True Love?

I've sat in a quiet house for over an hour this evening.  The kids went to bed a little late, squeezing in the finishing of homework and evening showers.  My tired husband joined them in sleep not long after.  I told him I would be turning in soon, but I haven't been able to follow through.  It's because of the silence.  I needed it.  And if I sleep, I'll miss it. 

There is not one thing I would change about our happy home or the beautifully loud people in it.  They fill every sun-filled hour with giggles and shouts and the thumps of wrestling and questions and still more laughter.  I adore the sounds in our house.

But, my days are so filled with the noise of taking care of the people I love, I sometimes hunger for the silence that takes care of my own heart.  The kind of silence that invites my mind to slow itself into a pause.  The kind of silence that wraps itself around and shields from the laundry undone and the floor unswept.  The kind of silence that beckons my Jesus to speak into the inmost parts of my soul.

It's why I lept at the opportunity to take an hour and a half drive to run an errand for my husband last week.  All alone on my beloved Texas roads, the hills capped with a rare snow.  Sometimes music, sometimes not.  Just me.  And Him.

I read once that you know you have true love if you can sit together for an hour in silence and not feel awkward in the least. 

I think we're there, He and I. 

Simplify

There is always something refreshing to me about the whiteness of January.  It's a blank calendar page waiting for my notes on a new year.  It's a soft shade of light streaming in my windows, highlighting my newly bare shelves after all the Christmas decorations have been put away.  It's a chance to start fresh and to simplify.

It somehow makes me think back to all the things that were on my Christmas list and wonder why I thought I needed them, especially when I remember the pastor I met from Africa who was praying for a way to feed his children twice a day instead of just once.

It causes me to look at my dayplanner and ponder what is a true need and what is just something that will take me away from my children, the question growing more urgent when I remember how much their faces had changed in the Christmas photos this year compared to last.

It gives me reason to consider my checkbook to discern what it is I have considered treasure, for where my money is, there my heart is also.

And the words of the old spiritual find their way to my lips....

Give me Jesus,
Give me Jesus,
You can have all this world,
But give me Jesus.

Simple ways to simplify:

• clean out your closet (or your kids' closets),  fill up a box with donations, and take them to a shelter for battered women
• make a list of your weekly obligations, pray over them, and listen to see if the Lord wants you to make some changes
• cancel your cable subscription; pray and ask where the Lord wants you to spend that money instead
• schedule a day to fast; when you complete it, schedule another one
• set one time when you will check your social media sites, and resolve not to check them at any other time in the day
• read The Beautiful Outlaw, by John Eldredge, and remember why you fell in love with Jesus

In Daddy's Arms

She started ballet last Friday.  She had been counting the days, telling me how many she had left every night when I tucked her in.  I caught her chewing her lip over it once.  When I questioned her, she confided she was nervous, unsure if she could do it.  Would the other girls be way ahead of her?  Would she be able to catch up?  Would she have any trouble making new friends?  I smiled and assured her she would do great.

We bought the shoes, put her hair up in a ballerina bun, and walked into the first class together.  The instructor let me stay and observe through a window, and I cried as I watched her, grace unhindered on the dance floor.

It wasn't until the next day that it happened.  I had a photography shot I wanted to get of her daddy and her, with her little feet in her new ballet shoes.  She was all too happy to oblige by dressing up in her ballet clothes again, anxious to show off some of her new skills.

As I sat on the floor, fumbling with the buttons of the camera,  she grabbed his hands and popped up onto her tippy-toes.  I hadn't been expecting that.  One day of ballet, and we're ready for pointe?  Where had all the anxiousness gone?

And then I realized the truth...you can't be unsure of yourself in your daddy's arms.  In daddy's arms, there is no fear, only love.  And when you live in a place without fear, and when you are loved without reservation, you are free to be yourself.  You are free to dance.

My little girl won't stay this little.  She won't always be a tiny thing spinning in the living room.  She won't even always have her daddy who loves her more than life there to hold her.  But, she will always have a Father who holds her close.  The One she is learning to trust to lead her through the dance of life upon this earth.  The Daddy that will never leave her or forsake her.  The Papa who created her to be grace, and grace unhindered.

So, dance on sweet girl, dance on.