my heart i hear beating

she's just like her daddy, wide-eyed for adventure, lover of snow, cold, and outside.  enthusiastic dreamers, they plan big and live loud.  his childlike wonder dances in her every leap.

but when she comes in from the cold, clapping for honey-kissed cocoa?  she climbs under my arm and pulls blankets high; we read poetry and wild tales of princess and prairie.

in those tender moments, it's my heart i hear beating inside one tutu-clad wondrous girl.





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footprints fade

boots crunch ice and light is fading, but it sparkles all the same across the snow.

trails tell tales of chickens, deer, and bunnies here and gone.  we remain as afternoon disappears over the horizon.

i ask for a photograph, but he'll have none of that, cheeks damp from an outburst even kettlecorn couldn't quell.  he's a boy-storm of intensity, and he's busy stomping paths.

powerful.  deliberate.  definitive.  every footprint tells a story.

I WAS HERE.

i am.

see me.  look what wonders i have wrought!

some footprints fade, but you, sweet boy, are written on my heart.

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be Right or be Love

we're having two different conversations, we are.
over one another and at top volume

families, churches.  in politics, parenting,
theology and everything else

we're speaking in tongues most of the time.
{shouldn't we know better?  where's
the interpreter to encourage
the Body in worship?}

talking at is never quite the same as talking with.
no wonder we misunderstand.

our caricatures are vivid:
a trace of truth
fleshed out in lies, and
have we even noticed?

we launch insults and laugh
at safe distance. we
cast stones and wonder
why glass houses shatter and
everything else stays the same.

should this day be different?
i'll have to decide:
do I want to be Right, or do I want to be Love?

shared with the gypsy mama's five minute friday. prompt: vivid.

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we're lovers and biters, we are

We have a biter.

My two year old, he of sky blues eyes, open-mouthed kisses and bright grins, is a biter.  He bites his sister hard and my heart breaks open wide.

We don't bite. We don't hurt. We love each other. 
We are gentle. We are kind. We love each other.
We listen with our ears. We help with our hands.

We. Love. Each. Other.

He's usually remorseful.  Tender kisses, loving pats and baby-signed "I'm sorry"s aren't even a show.  He means them, and her quick forgiveness makes my heart catch.

But he means the biting, too.  Enough to draw tears and red welts.

*****

She's such a verbal processor.  They scuffle over toys or paper or God-knows-what, and she prevails because she has words.

She smells weakness.  If only he could argue his position satisfactorily...

When words are law, she'll always win.

(i'll always win)
(but words aren't law)

His bite is worse than his bark.
(he just wants to be heard)

We are gentle. We are kind. 
We listen with our ears.

We Love Each Other.

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MLK & the Prophetic Church {or: reading Playboy for the articles}

On twitter, someone linked to this substantial 1965 Playboy interview of Dr. King by Alex Haley.  It is a fascinating portrait as well as the lengthiest interview the civil rights hero ever granted.  I recommend reading it in its entirety, but this portion about the church particularly caught my eye:


"The church once changed society. It was then a thermostat of society. But today I feel that too much of the church is merely a thermometer, which measures rather than molds popular opinion.

[...] 

I will remain true to the church as long as I live. But the laxity of the white church collectively has caused me to weep tears of love. There cannot be deep disappointment without deep love. 

Time and again in my travels, as I have seen the outward beauty of white churches, I have had to ask myself, “What kind of people worship there? Who is their God? Is their God the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and is their Savior the Savior who hung on the cross at Golgotha? Where were their voices when a black race took upon itself the cross of protest against man’s injustice to man? Where were their voices when defiance and hatred were called for by white men who sat in these very churches?”

[...] 

My personal disillusionment with the church began when I was thrust into the leadership of the bus protest in Montgomery. I was confident that the white ministers, priests and rabbis of the South would prove strong allies in our just cause. But some became open adversaries, some cautiously shrank from the issue, and others hid behind silence. My optimism about help from the white church was shattered; and on too many occasions since, my hopes for the white church have been dashed. 

