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.

a letter to fathers

I remembered this post recently and thought now is a good time to revisit these thoughts. I wrote this post almost exactly a year ago, while working in Honduras. Maybe it’s Valentine’s Day that has me thinking about it again.

daughter & dad

___________________________________________________________________

John Mayer’s song, “Daughters,” scratches the surface of the longing a daughter feels to be loved by her dad, but (not surprisingly) it isn’t strong enough.

Fathers, be good to your daughters
daughters will love like you do

It was simple enough to capture the attention of a whole crowd of daughters who wished for what this nebulously suggests, but I wish this song spelled out specifics.

Fathers:

  1. Be transparent about your first and greatest Love.
    For many daughters, your faith is a secret. You might go to church or you might have a Bible, but your ideas and convictions are as hidden and elusive as treasure on a child’s crayon-scribbled treasure map. It’s okay to be somewhere in the growing stages of your faith – in fact, it’s refreshing for us daughters to know you haven’t “arrived” yet. When your daughter can see you admit you need God, her heart and tenderness toward you will grow, but more importantly you will have pointed her gaze to the Father who never fails.
  2. Love your wife.
    One of the greatest ways you can love your daughter is to love and serve your wife. When your daughter sees you honoring, protecting, partnering, laughing, enjoying, and living in a way that reflects God’s design for marriage, she will respect your role and have an excellent example of a husband (especially important in those years when you cannot relate to your daughter. When nothing makes sense, love your wife well and I promise your daughter will see it!).
  3. Choose to be around.
    Your daughter will feel special when you decide the best place for you is next to her.
  4. Get personal.
    Some of my favorite memories with my dad are simple ones that we shared while we did chores together on the farm or as we drove out to a football game or prepared our animals for county fair. Every discussion doesn’t have to be deep, but if you open up first then you’ll gain your daughter’s trust and she’ll likely reciprocate (even if it’s not right away).
  5. Encourage, praise, love the God-honoring things your daughter does and push her in those things to be excellent.
    I’ll never forget my dad’s insistence that I study that little spelling book in preparation for the elementary spelling bees. My dad still types on the computer with his pointer fingers and English wasn’t his strongest high school subject, but when he found out I could put letters together in the right order, he was going to make sure I did it excellently. Those little things (though I assure you I didn’t love them at the time) made his love for me so obvious.
  6. Be gentle.
    Your daughter will appreciate well-placed words and respected silences.
  7. Be good to your sons, too.
    Your daughters are smart. They will see the way you are leading and guiding your sons. Right now they are making mental notes in their heart about whether their dream man will act like the father and brothers in their lives. Many daughters hold on desperately to the hope that it can be different. If they have to rely on Hollywood, they will be hoping for something unhealthy and unrealistic. Your daughter has a front row seat for what a man should look like – so show her!

 

let LOVE fly like crazy
and let those people closest to you benefit

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notes & words

Here are some of the tunes I’ve been loving on lately. I think there’s a little bit for everyone here, but probably not all of it will suite you. If you don’t listen to anything else, at least check out Josh Garrels today and I promise your Monday will dance.

Josh Garrels

Jeremy Larson

Sugar and the HiLows

William Fitzsimmons

High Society (this is rap – fyi)

Jenny and Tyler

Lighthouse and the Whaler

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ampersands

“… & now I live in Ames, Iowa.”

Tonight it struck me, facing a beautiful piece of stained glass in the cozy, stone room that tucked itself in as an afterthought of the grand cathedral. I sat in the corner and scanned the room, drank in the faces, and then closed my eyes to let the lilting music of rolled r’s and long o’s seep behind my watery eyes.

Tonight I found myself (at 5:15 pm and on time to the 5 pm service) at the Spanish Mass and I started to feel the weight of my most recent ampersand.

“… & now I live in Ames, Iowa.”

The weight is not wrong, only sometimes I forget what I joyfully carry around – three years of my life lived with kingdom eyes to hold the gaze of beauty in Tegucigalpa, Honduras. With every ampersand added to my life, I found the blessing of my daily rhythm beholding the beauty of God.

I sang & jumped & talked
& listened & wrote
& learned & prayed
& crafted & played
& taught & watched
& loved…

because God showed me boundless grace & mercy.

God commissions me, with His blessing, to be a blessing… to stuff my life full of ampersands that PROCLAIM His glory.

Some ampersands are harder than others to etch into my life sentences. Some ampersands are carved painfully because I’d really rather not add anything else.

But, no matter how they find their way into my story, I love ’em… because what else can we do with the life God gives us? Every ampersand is a blessing, every day and each moment – an ampersand stamped on our existence this side of heaven.

I’m looking at my long list of ampersands tonight and counting my many blessings… counting them like currency that should be spent lavishly on gifts.

“… & now I live in Ames, Iowa.”

Thank you, Lord, for stamping this ampersand on my 27-year-old life. Thank you for bringing me here and adding dump trucks of blessings on my already overflowing soul. Thank you for the hard days and the brilliant days and the days I wish I were somewhere other than here.

