Unfinished Stories

Today I bought a children's book entitled Are You Scared, Darth Vader? The title was so goofy (and Tom's interest in the Dark Side so intense) that I just had to pick it up and take a look. Each page of the book shows the author trying to frighten Darth Vader, who claims to have no fear. Werewolves, vampires, and witches don't do the trick. Near the end of the book, it's revealed that the monsters are actually children in disguise. Vader starts to get a bit uncomfortable. He refuses to engage with them, so the kids decide he's boring and leave. At the very end, it turns out he is scared of something--of the child reading the story, who has the power to close the book and trap him inside. Oh, sorry. Spoilers? I bought it because it made Tom and I both laugh and is exactly the kind of weird thing we want our Bean Sprout to enjoy. Then it turned out there was a little more to it than I thought.

Tonight, I was thinking about what I thought was a separate topic and realized that it wasn't so separate. School has been pretty intense over the past several weeks and I haven't been writing. As I sat down to write tonight, I reflected over all the times I began to write a story, a song, a blog, just anything--and abandoned the project. I used to think it happened because my writing just wasn't very good. I'd wrap myself in a creative fury and get excited, but in reading it back I would hate every word. Looking back, I don't think it was lack of skill after all. I think it was fear. There was fear that I couldn't voice the characters, fear that I couldn't make it to an ending, fear that I could make it to an ending and no one would find it worth reading, fear that I was putting something out there that just made people roll their eyes...So, to make sure none of those things happened, I just quit.

Like Darth Vader in this silly little book, I often pretend to be fearless. It's a point of pride to act like you're casting something away because you want to rather than because your own self-doubt has crippled you. Like him, what really scares me is the thought that I don't really have any say or any control in what happens next. Like him, I'm afraid that I'm just going to get trapped in a story I don't like. Also like him, kids have always scared me a little...but we will get to that on another day.

So here's the thing. In real life, your story isn't fully in your own hands, but how you choose to behave in it is. The kids wanted to close the book on him, making his fear reality, because of his own actions. One of my favorite movies says it like this:

And finally this question, the mystery of whose story it will be. Of who draws the curtain. Who is it that chooses our steps in the dance? Who drives us mad? Who lashes us with whips and crowns us with victory when we survive the impossible? Who is it that does all of these things? Who honors those we love with the very life we live? Who sends monsters to kill us and at the same time sings that we will never die? Who teaches us what's real and how to laugh at lies? Who decides why we live and what we'll die to defend? Who chains us? And who holds the key that can set us free?...It's YOU. You have all the weapons you need. Now fight! 

Fear is really about the need to control...which also is what led good ol' Anakin to join the Dark Side. We can't control what other people will do or what the future holds, but we can choose to take hold of those weapons we have and fight against fear. We can decide to develop our own character, even if we can't write the narrative. No matter where you are, who you are, or what you've done; if you are reading this now, your story is unfinished. Rather than some disappointing, daunting thing--recognize that truth for what it is. It's hope. It's the possibility of revolution, redemption, and joy. Pick up the pen again. Don't like the role you're playing? Make some edits. Write in the margins. You're strong and your story has worth. Never give up or let yourself be convinced it isn't worth trying.

This is the time again when some readers may wish to depart. We're about to get spiritual.

Remember how I said life isn't fully in your control? Well, I've found the best way to beat fear is to remember who really is in control--the Father. He knows what He is doing. That movie quote I love so much still applies--except when it says 'you hold the key'...it's only true to the extent that the key to my freedom lies in my decision to trust Jesus. The self-imposed chains appear when I'm trying to do everything without Him.

Because He loves us, He doesn't force us to follow Him. God doesn't hardwire people like robots who can only do the right thing. If it's forced, it isn't love. I have to make that move. No one else can make it for me. My 'power' comes into play the most in electing to relinquish control. It's also in being faithful. He doesn't tell us to throw up our hands and just stop trying. We don't just laze around saying "if God wants me to get out of poverty, He'll help me when the lottery" or "If I'm supposed to graduate college, He'll make it happen even if I don't study." The weapons I was talking about earlier aren't of our own construction, they're part of His design. We have to take an active part in our story. We have to work. Sometimes we have to straight up do battle. In the end, the difference is that we don't have to do it alone.

