I owe you a blog post. Several, actually, but let’s not get into that.

courtesy of domeheid via flickr

A few weeks ago I posted here about an experiment in personal change.

This was an attempt to change one of the things most ingrained in my daily life: my sleep patterns.

I’ve been a reluctant sleeper for as long as anyone can remember.  My mom likes to say that I was born at 10:00 at night and ever since then it’s been my favorite time of day.  She remembers sitting in the doorway to my nursery when I was a toddler to make sure I didn’t climb out of the crib as I stood, shaking the bars and screaming like an inmate who’s been denied parole.  That’s a pretty good picture of how I usually feel about having to go to bed.

My dad has the same issues with sleep that I do. Even worse, actually.  When Drew was born it was clear that he got his sleep gene from the LaGrone side. (Thank God!)  My mom, when observing that we could put Drew down in his crib and he would peacefully chat with his stuffed animals and hold his blanket until falling asleep, said in a bewildered way: “I just didn’t know babies could do that!”  The look in her eye showed a hint of PTSD at the memories of years of sleep deprivation that I caused.

I’ve come to the gradual realization that the time of day I like to be most awake and active (10 P.M. to 2 A.M.) doesn’t quite fit with specific times of day my baby and husband and my church need me to be alert and fully present, not groggy or crabby because I stayed up half the night.  No matter how many times I’ve made goals of getting more sleep, those always seem to fall by the wayside around 9 P.M. when my adrenaline peaks and my need for alone time is met for the first time all day.

Motivating myself just wasn’t working. I needed some external help, some accountability and a daily reminder of my goal.

Enter loopchange.com, a tool that helps people make one change at a time.  You pick a “mission” and post about it every day for 21 days, while other members cheer you on or give you gentle nudges when you’re not meeting your goal.  You, in turn, keep posted on their missions and give them shout-outs of encouragement as well.  I liked the community aspect, and found it helpful to post each night just before turning out the lights to stay on track.

I won’t say I met my goal every night in the 21 days I spent on loopchange, but I probably got more consistent sleep in those 21 nights than anytime since… actually I have no memory of a time in my life I’ve gotten consistent sleep for that many days.  It felt good. And strange. Sometimes like I was missing the best part of my day.  But sometimes like I was at my best during the hours I really needed to be.

I would love to say that I’ve been sleeping full nights since then.  I’m writing this post at midnight, so that should tell you I didn’t automatically transform into a morning person.  I’m pretty sure I never will.  I did learn that I’m capable of the discipline it takes to act against my ingrained nature, to do what does not come naturally to me for the sake of the greater good, and I think that is an invaluable tool when it comes to making even more serious changes.  I think it even gives me faith that I have the ability to resist the temptation to go with my flawed instincts rather than follow God’s instincts for what glorifies Him and benefits me and the people I love.

Sleep may not seem like a very serious subject to talk about changing, with all the possibilities for things that need change in people’s lives.  Just know that no, it’s not the worst flaw I have. Ask my iHusband and you’ll find out there are many other things about me that could bear changing (but only if I get to ask your spouse or closest friend about yours and post it on the internet.)

This happens to be the area that needs change I’m willing to share about in this public forum. It’s the one I’m starting with in a desire to make changing things that need it a pattern.  It’s the one that I think could be a tipping point, since discipline in one area of life breeds discipline in all areas.

I’d love to say more, but for now… it’s time to go to sleep.  Good night.

Have you ever made a big change in your habits or patterns? Or do you know someone who has? What helped make a difference?

I’m super-excited to be working on a new Bible Study series called Namesake.  This is the culmination of years of a minor-obsession I have with names in the Bible, where they come from, and how God often changes people’s names when He changes them.  The series will start August 21 on Sunday mornings and Tuesday nights.  I’ll put the complete schedule at the end of this post.

LaGrone X 3

All this thinking about names has me remembering the conversations we had when trying to find a name for Drew.  For months it was hard to get the iHusband to be serious on this topic. I would throw out an idea and he would counter with: “How about Belteshazzar?” Funny? Yes. Helpful? Not so much.