I pray I make every ampersand (every blessing added to my days, every moment) available to others in a way that brings them face to face with the Giver – no matter where my ampersands land me.

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like diamonds

diamonds are attention-getting

Sometimes, it’s the only thing you remember when you walk away from a conversation. Somehow, a diamond can make everything else seem insignificant and dull.

This is the GOSPEL to me. I want to wear it like diamonds, so that everything else is its backdrop. I want the Gospel to be the first and last impression I leave with every conversation. I want the Gospel I’m wearing to sparkle with mystery and throw off a curious reflection.

Last night, in a conversation with a self-proclaimed “agnostic, buddhist, Indian scientist,” I hope he noticed the Gospel above all else.

I hope Truth shone like diamonds, because there is nothing more beautiful.

let LOVE fly like cRaZy

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the greatest story that ever was

I wrote this entire post yesterday and then cyberspace stole it. It took me awhile to cool off and find time to try it again (because I had a 15 minute window between work and work), but if Vince is right – this should be better anyway.

This morning I woke up remembering. My mind was heavy with it and I didn’t want to shake free. A deep sadness chased after rose-petaled joy in the wide expanse of slight slumber and I soaked it all in with my head smooshed to the pillow. Remembering.

I know the words to a beautiful tale of trial and tragedy and triumph. I know the beginning and ending of the greatest story that ever was. I carry around the chapters in thought bubbles above my head and feel them in the work of my hands. It’s a living kind of story that is both finished and in process. It’s the kind of story that everyone wants to believe is true, but only some have eyes to see.

It’s a story where we are the characters and we live the plot.

This story is the Gospel.
God’s plan for humankind to live as we were designed – for worship.

The Gospel is the greatest story that ever was, penned by the Creator with great care – from the moment the first light broke into the furthest reaches of black void.

In the beginning, God. Forever before and forever after this little blip called human existence, God lives – Perfect, Holy, and Blameless. Our failure to reflect Him (in His perfection) required a hero – a Perfect Savior who would stand in our place to take on everything imperfect, unholy, and blame-filled. Christ is that Savior. 

And today my heart is heavy with the weight of this story – to receive it with joy and to tell it with abandon; to preach it with my feet and to sing it with laughter. This is the story of deliverance from death to life, from lost to found.

This is the story that changes everything. And so deep sadness plays with great joy in my soul as I turn over this blessing in my sleepy mind. This is the story that changes everything.

What have I imagined to be more important than this story? What have I elevated to get more fame than this true tale? What has taken my gaze from the One who redeemed me from the pit and restored my soul?

Today, the act opens on the greatest story that ever was and sets the stage for the greatest party that ever was. 

let LOVE fly like cRaZy

what scene are you making tonight? we are bound to make a scene – like fools in love.

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samaritan’s love

I’m just singing the songs of Tuesday…
and thinking about how beautiful it is to be called light when I was once dark. O, Lord – may I remember what I once was and how, by Your grace, I am not anymore.

“but then came a light
you opened my eyes
to all that is obscene in my life
and given new breath
and finding that the death of me
is better than trying my best”
…
“the debt that was mine
you paid every dime
where once guilt crept
now peace in me dwells”

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it’s official

If you weren’t convinced before, this oughta do it. Remember my boot sliding escapade last week? Well, apparently I didn’t.

Here’s how I do the math:

snowstorm overnight + slightly warmer daytime temp + 5:00 pm = ice covered sidewalks

This is the equation that lands me smack dab in the middle of crazy (don’t forget that I’m notoriously unstable in good sidewalk conditions). I had been office-d all day, plugging away in Excel (wishing my brother would have given me the tutorial he promised over Christmas break) and pushing some papers… so I was ready to run.

The snow made my whole body nervous this morning (when I realized I have no idea how to drive in it), so running was going to be my way of snatching back my winter joy. The first five minutes involved a simple, out loud conversation with myself, “This is stupid. You are stupid.” But, I kept going… down the icy stairs, through the icy park, past a cautious walker, and looping around to follow the path toward the university.

I kept thinking, “Why am I doing this?” and then answering, “because this is how to live winter” … and then catching myself from a near fall. I really had very little mental space to process while I ran because I needed to focus singularly on staying upright.

I let a giggle jump out and chase the sky.

Let the winter come! And, oh, let me run in it!

I loved every bit of my run – no matter how official it made my craziness (I’m not sure that was even in question to begin with).

I loved the way the man stared at me when I said, “Should have brought my ice skates”
and the way I ran by the university campanile at exactly 5:30, approaching an ice patch (and the way I jolted when the bells chimed)
and the way people stared at me like I was some luny freshman, trying to resolve off 15 pounds
and the way the Cadillac slid to a halt to let me pass in front of it
and the way I only slipped once and another time saved a fall with bowling-like form
and the way the footsteps in the snow revealed other crazy people
and the way the wind whipped at my back on Lincoln Way, encouraging me on in my ridiculous endeavor
and the way the wind slapped my face on University, reminding me of my ridiculous endeavor
and the way that my stride grew every time I hit iceless pavement
and the way that winter is a muscle doctor – it’s like running inside an ice pack
and the way my lungs burned and my sweat froze

Let the winter come! And let me run in it.

let LOVE fly like cRaZy

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handwriting

Whatever happened to all that penmanship our elementary teachers hounded us about with dotted lines? All those rewrites and all that time spent with my tongue hanging out to get the curve just right. Whatever happened to handwriting?