There are so many verses about His plans for our future. From the womb to the grave, the Lord wants to lead, shape, utilize, and bless us. And unlike the unseen kid in the Darth Vader story, He doesn't want to clap the book shut and trap us inside. He wants us to experience life--and life more abundantly (John 10:10).

The following verse, however, is the one that seems most to apply to the concept of an unfinished story and the anxiety it brings:

"...being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus." - Philippians 1:6

The One Where I Learn to Shut Up

I have typed and deleted several complaining, passive-aggressive statuses (statii?) in the past week or so. Stress wears on us all sometimes. I think venting can be healthy (when it isn't constant and it is in the correct setting), but I think sometimes we create additional sadness, anger, and worry when we let anything and everything prompt us to be annoyed, irked, or generally disgruntled. 

The reason you haven't seen these multiple rants on my mind this week is that I've decided to really try to focus on the good things. Admittedly, I still have a couple of people that I talk through my Haylee-rage with (they know I'm not a natural Pollyanna), but as far as public displays of my less-than-productive opinions, I feel like I've learned to just shut up and let it go. Stepping up in front of everyone to say "THIS SUCKS," even if it's true, does nothing to make the world a better place. It might make you feel better for a moment- like having a few beers at the end of a hard day. But like winter for Westeros, brace yourselves...HANGOVER IS COMING.

We tend to poison our own surroundings with negativity when we consistently broadcast it. Then it comes back to us tenfold because it is in the very air we breathe. What flows out of us so easily tends to choke us when it comes back. I can rant and rave and complain and feel perfectly righteous about it, but every time I see it from someone else, the needless ugliness is completely glaring and offensive to me. Why would my own negativity be anything else? Yeah, I'm still working on getting that plank out of my eye.

I used to be a "you know what I hate?" person. I can't tell you how often I had this exact phrase come out of my mouth or flow through my typing fingers. I want to be a "you know what's amazing?" type of person. Ephesians 4:29 tells us just to do just that..."Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen."

Can you honestly say that all the words coming out of your mouth (literally and figuratively) build people up or benefit them?  I can't. So today, and likely for many days to come, I'll continue to ask for help on taming that beast (hint: the beast is me).

"Set a guard over my mouth, Lord; keep watch over the door of my lips." (Psalm 141:3)

Little by Little

You might have noticed I didn't put out a blog entry last week. You might not have noticed, as alas; I am probably not the center of your life. In any case, last week a new wave of mourning crashed over me somewhat unexpectedly. On Sunday, I felt worn down and deflated without really understanding why. I had spent Saturday enjoying a rare date day with my husband. We had an amazing time together and I felt so full of love and joy. The next day, I felt like an old, wrung-out sponge. Normally I would have made up for my Saturday fun by grocery shopping, meal prepping, and doing a little bit of housework. I've actually come to love and find energy in that routine. Instead, I ordered some pre-prepped meals from a slightly overpriced local place that does such things and watched Doctor Who the entire day. I told myself a day of rest was just what I needed to be raring and ready to go come Monday.

But Monday came and went, the drained feeling never leaving. I scrambled (as lethargically as one can scramble) all week long. Normally an "on top if it" kind of person at work (who maybe a teensy bit judgmentally chides other people when they are being careless or missing deadlines), I couldn't keep up with anything. I made mistakes. I had no focus. I felt like every task with work, school, or home represented a metric ton of quicksand being dumped on my head. Come Thursday (Daddy's birthday), I was very emotional and even starting to feel physically ill, but still hadn't connected the dots. Unfocused and somewhat drowning, I spoke with a friend who had experienced a similar loss. She related that on important anniversaries like her dad's birth and death, she usually finds herself feeling "off" for the week- whether she is consciously considering the date or not. It occurred to me that the anxiety, sadness, anger, and general ineptitude might have been owing to that very phenomenon. I left work early that day, skipped class for the evening, and had dinner with my husband, mom, and sister to celebrate my dad just like we would have done if he were here: with good food, love, and Long Island Iced Teas. I continued to feel sick and exhausted Friday, Saturday, and part of Sunday- though I picked back up on my routine. On the following Monday (this week), I "snapped out of it." It was an almost instantaneous change.