When we finally got down to business, we decided to continue a little family tradition – just two generations running – of giving a kid his dad’s first name as his middle name.  Drew’s name is Andrew James.  His dad, Jim’s, is James Robert.  His dad (Drew’s Pawpaw) is Robert Alan.  You see how it works.  It’s a way of embedding a little bit of history in a name. A subtle nod without going so far as: “Jim Junior.”  LaGrone men tend to resemble one another anyway (those are some strong genes!), so naming him full-on after his dad would be just too confusing.

I grew up around quite a few guys named “Junior.”  It took me a while as a kid to figure out that wasn’t their proper name, but a place-holder.  A way to distinguish them from their male relative, usually their dad, for whom they were named.  Some guys went by “Bobby” while their dad was Robert, or “Little Ken” when their dad was Kenneth.  I even knew a few that were the third bearer of their given name.  John Tristan Alexander III went by “Tripp.”  Norton Barrett Hargis III was “Tres.” Clever.

My favorite, though, is one of my father-in-law’s cousins.  Named “John” after his father, from an early age he was simply called “Ditto.”

Ditto. That’s really what these families are saying when they give a child the same name as one of their parents or relatives. Ditto. Repeat. Do it again.  You give someone the name of another person because you want them to emulate the qualities that make that person great. You want them to grow up to be, not a copy of that person, but a reflection of their strengths.

No one ever names their child after someone who really hurt them, or annoyed them, or gave them the creeps. That’s one of the issues expectant parents face when they begin the tough task of agreeing on a name for their baby-to-be.  One prospective parent likes the name Sydney. The other dated a Sydney who broke his heart, so that’s out. One likes Lucas. The other remembers back to Kindergarten, where little Lucas ate paste and smelled funny. No chance for that one.  This gets especially complicated when your spouse has been a teacher (like mine) and hundreds of names are already ruined by little punks from classrooms past.

When you share a name with someone, you want the commonality to mean a resemblance of sorts.  For the namesake to share more than just initials. To grow up into a likeness that the original can be proud of.

When you pray, pray in my name, Jesus said.

I’ve been wrestling lately with what Jesus really meant by that. I’m pretty sure it’s not some kind of spiritual credit card where we can charge up what we want, like: Just put it on my Father’s tab.

I think it might be closer to:   Take my name. Call yourself after me.
Be my namesake. Let your prayers be my prayers. Your actions be like my actions.
Ditto.

That’s a tougher one than just ordering up the prayers I want and naming Jesus as a kind of magic word at the end. Abracadabra… In Jesus’ name! Instead, while I’m praying I’m supposed to check my motivations, survey my heart. What do these prayers say about me? If I’m growing into the name “Christian,” do my desires reflect the Christ at the center of that name?

I want to grow up to resemble that name that I’m praying in.
I hope Jesus is proud that he offered it to me in the first place.

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Namesake is a 6 session Bible Study series that I’m teaching this August and September at The Woodlands UMC.  On Sunday mornings August 21, 28 and September 4 I’ll be preaching the 8:30, Harvest and 11:00 services, and then teaching again on the following Tuesday evenings at 7:00 (in the sanctuary) for Tuesday Teaching and Conversation.  We’ll record those sessions on DVD to be used later in Bible Study format by other churches and groups.  I’d love it if you’d join us for the launch and be in the “live studio audience” for the recording of this new series!

Do you have a story of someone who is named after someone else?  How did names of people in your family or in your past influence your choice of names for your children?

Our little family is on a road trip together this weekend.  One day’s four hour drive and the next day’s six hour drive (with a one-year-old in the back seat) are almost complete, and I’ve only wanted to bang my head on the window a few times during the thousandth rendition of “The Wheels on the Bus.”  The wipers. Swish. Swish. Swish. Please: Make. Them. Stop.

