The Game God Doesn't Play With Me

I sat at the long wooden table the youth Sunday School class gathered around. Aside from me, our Sunday School class consisted of my brother, one of our cousins, and another girl who was a distant cousin. On occasion, another pair of brothers showed up, but the class was mainly comprised of myself and those three relations.

As I look back, I sympathize with the different adults who took on the role of teaching that class. I’m sure we appeared bored and disinterested as the teacher painstakingly asked for a volunteer to read the verses or waited in the awkward silence for someone to answer a question. Most of us were quiet, my brother was usually not happy to be the only boy in the class, and I grew frustrated with how Sunday School books asked questions with answers so blatantly obvious to the text we just read, it wasn’t worth the effort of speaking up to answer what was already printed right in front of us.

One Sunday School class specifically stands out in my mind. The subject centered around the vague topic of prayer and, perhaps feeling desperate to fill the silence with something—anything---the teacher gave an example to hopefully contribute to the lesson.

The Land Of In-Between

Do you really heal the broken hearts,
bind wounds, and comfort pain,

though I don't feel you near my
shattered soul or deepest strain?

When I can't see in front of me,
are you still making plans for me?

Or is my every effort just in vain?


Remember when I once believed
you had a better plan,

and though I lived in darkness,
I knew you'd come sweeping in?

Although I wept, I still believed
that you'd rush in to rescue me,

but here I wait in silence once again.


I hope to see, on down the road,
some good come from this wrong,

if not here, then maybe when
I weep at Jesus' throne.


Surely, somehow, won't some joy
flow from my misery?

My finite sight can't see beyond
this Land Of In-Between.

Dying Dreams And Resurrection

Resurrect my hopes and dreams
that died so deep within.
Stir my heart, stilled be grief,
to beat with joy again.

Like you arose, please raise in me
the hope life stripped away.
Call to life those dormant dreams
in my soul's silent grave.

In each dark corner of my soul,
lifeless, empty, worn,
Breath new life, revive my heart,
where hope seemed lost and gone.

More Than Just "Close To The Brokenhearted"

Psalm 147:3 

"He heals the brokenhearted 
and binds up their wounds."

"Close to the brokenhearted, close to the brokenhearted," I would whisper that phrase over and over to myself when I was younger and facing some sort of crisis. I found comfort in the image of a tender Jesus cradling His wounded children, slowly pouring comfort and healing into their brokenness.

Not so long ago in life, I whispered those words to myself again: "close to the brokenhearted, close to the brokenhearted."

But the words immersed themselves more deeply within me this time. For most of my life, I had known He is close to the brokenhearted. For much of my life, I had known that we are not alone in our suffering, because Jesus lived life on this earth too. Jesus experienced sorrow, anger, rejection, betrayal...Jesus experienced the people He served not valuing the person He was.
 

Tears In The Bathtub, Peace In The Chapel

I love this small, simple chapel.

It beckoned to me when I first saw it. My students had just finished performing music at a retirement home near their school. After their performance, a friendly resident took me by the hand to show me around the building.

"This is where we have chapel every Thursday afternoon at 1:30," she commented, as she flipped on the light switch in the upstairs room.

"Ohhh," I breathed. "It's beautiful."

It was beautiful. Small, but quaint and inviting, with a communion table and beautiful stained glass window of a cross that still appeared triumphant.

The Tears Of Change

Change.

My heart aches tonight, and I'm not sure why.
Probably because of that word: change.

I'm not opposed to change. I can often adapt easily and with flexibility. Sometimes I don't even feel the pangs of change until after it has happened---running purely on adrenaline in survival mode when I am in the midst of it. And I have many things in my life changing for the better. I am about to relocate my piano teaching studio---positive change. But the reasons behind it---hurtful, disappointed change.

Watching friends go through situations that I keep hoping and praying will improve for them, but don't seem to be---sorrowful change.

My boyfriend is possibly in the middle of a career transition, and I'm trying to assist him with some of the steps I've navigated before in that process---hope-filled, turning-point change. But seeing the pain on his face as he still deals with being in the middle of the process---heart-breaking change.