A couple of days later I was reading in Exodus as part of the Bible in a year progression. As the Israelites are journeying into the desert following their delivery from Egypt, God promises essentially to clear the way for them. He says that He will drive out their enemies so that the Israelites can inhabit the land. Unlike some of the other situations Israel had encountered by then (rather rapid or even instantaneous granting of land and property), He promises to do so gradually: "But I will not drive them out in a single year, because the land would become desolate and the wild animals too numerous for you. Little by little I will drive them out before you, until you have increased enough to take possession of the land." (Exodus 23:29-30)

Honestly, I have never been good at "little by little." I have lived my life in cycles of optimistic, tireless productivity followed by longer periods of exhausting depression and despair. This pattern is largely owing to my desire to conquer the whole world at once. Whether it's working multiple jobs at a time, trying to be "all things to all people," trying to be a health and fitness freak, trying to take too many new projects, trying to pay off debt more quickly than is realistic, or a combination of all of those things at once; I get impatient and I overdo it. I eventually slam into the walls of reality (hard). At best, I am back at square one. At worst, I lose not only the ground I've gained but regress several steps further back in whatever I was trying to accomplish. I disappoint myself and get questions like "wow, what happened?" (which, by the way, is not a great way to tell someone you are worried about them in any category...so there's a bonus PSA for you) As I have tried to be faithful to this year's goals- spiritually, domestically, academically, physically, mentally, and professionally- I honestly believe myself closer than I have ever been to striking a healthy balance. And yet when I'm doing my best is when I tend to lose sight and get cocky.

Last week represented a serious halt to my manic self-assuredness. I discovered that, as in everything, I had rushed ahead in my grief to declare myself in control. I assumed it couldn't overcome me unless I let it...and then it did. I was reminded that balance is a result of a conscious effort to arrange your life around a fulcrum. For me, the fulcrum is Jesus. He knows much better than I do exactly how much of the land I am ready to inhabit. He knows that sometimes it isn't the miracle of an evening, but of an era. Instead of letting me run out into the future, grabbing everything I can and spinning around like Julie Andrews on uppers (great analogy, right?), He knows I need to slow down and take the time to "increase" (grow). If I try to take the whole at once, "wild animals" (obstacles, doubts, exhaustion, pride, anxiety, lack of preparation) will overtake the ground I'm trying to claim and I'll lose it all. Whether it is in learning to understand grief or pressing on toward a [million] goal[s], I have to remember that sometimes things are meant to be gradual. 

Little by little, God is teaching me.

"Sloppy Wet Kiss" from Guest Blogger Elise Peek

Our parents were the king and queen of sloppy wet kisses. They kissed in front of us kids all the time, sometimes just to embarrass us- which is typical for parents of young children. But unlike the typical parents, ours had the sloppiest, wettest kisses. They were so loud you could hear them from the next room. They definitely had the loudest, sloppiest kisses of anyone we knew, but this was one of the many ways we knew how much they loved each other.

My sister Haylee recently reintroduced me to John Mark McMillan’s music. If you don’t know who that is, you may know him by the song he wrote “How He Loves.” You know, the one with that strange line “Heaven meets Earth like a sloppy wet kiss." Some artists that have recorded the song have even gone on to change that line. I can’t say that I wouldn’t have done the same thing, but I just listened to the original version of this song from the album The Song Inside the Sounds of Breaking Down. Most of the song is the same version I’ve heard a hundred times, but the last minute and 30 seconds hit me like a ton of bricks. It was so raw and emotional, I knew there was more behind this song. Through some research I found out that this song was written at a time of grief, bitterness, resentment, and anger. John Mark McMillan had lost his really close friend Stephen in a car accident. He was so frustrated and angry with God when he wrote this, but that’s exactly where God met him. God spoke to him despite his anger and resentment because that’s “how He loves us."