We’re headed west to a camp near Amarillo for a family reunion.  It’s that season, where families get together and eat watermelon and try to figure out how distant cousins are related: Are you my first cousin twice removed or my second cousin once removed?

That may get a little interesting to explain at this one, because when asked how we’re related, we have a slightly awkward answer: We’re not.

That’s right, we’re attending a family reunion for a family we’re not even related to.  Remember the movie “Wedding Crashers?” That’s us.  We’re crashing some other family’s reunion.

This story goes back a few years to when my iHusband Jim was in college at Texas Tech.  Jim grew up in a faithful Christian family in a very loving Methodist Church.  But like a lot of us, he hit college not really owning his faith for himself.  A year or so into it he had exhausted all the usual college options for trying to fill oneself up when not looking to Christ for fulfillment.  He was tired of the party scene and tired of the story he was living. That’s when he met Kim.  Kim was a clarinet player in the Tech band. Jim played saxophone. Their friendship led to spiritual conversations, and Kim re-introduced Jim to Jesus one night sitting on the hood of a car in a university parking lot. That one conversation changed his life story, and, down the road, it changed mine as well.  Kim invited him to the Wesley Foundation, an amazing campus ministry dedicated to growing strong Christian leaders.  That’s where my husband was really discipled, grew in his faith, and became the amazing Christian man I know and love today.

Kim is part of a big family.  Her dad is one of four children, and between those four siblings there are ten granddaughters.  That’s right, her generation is all girls, no boys. At least four of the girls were in college at Tech at the same time, and they all included Jim in their friendships, mischief, and fun.  He went home with them on vacation and holidays, got to know their parents and grandparents, and somehow got unofficially adopted.  They were excited to have a grandson at last.  Once or twice someone in the family wondered which of the girls Jim was dating, but the truth was he was in love with all of them, with this whole crazy, fun family that loves Jesus and each other and truly enjoys being together.

Over time he’s been to reunions, birthday parties, ushered at weddings and even been given a copy of the family genealogy that one of the uncles wrote up.  They think they may have even found a way that Jim is actually distantly related somehow!  When we married, Kim’s husband Tom was Jim’s best man.  Their daughter was our flower girl.  That summer the whole group welcomed me with open arms at my first family reunion.  Their grandmother gave me a big hug and told me how happy they were that “their boy” had found someone so wonderful.

I remember learning that the family we grow up in is called our “family of origin.”  Much of our identity, our traits, strengths, baggage, hangups, and the trajectory our life heads in is formed in this family.  We start a new family when we get married and have kids. I call that our “family of destination.”  Although it’s influenced by our experience in our family of origin, this is where we get to write our own script of what we believe family should look like for ourselves and our kids.  Jim and I are blessed with wonderful families of origin. And we’ve begun writing the script for our family of destination that I think Drew will grow up to be proud of.

But I believe there’s a third circle of family we experience in life.  Think of it as a “family of choice.”  These people are sometimes related to us by blood, but often are people we just choose to spend our lives with.  Their presence in our lives is more based on choice and conscious effort than convenience.  We choose them because there are things we love about them that we may not have found in our own families.  The time we spend with them over the years means we have a good chance of absorbing the traits that drew us to them in the first place. That’s a kind of heredity no one taught about in my genetics classes in college: we can choose to inherit the traits of those we love and admire without any DNA linkages causing us to do so.

That’s what we’re doing here this weekend. Being with our family.  Exploring our inheritance.  This family helped make my husband who he is, and by doing so gave Drew and me a wonderful gift.  If someone asks me this weekend how we’re related I might just say: “In the most important way of all.” And leave it at that.

Do you have friends that you consider as close as family members? How did that relationship come about?

Photo courtesy of alexlc13 on flickr

I’m working on a new project that has me thinking a lot about change lately.  Can people really change over time?  I’ve seen marriages broken up because one person expected the other to change and it never happened. I’ve known people in the second half of life who look back with disappointment at their own habits, sins or character traits that have remained the same for decades even though they wish to be different.