A few days ago, I got a letter in the mail. Well, not technically in the mailbox, but in my email inbox. I glanced at the message from a dear Honduran friend, but didn’t stop to click on the attachment. I knew it needed more time, so I postponed until today.

I found this letter after clicking on the “document.pdf” file and I’ve probably read it a zillion times since.

There’s something about pen to paper that can’t be imitated in typed script. No number of fonts can capture the haphazard curve of the “s” or the way the “i” doesn’t have a dot hovering over it’s rigid line.

There’s something very special about handwriting and about the kindred spirits who use it to communicate a stronger emotion than can get lost on the keyboard.

let LOVE fly like cRaZy

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blessings are sojourners

It took awhile, but Vince is finally on board with this idea (although he’s still skeptical) of blessings as sojourners. In church this morning, I was scribbling and doodling and arrowing and marking on my journal pages (taking bullet notes is so overrated). Right when the service ended, I leaned over and said, “I figured it out!” pause, “Hoarders!” Vince, not surprised in the slightest, just waited for me to flesh it out. “Quarters?”

“No… You know, blessings are meant to be always transferred, always moving, always given… but we love the blessing so much we keep it. We hoard it!”

He chuckled a little bit, “Oh… hoarders! Alright… I can see that.”

I’m so thankful to have a cousin/friend who equally loves processing through ideas, asking questions, and challenging assumptions. This afternoon, I had to stop myself in other company and ask, “Is this too much?” Because sometimes I forget how spoiled I am to have such a friend around.

So, this idea that blessings are sojourners and we are hoarders has been rolling like a snowball and gaining serious speed and mass in my mind. This is week two of Perspectives class and the first several lessons focus almost exclusively on God’s blessing – what it means for Christians and for the world. Pair that with a series in Ephesians at church and my personal obsession with the a la orden philosophy and I’ve got a dump truck of blessing on my hands. I’ll let you in on the processing side of things, if you promise you won’t reject it right away or laugh. Sometimes it’s fun to throw something up on here that I don’t think is finished quite yet. The thoughts still need punctuation and perhaps a more obvious thesis, but so do most of my posts I suppose.

_______________________

Blessings are sojourners.

They tread crowded roads and lonely trails to visit million dollar homes and corrugated metal shacks. They knock on expectant doors and ring doorbells of disinterested tenants. They dance with the leopards and race the rivers to the sea.

Blessings are sojourners.

They pack light. They carry purpose and reflect sunshine, but they are not weighed down. Their shoulders bear the weight of inheritance, but never long enough to slow their pace. They have no suitcase, no cargo pocket, no oversized handbag.

They are at home in motion.

Blessings are sojourners.

__________________________

let LOVE fly like cRaZy

Posted on by Caroline 3

this & that

It’s like powdered sugar, this snow.
Deliciously winter.

My list is long of to-dos today, but here are some things worth the clicks. I haven’t posted this & that for a while, so I hope you still remember what to do with these links (click).

I found Jeremy Larson by way of his creative wife, who has a vintage store in Missouri and blogs on the web. I really appreciated his style and the stories behind the songs. He just re-vamped his website and you can stream his latest CD, They Reappear. He’s a cellist. His full-time job right now is writing string arrangements for bands and producing music (whoa). That right there is legit.

Are you a doubter? Join the crowd…  of everyone. What do we do when the people around us struggle with the faith, with believing and not seeing? This article over at the Gospel Coalition, “Dealing with the Doubting,” is really helpful in giving some practical tools.

Wow. Check out this video. Just click right now and watch it.

I’m a big fan of discernment, but sometimes the word gets thrown around and it seems less-than-useful. I appreciate Michael Horton’s article, “Making Necessary Distinctions: The Call to Discernment” because it puts contemporary controversies in perspective. He writes, “Sometimes we treat contemporary controversies as if we were the first to encounter them. Unaware of the discussions and debates that forged Christian consensus in the past, we often treat controversies as if we were the first to encounter them. Starting from scratch, we often end up with our own lopsided confusion of things that ought to be distinguished and separation of things that ought to be held together.” He goes on to tackle three controversies and how to think through them.

It’s been too long, but the Lord of the Rings movie will come out this year! Here is the trailer:

Lastly, I enrolled for a second time in the Perspectives class. It’s only been one week and I’m crazy with blessings from it. The Lord so desires that we know his heart for the nations! You should check it out to see if there is a class starting in your area!

Okay, friends. I hope you are enjoying the snow today if you’re anywhere near it. Do me a favor and look kindly on it – respect the power and beauty in those little flakes.

and as always,
let LOVE fly like cRaZy

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