I have definitely dealt with my share of anger and resentment through my life. Losing Daddy to a sudden heart attack was no exception. The grief of losing someone close to you is one of the hardest things someone will walk through. It’s also one of the easiest places to become angry, resentful, or bitter. The loss of Daddy has been a hard road to walk down. I’ve had moments of being angry. Angry that Daddy didn’t go to the doctor more often. Angry at God for not performing a miracle. But as I listened to these few lines in this song, something resonated inside of me. 

I thought about You

The day that Stephen died

And you met me between my breaking

I know that I still love you God

Despite the agony 

See people they want to tell me you’re cruel

But if Stephen could sing

He’d say it’s not true

Cause you’re good

I will forever hear this song and see sloppy wet kisses differently. I envision a parent showering a young rambunctious child with kisses as they are pushing away wanting to run off and play. God is a father that showers us with kisses even when we fight it and push Him away. He does not change, even when we do. He loves us because of and despite who we are. 

https://youtu.be/U0luHiWwi08

https://youtu.be/M6wl3uqfbYQ

Alternate Routes

Lately, I feel like I'm experiencing a miraculous continuity of themes in my life. Something will be on my mind and then someone else brings it up- or I see it in a TV show- or I read it in my Bible. You know that feeling when you have something to say and then the conversation gets sidetracked and you completely forget what it was? I feel like my whole life has been that feeling, thoughts running through my fingers like sand. Now I'm experiencing this season of completed thoughts and it's kind of epiphanic (isn't that a good word? what a word!). Any who, this week's thought is about alternate routes. I know, spoiler in the title.

One of my recent projects has been rebuilding a bulky, overcomplicated Excel report. Full of tabs, unnecessary formulas, and overwhelming data, it didn't quite suit its purposes. It often malfunctioned and its complicated appearance kept people from making use of it. As we delved into each redundancy and overdone function, we realized the root of the problem was an aversion to changing things that were already done (even when they needed to change) or learning a new way of doing things (even when the old ways didn't work). As I spoke with someone about this realization, I thought about how much I've learned in my professional life. I've also been guilty of being afraid to try another way. Even if I knew I could be more effective by changing my methods, I was too lazy or to anxious to try. Especially when I first started in leadership at work, I would avoid learning new tasks. If someone else knew how and I could say 'oh, you'll have to do it. I don't know how!'- I got to:

A) Be lazy
B) Deflect responsibility if something went wrong
C) Avoid having to feel stupid while figuring something out for the first time

Things like that don't tend to just happen without consequences, so in turn I became:

1) A bad leader
2) A mediocre employee
3) An unhelpful and disappointing peer
4) An unhappy, unfulfilled person whose growth (with promotions, recognition, positive relationships, and personal satisfaction) was COMPLETELY STUNTED BY MY OWN ACTIONS

Sometimes when I feel like I'm onto something (these themes in my head), I like to rattle them off to someone in long, excited raptures. My mom is one person who often happens to be available and who, history has shown, will enthusiastically engage with me about these half-formed ideas, either countering or agreeing and providing more examples. So, after a day of working on the unwieldy Excel workbook, I gave her a call. This stuff must have been in the back of my mind, because I actually started out talking about whether I would want to stay at home one day instead of working (that's a story for another day). Eventually I got to talking about how much I learn every day in the professional world. The report came to mind and we began to discuss it.