Why Being Invisible Sometimes Feels Comfortable

Even when I was really young, I was very thought-conscious for a child. My elementary school teachers often told my mom, "She's a great student and always makes Distinguished Honor Roll. But she's bored. She's a really deep thinker and likes to be creative. She gets bored with some of the worksheets and assignments we have to do."

In second grade I wrote what I remember as my first "poem." I wrote it in December, as I eagerly anticipated the upcoming holiday. Shyly one morning, I walked up to my teacher's desk with a copy of my poem behind my back and quietly handed it to her when she looked up at me. She was a tough teacher, large and intimidating, not the nurturing or welcoming type, and she quickly began reading my piece of paper without much expression. Then her eyes flickered at me, and she looked back up suddenly. "Did you write this?" she asked abruptly, inflection in her voice. Without making a sound, I just nodded, my hands behind my back and my feet shifting awkwardly, then watched as she walked past me up to the blackboard, my poem still in her hand.

The New Year's Hopes and My #OneWord365

In the past, I have considered January one of my least favorite months---the end of festive celebrations, return to routines that aren't always enjoyable, and, basically, just winter. Cold, dry, dark, empty winter.

I have often tried to fill that January void with the hopes of a new year---a clean slate, a fresh start to long-held dreams, the lure of goals I am working towards. I have often sat at lengthy times with my journal, pouring my heart out onto the pages, not only for what I long for, but for who I want to become, and what I want to let go of.

At the turn of this new year, my thoughts were overwhelming, too many to even organize onto a journal page---who I want to be, the baggage I want to drop, the people I yearn to help, the areas I want to make a difference, the dreams I strive for, goals I long to reach, the pleas with God that are so strong they burn in my heart and keep me awake some nights.

Because This is What Achievement Really Looks Like

"So what was it like?" I asked her. "Did you feel comfortable? Or was it distracting and challenging at all?"

I was asking this question to a retired woman I have been teaching piano to for the past few years. She had a heart that yearned to serve. Even amid the frenzy of tending to a husband with multiple serious health problems, keeping up with her grown children and grandchildren in another state, she carried a determination I wish all of us could hold on to. The fact that she was only one of a few adult students in an academy of mostly children did not deter her. Deep within her heart, she felt certain that she needed to help with the music at her small church in a nearby community. She came weekly for a piano lesson, her books open to the hymn she was currently working on, and even signed up for voice lessons for the Sundays she could help lead the singing.

From Holiday Blues To A New Year Of Hope

As a child, I was glad that a New Year's celebration came only one week after Christmas Eve, mainly because I always got those "post-holiday blues" when Christmas was over. I anticipated that special day of December 25 months before its arrival. I participated in all the usual festive activities---mailing letters to Santa, helping bake Christmas cookies, listening to my Grandma read me Christmas stories, being either Mary or an angel in the Christmas play (because what other part could a girl be, unless the director thought the play was desperate for another wise man or shepherd?).

But I had an active imagination and could play independently for hours, so my enjoyment of the holidays went beyond the usual. I dug my mom's old Christmas records out of the closet---three I especially remember: one by Perry Como, one by the Oak Ridge Boys, and one of instrumental music called "Holiday Strings"---and began listening to them long before the holiday season was near. I would line my Barbie Dolls up on my pink bedroom carpet and stand each one up to take her turn singing when the song on the record changed. I would read Christmas stories, then choose my favorite character and reenact the story quietly in my room. Lying on my bed with a notebook and pen, I would pretend I was a playwright before I ever knew the word "playwright," and would write out scripts for Christmas plays, including specific cues beside each character's name. I felt fascinated by silent Christmas Eve nights that transformed into joyous Christmas mornings with gifts under the tree, an emptied milk glass, and only cookie crumbs left on a plate. And my young heart was lured by the mystery of a divine baby in a manger who was somehow God's son, whose birth was so significant that angels burst into the sleepy shepherds' night and a sudden star caused wise men to embark on a lengthy journey.

The Soothing Stillness Of Snowfall

Just a couple of days before the Thanksgiving holiday, I was driving to my afternoon job when the heavy clouds in the sky began releasing soft white snowflakes, dancing through the air and falling to the ground so far below. Most people wish for a white Christmas, but snow wasn't even on my mind that Monday before Thanksgiving.