True, lasting change is hard. Even when we hope to change, work at change, pray for change in ourselves, sometimes we end up resigned to the idea that we are meant to stay the same forever.

I’d like to look back in 5, 10, 20 years and say that I’ve changed for the better.  What should I be doing now to get there?  I decided to wait on addressing the major character flaws and tackle a simple habit first.

My entire life I’ve had trouble with sleep. Well, it’s not that I have trouble. It’s that the world has trouble with my natural sleep habits. If left to my own devices I’d stay up until 2 or 3 AM each morning and sleep until 10 or 11 the middle of the next day.  Sounds reasonable to me.  What? That’s not how the rest of the world’s schedule works? My job, my husband and my baby have expectations and needs that happen before 11 AM? Sounds like their problem, not mine!

Seriously, I’ve struggled for a couple of decades to adjust my sleep cycle.  I’ve tried to change because of early morning classes. I’ve tried to change because of jobs. Usually I’ve ended up keeping my same evening hours (sleep between 12-2:00 AM) and then force myself to get up for the rest of the world.  I’ve averaged between four and six hours of sleep a night for years. The results have been a lot of sleep deprivation, moodiness (no comments from the peanut gallery that knows me and lives with me, please), and a general hatred of the world in the morning and sleepiness in the afternoon. Not a lifestyle I want to continue.

One of my problems is that I’ve been trying to change for the wrong reasons.

The true thing that motivates us to change is not resolutions or responsibilities, but relationships.

Getting married (6 years ago) and becoming a mom (16 months ago) have motivated me to change in ways I’ve never experienced before.  I want to be able to be kind to my husband (not throw things at him when he attempts to wake me) before 10 AM.  I want to get up with my baby without resenting his cries bringing me out of a sleep I’ve only entered 2 hours before. I want to have energy and enthusiasm for those that I love the most, not come home exhausted at the end of the day.

The tipping point came for me a few weeks ago when Jim remarked that he had gotten up with Drew every morning that week, gotten him his milk and his breakfast, and started the day with him while I slept. My husband is a non-complainer, but having the sole responsibility of our toddler in the mornings had cramped his schedule and his desire to pray, read Scripture and work out.  It grieved me that my selfish patterns were affecting him.  I decided to change.

For the last week I’ve been using a website called LoopChange to commit to a 21 Day Mission to change.  (www.loopchange.com) I set a goal and have been posting each day to keep track of how I’m changing my sleep habits for the better. I haven’t succeeded every night, but I’ve bumped my average “lights out” time earlier and my “total sleep time” has increased.  I’m feeling better and getting up earlier and more enthusiastically.

You can follow my progress at loopchange here. The site is free and is based on the philosophy that it takes at least 21 days to change a habit.  Other members of the site are following my progress and commenting with encouragement and advice on my mission. I can’t tell you what a difference that has made.  I’m also following their missions (which include things like exercise habits, eating healthily, breaking an email addiction, fasting from TV as a family and giving up Dr. Pepper) and posting encouragement and advice on their page. And I’m praying for them.

The principle at work here is one that I believe in with my whole heart: we can only truly change within the context of community.  We need gentle accountability and encouragement from others.  I also believe that God can effect true change in us through prayer and His power in ways that we cannot even attempt on our own.

When I proofread items for worship at our church one of the most common misspellings is “alter” instead of “altar.”  As in “kneel at the Communion alter” or “come forward to the prayer alter.”  Besides stirring up my inner grammar/spelling Nazi, that mistake has always amused me.  When we truly place our lives on the altar before God, that’s where they are truly altered.  God is in the alteration business.

Change. It is possible. But it won’t happen on its own.

-We need a reason to kick us in the pants and push us forward. Relationships are the best and most lasting reason to want to change something about yourself.
-We need a community to encourage us and hold us accountable.
-We need a Savior. When we try to go it on our own we are doomed to fall back on our own loop of habits. When we ask for His help He lifts us out of the loop and places our feet on a new path.