As we spoke, another story called itself up from memory. I thought of another time, before I gained all this #adulting knowledge. When I was in high school, I had an older friend who worked just outside the east side of town. The school was on the west side. On my lunch, I decided to go visit. The trouble was, I really only knew the path I was used to taking when I went to church each week- a path that started on the east side of town (where I lived). Instead of trying to figure out a better way, I went all the way to the edge of the east side to get to a long winding road that led to a turn onto another road that headed back west. I wasted almost my entire lunch period just trying to get there before realizing I didn't have the time to make it. I turned around and headed back to school, effectively disappointing my friend and myself.

In both of these situations, an alternate route was needed. In both situations, someone was afraid to do it. For me, it resulted in a wasted lunch period. For the author of the Excel report (and several people after), it resulted in wasted resources.

So what is the moral of the story (besides that I am obviously growing up and am so unbelievably wise)? It's that when we refuse to change routes, when we refuse to blaze a trail or try something different, there's waste. We waste our potential (because we can't reach it through the old paths). We waste our time (because doing things the wrong way always takes longer in the end). And we waste our good will (because the next person who has to come along and fix your mess may actually hate you a little bit). The moral of the story is...don't waste what you have been given because of fear.

If you're on this blog for generic inspirational nuggets, this is your stop. But if you want to dig a little deeper...

So...continuity. Connectedness. Here's the last part and then I promise I'll shut up. My new study Bible is fantastic because its focus is on cultural backgrounds. It sheds light on the deeper significance of things that we might not see in the context of our current environment. Things were different when the Bible was written and so the audience would have understood it differently than we do today. One of the first extremely illuminating notes I encountered talked about Abraham. He began to call upon the name of the Lord. So he prayed? Okay, we all do that these days. No big. He said "the Lord will provide." Yeah, that's what the preacher men say. And, well, God literally gave him a ram to sacrifice instead of his son. So duh, he thought God would provide after that. Oh but wait...he said that before it even happened. On the surface, neat statements (all of this in the first half of Genesis if you're interested)- but why are they so very special?

In Abraham's day, people were all on the polytheistic jam. The whole narrative of religion in the culture of all of his neighbors was rooted in it. They believed that there were the major gods, who probably didn't care about them at all, but who had a hand in the "big picture" stuff- the fates of the nations. Then there were their gods- household gods, city gods, regional gods. These guys actually listened to the prayers of the people and were considered kind of in charge of the people's welfare. They were connected to (as alluded to already) where you lived and who your family was. That Abraham began to see God as both the orchestrator of world events and available to him/personally concerned with his welfare was a complete departure from anyone else's belief system at the time.

Without telling him, 'worship only me,' God nudged him toward monotheism. He told Abraham to move to a new land. This was a HUGELY alternate route because inheritance, wealth, status, and safety were all connected to your people and location. Abraham listened. He moved away and the connection with his old gods was effectively broken. He learned to depend solely on the Lord and was blessed because of it. The Lord told him in Genesis 22:18: "through your descendants all the nations of the earth will be blessed- because you have obeyed Me." And He followed through. Abraham was the father of nations and his family led Israel for generations to come. Abraham broke tradition and habit. He chose an alternate route.

Jesus gave us a new route, too. Maybe I'm experiencing all this continuity because I'm seeing it in the Word. Long after the Old Testament days, a man came to change the game. He walked the old roads for us and gave us a new destiny.

Today a status came up in my Facebook Memories. This day last year, I had to go another way to get home from work because of snow, ice, and bad drivers. I proclaimed "I am the queen of alternate routes!" Well. I'm really not. But Jesus is the King of them.

Commitment is an Itchy Turtleneck

Today I did something I've been putting off for almost a decade. I stepped through the doors of an educational institution and sat through my first two classes toward finishing my Bachelors degree. When I finished my Associates, I couldn't wait to get the heck out of the classroom and into real life. I didn't want to spend the money or the time to keep going down the path set before me. In fact, I felt like I would lose my mind if I did! I wanted to take what I learned and try my luck in "starting my life." Impatience is one of my most prominent and least desirable qualities. Occasionally when I'm not where I want to be I forget that my life has already started. I'd like to say that this ridiculous feeling has become less frequent as I approach my thirties...but I'd be lying. I still say to myself, "when I get [insert goal here], everything else will fall into place." Well, that's not actually how life works...but maybe one day I'll learn. And then everything else will fall into place. Oh wait...