I am usually not a fan of snow, mostly because slick, icy roads have placed me in frightening, dangerous driving conditions in the past. I hate being cold and having to bundle in layers just to walk outside. When snow begins melting, with patches of the dead, dry earth making the ground look like a shoddy, poorly stitched patchwork quilt, I dislike the messy appearance it leaves behind.

The REAL Reason I Am Not Yet Married. It All Goes Back To One Thanksgiving...

My cousin Jessica and me

I always loved holidays as a child, especially Thanksgiving, when fall hung crisply in the air, and my entire crew of relatives packed into Aunt Martha's white, A-framed house, each family bringing a dish or two, until her crowded kitchen was filled with abundant aromas of enough food to feed a person for days. After a huge lunch and a brief pause while everyone sat around relaxing until their bodies could hold some chess squares or chocolate mousse for dessert, the day was filled with laughter and talking, games and reminiscing. When the early nighttime came, the cozy glow of soothing yellow lamplight filled the little house at Aunt Martha's.

Challenging Perfectionism In 8th Grade Spelling Bees

I writhed with dreadful anxiety each year when it rolled around---the time for the annual class spelling bee. I had won quite a few spelling bees in the past, competed for the school and region, and ranked among the top students in my grade. Therefore--it was expected. "Misty will win," students predicted before we even lined up across the chalk board at the front of the room.

Inwardly, I groaned and wished to disappear into the floor. "Just something else to feel pressured about," I lamented to myself. Though only in 8th grade, I was so tired of the academic expectations, so worn out from constant pressure to succeed and be 'the best' that there left very little room for me to enjoy my middle and high school years. Except for a few, rare bright moments that stand out in my memory---I was miserable.

That 8th grade year---I made up my mind. I determined not to win. I had already been placed in advanced classes and was struggling through Algebra, which I had been placed in a year early--and received my first B. The subject just didn't click with me. Letters--in my mind--were meant for creating descriptive, poetic words of self-expression---not to be used as pieces of equations that would most likely remain irrelevant to my life. The fear of exiting Algebra with a C--"average"-- was already weighing down on me. No way was I going to win a class spelling bee just to be handed pages of hellacious words to spend hours studying, so I could potentially go on to compete against the entire school---then county---then state. I was already spending hours each night trying to conquer Algebra and setting my alarm for 4:30 each morning to try to figure out what my tired mind had been unable to comprehend the night before.

My 7th Grade Thanks To The Soldiers

I was not even school-age when they came to the church I grew up in---the new pastor, his wife, pretty daughter, and mischievous son. Years later they would tease me about being so shy that I would hide my little toddler self under the kitchen table when they came to my house to visit. They pastored our small church for at least twelve years, long enough to become family to the church members of the quiet town, long enough to watch me grow from a toddler to a teenager.

When their son was 21, he was deployed to Saudi Arabia during Operation Desert Storm, which struck at the beginning of my seventh-grade year---a personally turbulent time for me. I had lost my aunt right before beginning 5th grade, then lost my grandma the summer before 6th grade. Now I was beginning middle school, the emotional hormonal roller coaster of puberty; my grandfather was having serious health issues that he would discover to be cancer, and our pastor's son--the teasing "big brother" to all the younger kids in the church--was being sent across the globe to fight a war we could sit and witness on our TV screens.

Why Being Uncomfortable Is More Than Normal

It finally hit me.

I hadn't been feeling myself for several days, mostly due to fatigue, a stressful week, and a few days packed with too many work obligations and constantly being surrounded by people I don't know, which sometimes contains the capability to deplete my emotions. So when I began feeling really low and discouraged, I knew the first culprit to face:

Get some rest. Give yourself some time alone.

I sent myself to bed at 7:00 on a Sunday evening. I changed my Monday afternoon teaching schedule so I could have one afternoon to relax. But the feelings of discouragement persisted, and even worse, I felt down on myself.

While trying to unravel my tangled thoughts and emotions to determine why I'd spent the last three days feeling like my worst personal enemy, I read a sentence along these lines:

Our Fish And Loaves

When the steps I take
are meek and slow,
please multiply
my fish and loaves.