I’ll be posting once a week here to keep you updated on my 21 day mission. Today is day 9. Wish me luck. Pray for me. Start your own mission. I’ll pray for you.

In the meantime, I have to turn off my computer now. It’s time to go to sleep.

What change do you long to see in yourself or what have you changed with success? Any tips on how you see real change  happening in people’s lives?

Review and top posts for June 2011

Party of One

This is the first “month in review” post for Reverend Mother, and I feel a bit like throwing a party!

When I first dipped my toe into the blogosphere, one of my greatest fears was that I would put my heart out there and no one would show up.  What if I started talking and no one was listening? Or what if it was just my mom, commenting again and again with: “Good job, Sweetie!”

Turns out that fear (as most of them are) was unfounded, a waste of thoughts and energy on the negative.  Instead, you showed up. And read. And commented. And blessed me more than I can even tell you!

Some of my favorite moments this month:

• People stopping me in the hallway to talk about a blog post or saying: “Hey Reverend Mother!” (None of you stopped me in the grocery store with a stalker-like line. Thanks for that.)
• Starting to tell someone about my feelings about an upcoming funeral and their response: “I know how you feel about that, I read your blog.”
• My first SPAM comments. I feel so official now!  I’ve left a few for your entertainment, because yes, discussions about family and ministry should definitely lead to how can I invest money in your unheard of venture or get Celexa at a discount. Thanks for asking.
• The great response to the release of Women in the Word. My first Bible Study DVD series.  I’m excited about those of you embarking on this study and have a few more things up my sleeve… announcements to come!
• Countless comments and emails where you’ve shared your heart and your experiences. Thanks for your insights and advice, and making me feel not so alone in the world.
• Connections with those of you I’ve never met in person, but have shared your hearts here, or in emails.  Thanks to those of you who have shared the blog with friends through email or Facebook. It’s such a trip to hear from people reading the blog in Alaska, California, and other random places.

The top post for this month (Drumroll?) was by far Know It All.  Evidently I’m not the only one to have made a few little mistakes in parenting.  You posted more comments on this one than any others, and they made me laugh and gasp and feel not-so-stupid after all. Thanks.

The next top hits were:

• These things just don’t happen to normal people (the diaper cake caper)
• Me and my shadow (making the transition from work to home at the end of the day)
• Fear of Blogging #1 – Transparency (stalker in the frozen foods section)

Thanks for an awesome first month for Reverend Mother. One-month-olds are cute. They spit up, poop and have gas, but that first smile makes it worth it all.  This one-month-old blogger is smiling (no comment on the other traits listed) and thankful the party is populated with wonderful friends.

Blessings,
~Jessica

P.S. – Don’t forget to subscribe so you’ll get updates when new posts appear (look just under the picture in the right column) and to share your favorite posts with friends on Facebook (by sharing a link) or through email. Thanks!

What’s following you home?

Nothing like having someone looking over your shoulder to make you more mindful of your actions. To make you measure your motivations, anticipate your words. All in a way you would not if you were acting alone.

I’ve spent most of the summer so far with a shadow: Our church’s Pastoral Intern, Travis, who has just finished his first year in seminary at Duke Divinity School.  Travis’s job this summer is to watch and learn. To try on the identity of being a pastor and see how it fits.  He has lots of wonderful gifts that will serve him well in ministry, including the gift of asking tough questions.  More on that later.

In our first few weeks together there was one day in particular packed with appointments. It was one of those days that makes ministry both rewarding and exhausting. We finished the day around 7 P.M. and drove back to the church together, which gave us time to process a few of the day’s events:

Coffee with a man in his fifties who is sensing a call to serve in full-time ministry and asking questions about seminary.  Leaving a successful career to follow God’s calling is tough.  It feels like both a blessing and a challenge that God only provides us with enough “light for our feet” (Psalm 119:105) – showing us the next step and asking us to take it without necessarily knowing where those steps will eventually lead us.