I actually think I made the right decision. I wasn't ready, at that time, to really commit to doing anything for an extended period of time. And as I've kicked and screamed and pushed myself to move forward, I've realized that even now I struggle with commitment. There's a part of me that wants to flit around based on the feelings of the moment. No anchor, just sails. Being tied to something- even something that's good for me or enjoyable- freaks me out with a capital "f." I've bucked and whined and pulled my hair out in every situation when I've had to give up time or energy to be a part of something.

I realized today that in so many of these things, I'm kind of like a kid in a turtleneck (or just me in a turtleneck because I'm kind of a child). On a frigid day, parents look for warm clothing for their children. Remembering that Crunchy Mom Monthly says that cold air on the throat can increase the likelihood of sickness and that terrifying 6 o' clock news story on the choking hazards of scarves...the parent chooses a turtleneck. Inevitably, the kid hates it. It's constricting, it's itchy, it's maybe even a little too warm at times. It feels like a prison to the kid. Likely there will be complaining and a few tugs at the neck. At the end of the day, getting out of that woolen prison is going to feel like the most important thing to that kid. The real reward, though, is not in escaping. It's in being warm and protected and making future days better (because they're a lot less likely to be filled with sickness and sadness). The end justifies the means.

Commitment is the grown-up version of the cold day/itchy turtleneck scenario. Sometimes as we're held to a thing, we just think about how uncomfortable it is. We think about what we're losing. We think about how restless we feel and how we can't wait for it to be over. We fail to think of the benefits that come from the experience. For the kid, it's staying warm and healthy. For me, it's learning and growing (and honestly, getting a piece of paper that magically makes people think you're special and deserving of more money...I'm not bitter). The moral of the story is, sometimes the situations that are most difficult or frustrating are the ones that reap the greatest rewards. 

Earlier this week I was reading the daily devotional Tom and I have been doing together, Streams in the Desert (L.B. Cowman). It started with the verse, "I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us." (Romans 8:18) The writer spoke of an occasion when he witnessed an emperor moth trying to come out of its cocoon. It struggled for so long that he felt the urge to help it along. After cutting some of the threads, he observed the moth emerging. Yet instead of opening big, beautiful wings- it fluttered tiny, stumpy things. It turned out that the fight out of the cocoon is what makes the wings reach their full potential both in beauty and function. In trying to help the moth, the writer actually crippled it. 

Sometimes when we're trying to stay comfortable, we hobble our potential. We focus on the sufferings and not the glory, talking ourselves out of the journey and subsequently the gifts it will bring.

So- wear the itchy turtleneck for a while. You might find that it changes you.

What the Biscuit?: Tribute and Tidings

For any of you who read my blog at one time, you might notice that I have changed the name from “Observations of an Acorn” to “Our Daily Biscuit.” You might also notice that I haven’t been much of a writer in the past couple of years. I’ve always felt called to put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard- but that sounds much less poetic). Writing is something I do when I am completely broken and empty, when I am overflowing to bursting, or when I’m trying to process anger and stress. I’m trying to take up that old habit again- mostly because I’m experiencing all of those emotions in a constant cycle these days. They are extreme and they are consuming and they are kind of beautiful in a terrible way. Regardless, I feel like I am undergoing a shift in who I am.

Because of that shift, I feel compelled to follow the call to write in whatever way I can. I don’t expect that anyone will hang on my every word, but I am starting in faith that something I have to say might impact even one person. So…what’s up with the biscuit part? I’m not starting a baking blog. I’m possibly the world’s worst baker. As in- I either churn out mush or bricks with no real in-between. This blog is about faith, family, and the desire to leave a legacy like the great one that has been left to me.