There are many signs that the judgment of God is upon the church as never before. Unless the early sacrificial spirit is recaptured, I am very much afraid that today’s Christian church will lose its authenticity, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and we will see the Christian church dismissed as a social club with no meaning or effectiveness for our time, as a form without substance, as salt without savor. The real tragedy, though, is not Martin Luther King’s disillusionment with the church—for I am sustained by its spiritual blessings as a minister of the gospel with a lifelong commitment: The tragedy is that in my travels, I meet young people of all races whose disenchantment with the church has soured into outright disgust."

MLK and Divine Dissatisfaction

wounded justice {i still believe}

love to light a night devoid of stars

{image source}

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homosexuality is(n't) a sin | half-truths, hurt & the limits of language

"Homosexuality is sin."

How many times have we heard that?  One hundred times?  One thousand?

The trouble starts when we begin reading "homosexuality" into the biblical text, because that idea as we understand it just isn't there.  Although it condemns various homosexual behaviors, scripture is silent about what modern readers understand as sexual orientation or same-sex attraction.

Christians say "Homosexuality is a sin" and mean "Same-sex sexual activity is a sin"--but those statements have entirely different meanings and ramifications, don't they?

Homosexuality is not a a sin.  At most, homosexuality is a temptation--and temptation is not sin.

Jesus was tempted.  Jesus didn't sin.  Being tempted by sin is not the same as sinning.


[I won't unpack, refute or defend the "same-sex sexual activity is a sin" statement today.  Perhaps that's a cop-out, but I'm not a scholar, and honestly, I have more questions than answers.  I do know that bible-believing Christians disagree about its implications regarding homosexuality, and interpreting scripture in its original context is rarely as simple as we sometimes pretend.]

My hope is that whether we think that God calls gay people to lives of celibacy or believe that they honor God within committed relationships, we can agree to change our problematic and destructive language.

When Christians insist that homosexuality is a sin, we're condemning people instead of behavior, and that is not the place of a people called to love our neighbors.  It also unnecessarily conflates both sin and sexuality with identity.

How many stories have you heard--or lived--where gay Christians are kicked out of communities simply for being people who are wresting, questioning and hurting--not even for "choosing the gay lifestyle," whatever that means?

How do we expect gay Christians to remain faithful?  If we're honest, do we offer those who are wrestling with same-sex attraction anything more than:

"Homosexuality is a sin,"
"Don't be gay,"  and
"Don't let the door hit you on the way out" ?

I have to believe that the Jesus who was known as friend to drunkards, tax collectors and sinners would respond wholly different than his Church does when it comes to loving our gay brothers and sisters.

When Christians insist that homosexuality is a sin:

...we draw lines, make assumptions, and misunderstand.
...we exclude gay Christians or seekers from feeling welcome in our churches.
...we fail to affirm the image of God in our gay brothers and sisters.
...we make sexuality and sin primary markers of a person's identity, when neither is.
...we legitimize anti-gay bullying.
...we fail to wrestle through, articulate and live out together a sexual ethic that honors God and includes the young, old, gay, straight, married, single, divorced, widowed, celibate, everyone.

We pretend that:

...being gay is a choice to get us out of wrestling with harder questions about the bible, God, community, sexuality, politics, etc.
...being a Christian means being straight.
...anyone who wants it enough can just "pray the gay away."
...the answers are easy and we know them all.

The "homosexuality is wrong" language is dehumanizing and dishonest.  It stops conversations, burns bridges, and compromises the ability of Christians to live out the gospel and make disciples.

Homosexuality isn't some abstract political issue.  People matter.  Language matters.  Sin matters, too, but that's true for all of us.  We're not exactly sending gluttons, materialists, porn-watchers or the self-righteous (can you imagine?!) away from the Church in droves; why have we made homosexuality such a deal-breaker?

There are gay people within our churches and communities.  They aren't projects to fix--they are our sisters and brothers.  The last thing Christians are called to do is drive people away with rhetoric, easy answers and a lack of grace.

Loving people well matters.  Changing our language, listening better, and having honest conversations about sexuality, scripture and what it really looks like to honor God are a few good places to start.


{image source}

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