And when my courage
feels like dread,
please multiply
the fish and bread.

When I yearn to give,
yet little own,
please multiply
my fish and loaves.

When I fail the words
I wish I'd said,
please multiply
the fish and bread.

And when my confidence
plummets low,
please multiply
my fish and loaves.

When I long to help,
but doubt my best,
please multiply
the fish and bread.

When I feel too lacking
to lift one soul,
Help me still to give
my fish and loaves.

Luke 9: 12 Late in the afternoon the Twelve came to him and said, “Send the crowd away so they can go to the surrounding villages and countryside and find food and lodging, because we are in a remote place here.”

13 He replied, “You give them something to eat.”

They answered, “We have only five loaves of bread and two fish—unless we go and buy food for all this crowd.” 14 (About five thousand men were there.)

But he said to his disciples, “Have them sit down in groups of about fifty each.” 15 The disciples did so, and everyone sat down. 16 Taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven, he gave thanks and broke them. Then he gave them to the disciples to distribute to the people. 17 They all ate and were satisfied, and the disciples picked up twelve basketfuls of broken pieces that were left over.

~What are your "fish and loaves"? 

What can you offer that you fear is too meager and insignificant to make a difference?~

Autumn's Welcome

The peak of breathless
summer heat
has melted to a crisp, cool breeze
that dances through
the autumn trees
and layers earth with brilliant leaves.


Nighttime steals
a part of day,
ushering the light away.
In early hours,
sunset fades
and welcomes in the Milky Way.


Fallen leaves
crunch on the ground,
the earth turns shades
of golden brown,
before our eyes, with little sound--
nature softly winding down.


With coolness in
the atmosphere,
colored leaves,
and harvest cheer,
the earth slows from
another year.
Again,
we welcome Autumn here.

Called By Name

I sit at the piano bench in the campus dance studio, where I sit twice a week to accompany ballet classes part-time. This job isn't like some I've had in the past, where I gather with co-workers in the break room to chat about the weekend or laugh at their jokes. Instead, I greet the instructor with a "Good morning," play for a classroom of college dance students, then lock my music books in the cabinet, place the piano bench on top of the piano, roll it against the wall, and walk the approximate mile back to my car, parked on a side street downtown.

The male instructor is fairly new, strict with the students, but nice---in a professional, formal way of being nice---thanking me after each class and shaking my hand, unless he is otherwise bombarded by questioning students.

He directs the class at a fast pace and dictates instructions through a heavy accent, so I must mentally stay on my toes to keep up with what he is requesting of me. After demonstrating each exercise to the students, he looks at me with a strike of his hand in the air and calls out in a strong voice, "Maestro!" 

And the music, with the four-count preparation, begins.

One Day, She Will Know

"So what's happened?" I asked, leaning towards her. "You've lost your motivation for music. What's going on?"

"I don't knowww," she groaned, throwing her head back, and I caught her glancing at the clock as she did. "I mean, I do like it sometimes. If I like the song. And if it doesn't take a lot of practice."

"You used to love practicing. Are you playing your clarinet much?" I prodded.

"Ehh," she evaded.

"How about your ukulele?" 

"Ohhh. I learned that one song. A while back."

"Do you still enjoy singing?" I continued.

"I just don't know!" she answered, with all the dramatic exasperation of a fourteen-year-old.

"Is it because of all these boys you've been talking to lately?" I asked directly.

Incomplete Stories

The impact took my breath, and for a moment I just sat in my car where I had been backed in traffic at a stoplight, and I tried to process. "Was I hit? I was hit." I waited for the driver of the vehicle behind me to come speak to me, check on me, but no one budged, as other cars zipped around us. My hand rubbed the base of my head, which was hurting on the right side, even along my right jaw, and my head felt funny---fuzzy and swimmy. (Probably should have had that checked out.) But operating on pure adrenaline, I jumped out of my car instead and raced to the vehicle behind me, not sure what I would find.

I could see her with her head leaned back against the seat, tears streaming down her face. When she saw me, she rolled down her window and asked, "Are you okay?"

"Yes!" I answered. "Are you okay?"

She nodded as she got out of her car, wiping her eyes. "Yeah, it just scared me," she sobbed.