 

On November 25, 2017 my wonderful Daddy died. As my uncle put it, it was more like Enoch in the Bible- “he walked faithfully with God and then he was no more…” (Genesis 5:24) Noel Turner was my window into the Fatherhood of God. I will be sure to say that my dad was definitely human. He was imperfect and made mistakes like anyone. He could be a little too blunt, a little too sensitive, and sometimes had a touch of impetuosity. What I mean when I say that he was the most Christ-like man I’ve ever known is not that he was perfect, but that he truly loved. He listened to God and did what He wanted him to do. He knew the Word inside and out because he wrapped himself in it every day. He was gentle, thoughtful, quiet, and patient almost always- but forceful when the situation called for it.

I still haven’t explained the biscuit part. Among the other effusive praises I can lavish on his memory, Noel Turner was an accomplished baker of the best biscuits I have ever (and probably will ever) have. This is a skill he used often. Making breakfast for his family was one of the great joys of his life and even as I grew older and moved away, there was always this unspoken invite that if I’d come by, I’d be fed. That was another aspect of his Christlikeness. “Ask, and you will receive. Search, and you will find. Knock, and the door will be opened for you. Everyone who asks will receive…If your child asks you for bread, would any of you give him a stone?” (Matthew 7:7-9) Daddy gave us bread (predominately biscuits) to eat whenever we asked- and often when we didn’t ask.

 

In the same way he fed our bodies, Daddy cared about feeding our souls. Jesus called Himself the bread of life (John 6:35). He didn’t specify what kind of bread for this example. For me, it was biscuits: carefully mixed, dutifully kneaded, patiently awaited- and delivered to the table with loving wisdom (and a sizeable portion of gravy…but I don’t know how to make a flowery metaphor out of that one). Daddy read the Bible through every year, meditating on it and often using the “Our Daily Bread” devotional series. It seemed only right that the mission forming in my mind encompass the classic and the unique- just like he did.

 

My dad was and is my hero. My middle name, Noelle, was after him- and I find it absolutely true that names can be prophetic to the nature of the person on whom they’re bestowed. I have thus far not pulled it off in its entirety, but I have always wanted to be like him. I look like him. I’m kind of an oddball amongst my siblings like he was. I am sensitive in the way that he was sensitive. I cook like him (where recipes, like the pirate code, are more like guidelines than actual rules). There is a likeness that I feel blessed to carry, but there are missing pieces I want to better enact. I’m not trying to be him. I’m a distinct person with my own gifts and talents. However, I do believe that you can pick up the mantle of someone before you.

 

One of the most famous biblical prophets was Elijah. He was called to great things. He performed miracles, gave insight into the future of Israel, and went head to head with evil and corrupt leaders of the day. He was a biblical badass. Is that okay to say? Well, I gotta be authentic. Who I am is kind of a little bit irreverent sometimes. Sorry Daddy. Sorry Jesus. Anywho- Elijah’s exit was as cool as his life…he went up into the whirlwind. Years earlier, he had thrown his mantle upon the shoulders of a man named Elisha, spiritually adopting him. He essentially mentored Elisha, entrusting the disciple with his prophetic legacy. Before that crazy whirlwind takes his spiritual father away, Elisha asks to “inherit a double portion” of Elijah’s spirit (the story can be found in 2 Kings 2). He doesn’t ask to be Elijah. He asks to carry the torch in such a way that it burns even brighter.

 

In a way that’s what I’m doing. My dad touched hundreds of lives during the course of his ministry. I’m not trying to rival that (and am not sure I could), but I am trying to exhibit a measure of faithfulness that allows God to use me like he used Daddy. Part of that is getting into the Word. Part of that is getting outside of my selfishness to help others. Part of it is remembering to praise even when things seem ugly and awful and I’d rather complain. And part of it is sharing who I was made to be with a world who can use it. This entry is just an introduction. I’m stepping out in faith on a lot of things- including starting school next week- so I’m not sure how often these entries will be released. But I do know I’m learning some things and I’m eager to share them with the people I love!