing to do His will, working in us that which is pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen. Hebrews 13:20-21

The words “working in us that which is pleasing in his sight” describe what happens when God writes the law on our hearts in the new covenant. And the words “through Jesus Christ” describe Jesus as the Mediator of this glorious work of sovereign grace.

So the meaning of Christmas is not only that God replaces shadows with Reality, but also that he takes the reality and makes it real to his people. He writes it on our hearts. He does not lay his Christmas gift of salvation and transformation down for you to pick up in your own strength. He picks it up and puts in your heart and in your mind, and seals to you that you are a child of God. (Good News of Great Joy  Advent Devotional, day 15)

His law is true and pure and beautiful. He writes his ways on our hearts when we put down all our human efforts and pick up His finished work on the cross. Then we will obey His commands because we love Him more than what is broken.

In His power and strength, we will act the miracles He has written on our hearts – from one hard fought step to the next. We cannot legislate the mending of this world because the brokenness is deeper than our pens and papers.

The mending of this world must begin in our hearts – by believing that Christ was broken on our behalf, but that He did not stay broken.

When we believe there is only One with power enough to beat brokenness, He grants power that we might thread the needle of His mending.

let LOVE fly like cRaZy
Posted on by Caroline 1

carried away

With news like this morning, the world suddenly sees what ripples underneath the culture’s glossy veneer. It’s horrible. It makes us sick. It’s ugly.

The world is not okay.

No amount of money or brick walls or achievements of institutions will suffice to mend it.

The world is not okay.

It’s painful to peek through the blinds and view the world outside ourselves – outside the way we’ve arranged our lives to make things comfortable and proper. It hurts because what we see outside our windows is ugly. When we pull back the curtains, it’s horror we see when people can walk into a school and kill our little children. And how startling, once the drapes have been drawn, our own reflection in the window as we look out.

The world is not okay and it’s not just the horrors in the news.
It’s the horrors that don’t make the news, too.

Oh, friends. Be encouraged before you get carried away with fear and doubt and pain and sadness. Ask the Lord to teach you to know the number of your days (Psalm 39:4) and then ask Him to be the strength to keep your heart grounded in His Word and His promises.

Teach me to know my number of days
hold on, my heart, from gettin’ carried away

The world is not okay.

But what better reason to introduce a Savior?

let LOVE fly like cRaZy
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the reason the world exists

“The magnifying of Christ in the white-hot worship of all nations is the reason the world exists.” from Good News of Great Joy Advent Devotional, day 9

I keep thinking about this statement that rounded out day 9 in the Advent reading. To propose a reason for the world’s existence is a claim worth considering. Westminster Catechism says the purpose of man is to love God and enjoy Him forever, but what is the purpose of the world as a whole?

The magnifying of Christ in the white-hot worship of all nations…

What is it about all nations that is so important? Why did the star lead foreigners across miles to an unlikely destination where Jesus had been born with the title “King of the Jews”?

Because God’s heart is not divided by national lines or allocated to allied forces. God desires that all nations would know about the gift of salvation through Christ.

Many things had to work just right – from the Roman Empire calling for a census precisely when Mary was ready to pop to a brilliant star trotting across the sky in a way that led the Magi to follow.

These things worked just right because God ordained them to be just so.

Now, if I am going to participate in the magnifying of Christ, I must understand how I am both singing in the white-hot worship and inviting others to join me.

What a beautiful thing to stretch out an invitation to worship the Savior of the world with every nation and tribe and tongue.

let LOVE fly like cRaZy

 

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scrambled

Over-easy, hard, benedict… scrambled.

If you asked me to describe my life right now in terms of cooked eggs (which of course you wouldn’t), I would say scrambled.

These days are like opening my eyes underwater and finding a thick, slimy mud. I’m muscling through the grime for clearer deeps, but there is a thickness trying to steal my hope. Cynicism is cheap in this business where skeptics are trained by years of disappointment.

Working with broken people means getting broken yourself.

The first line of this song sticks to me as I walk around broken, reaching out to broken, “Lay your righteousness on the table…”

It’s like sitting down for negotiation and emptying my pockets of every bit of pride trying to play the cards in my favor. I don’t know what The Gin House intended the song to mean, but it feels like the “fire is alive” is about hope.

After honesty and justice has wrung out all my vices, there is hope … and not in what I’ve flung on the table. There is hope outside of what I have to offer.

It’s that kind of hope that will hold when I pull with all my might.
It’s that kind of hope that is secure when everything is scrambled.

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peace is found in believing

“The key that unlocks the treasure chest of God’s peace is faith in the promises of God. So Paul prays, “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing” (Romans 15:13). And when we do trust the promises of God and have joy and peace and love, then God is glorified.”
– from Day 7 in Good News of Great Joy, Advent Devotional.

Some days it feels like I need the treasure of God’s peace more than I need anything else. In those days, I turn life upside down in search of it.

But my feelings betray me because every day I need this treasure. And every day I either find God’s peace or settle for something else. Usually, when I don’t feel like I need the treasure of God’s peace I have settled for something far less valuable and my very settling will send me on a desperate search for the real thing as soon as the counterfeit runs out.

I love this reflection about peace – that peace is faith in the promises of God.

Both joy and peace come in believing – in the process of trusting we unlock the treasure of peace. An easier treasure map you could not find: trust in the promises of the One who made you, called you, loves you, and sanctifies you. Trust in the One who has no beginning and no end.

This is the map to the treasure of God’s peace: trust.

That’s it.

Thankfully, there’s no math. It’s not trust + effort or trust + deeds that we need to get to peace. But it’s also not an equation one can finish and present to God in exchange for peace.

I am a notorious short-lived truster: I trust for a moment and then fall out of believing moments after. But this in believing that Paul talks about in Romans 15 – this in believing is beautiful because our active trusting (in the present tense) means the peace is hidden there in the activity.

God has infinite joy and peace waiting to be discovered by those who trust Him for who He is from this moment to the next… and then for the moments after that.

Some days it feels like I need the treasure of God’s peace more than I need anything else. On those other days my feelings forget to make me feel what my soul always searches.

Every day I need God’s peace and every day it is found in believing.
He finds me as I am believing and gives me peace.

And in the giving of peace, He is glorified as the only One in whom we can believe for this peace – the only One whose promises are worth trusting.

[deep breath]

let LOVE fly like cRaZy

Posted on by Caroline 1