A non-appointment (drop in) from a young mom with her two boys who showed up at the church requesting financial assistance.  When turned down by the secretary for legitimate reasons she asked to see a pastor. This usually means trying to manipulate a pastor to go over someone else’s head, but I met with her with an open mind and tried to hear her needs.  The most troubling part of her story, to me, was that her car had run out of gas in our parking lot.  It was approaching 100 degrees outside, and she said she and her boys would have to walk to the next town to get home. I told her I couldn’t offer her cash, but that if she would bring the gas can in that was in her car I’d send Travis to fill it up with gas. I was also planning to have him pick up some food for her young boys, who were alarmingly quiet and still for their age while we talked.  She left, promising to go out to her car and get the gas can.  Thirty minutes later she still hadn’t returned.  I really wanted her story to be true.

Time spent talking with a twelve year old girl and her parents.  She’ll be baptized in our church this month along with her newborn half-brother.  Since our baptism preparatory class is really for parents of very young children, I meet one-on-one with children who are at an age where they can understand for themselves what their baptism will mean.  We all took turns (Travis included) making things out of Play-doh that related to baptism (a gift, a vessel for washing something, a family) and talked about what she was looking forward to about the special day before her.  Sometimes I think kids “get it” even more than adults do.  We ended our time together in the sanctuary standing where she and her baby brother will be baptized and praying with them and their family.

Finally, the last appointment of the day.  The hardest.  A family who lost their one-year-old daughter last November, and a neighborhood grieving with them. This young couple and their two children had only lived there for a short time when a car accident at the entrance of their neighborhood took the life of their 17-month-old little girl. They’ve since moved out of state to be closer to family while they grieve, but returned for a ceremony that evening where the neighborhood dedicated a park bench in the little girl’s honor in her favorite park.

I didn’t know the family, but one of our church members on the neighborhood council asked me to facilitate and speak at the short ceremony.  No one was comfortable. No one knew what to say to the family. The family didn’t know what to say to their ex-neighbors. I had to say what needed to be said for all of them. It was a little like a funeral but more awkward, since I hadn’t met the family before that evening.  At a funeral everyone is still numb because the loss is so recent.  No numbness here. It was tough.

It was 7:00 by the time Travis and I left the neighborhood park and began driving back to the church.  I was trying to be a good mentor and ask him questions about the day and what he had learned from our different interactions, but I was emotionally exhausted.  We talked about the difficulty of remaining flexible in ministry: the struggle to be able to go from one setting to another, from one dramatically different conversation straight into another without blinking. Every person has to feel that they have your full attention. That they are the most important part of your day.  Travis asked: How do you make those transitions? How do you let go of one conversation and step into the next?  I answered him the best I could, not knowing if I had done the best job of it or not.

As we approached the church he asked: How do you make the last transition?  My brain was garbled from the day. I didn’t know what he meant.  He asked again: How do you make the last transition? How do you leave all this behind and go home to your family without carrying it with you?  How do you stop being a pastor at the end of the day?

I don’t think I had a good answer for him.  I had already called home and asked Jim to keep Drew up past his bedtime so I’d have a chance to see him for just a few minutes. Selfishly I think I wanted that more for me than for him. I needed to hug him. To hold him tight. To try hard to leave that family behind, back in the park, watching their one child play and knowing there should have been another.  A little one almost exactly my little one’s age. Drew had been on my mind throughout the ceremony where we talked about their little girl. I had taken him with me in my thoughts while I talked about her. Now I was bringing her home with me while I rushed to squeeze the last few minutes out of the day with him.

How do you leave it behind?  Some days I’m not sure I can.  But I have to keep trying to find a way.  Travis isn’t the only one looking over my shoulder.  Drew needs a mommy, not a pastor.  He’s watching me. Shadowing me.  He needs to know he’s the most important part of my day.  He’s going to be looking to see if part of me lingers back a the church or if I am fully his.  Fully present while singing him Jesus Loves Me. Gathering the stuffed animals that will accompany him safely to sleep. Squeezing him extra tight.

Is it easy for you to leave work behind at the end of the day? Or do you find yourself bringing it home with you? 

Trust me.  I know what I’m doing.  I’m a mom.

Moms are supposed to have all the answers.  They’re supposed to know what to do in tough situations. When you were little and something went wrong or you were hurt you went straight to your mom for help. When you did something that got you into a mess, inevitably it was because you hadn’t listened to your mom. 

I never really stopped to think about how moms acquire this gift until I became one.  Suddenly I was expected to know what I was doing. I did not.  In the early days of Drew’s life I had no idea whether we should let him cry until he fell asleep or try feeding him, give him gas medication or teething gel or rock him or walk him or drive him around in the car until he stopped crying.  I just didn’t know what to do. But I was the mom. The feeling was unnerving.  

Just before Drew’s first birthday he was really starting to get into eating “grown up food” off of our plates. Jim made lasagna one night and we ate at the coffee table while Drew toddled back and forth between us, holding onto the table for support and opening his mouth like a baby bird, asking for more bites.  How cute, we thought.

Then shortly after we put him to bed that night he was screaming bloody murder.  Not so cute anymore. Jim picked him up and found that his neck and ears were bright red from scratching.  I lifted his shirt and saw little hives emerging all over his chest and tummy.  He was inconsolable. My husband is a very calm man, but I have to say he freaked out a little.  What was happening to our son? What should we do? Should we call the doctor? 

Something clicked in my head. I looked at my child turning red and screaming and my husband freaking out and a strange calm came over me.  Some kind of mommy-gene turned on and suddenly I knew exactly what to do. I can’t explain the feeling, but it was the moment where I became “that mom.” The one with the answers. The one who you come to for comfort because you know she can fix it.  

I knew that there were eggs in the cheese mixture of the lasagna and that we had never fed Drew eggs before.  I knew it was an allergic reaction. I knew I had some oatmeal bath and I knew exactly where to find it (a miracle in and of itself if you’ve seen my bathroom cabinet), and I quickly got Drew into the bath where he began to calm down immediately.  The hives had started to subside a little already when Jim came into the bathroom, still hyped up and on the phone with the nighttime on-call nurse from our doctor’s office.  “No, no trouble breathing. We should what? Oh, I think my wife’s already doing that.  Yes he looks a little better.”

I know you’re not supposed to be happy that your child has an allergic reaction, but the feeling that I knew how to handle myself in a mini-crisis was one of the best mothering moments of that first year.

And then.

A week or so later I was running errands with Drew around lunchtime. We needed a few things from the grocery store and I knew he was hungry, so I was trying to give him a bottle and some snacks so he would make it until we got home for lunch.  Drew has never been one to hold his own bottle (he knows we’ll do it for him!) so I was pushing a shopping cart around HEB and propping a bottle in his mouth with one hand while I grabbed things off the shelf and threw them in the basket behind him.  

Even with the milk he was starting to get cranky and hungry. And that’s when I saw them.  The sample cookies.  They were in the shape of flowers and covered in bright pink icing.  I felt a little giddy that my child was eating solids now and had already had a bit of sugar at his first birthday party earlier that week(even though he really didn’t eat much of his cake).  I felt like a real, grown-up mom being able to hand him a cookie, which he happily munched the rest of the way through the store.  It was way more sugar than he’d ever had and he got more and more animated, waving hello to strangers and grabbing for things on the shelves.  A little like a mini-frat boy.  We checked out and got in the car and headed home to get some lunch, about an hour past his usual lunch time.    

It was about the time I got on the freeway that I looked in the rear-view mirror and saw Drew with a shocked expression in his eyes, mouth open, and large quantities of pink-tinted milk-vomit spewing out of his mouth.  Straight sugar. Empty stomach. Stupid mommy.  I called Jim and told him to meet me in the garage with lots of towels.  I took the baby and he took the car seat – and I really think I got the better end of that deal because the bathtub and washing machine did most of the work for me.  I looked at my baby in the bathtub once again (now feeling much better and hungry for lunch) and wondered how I had gotten us into this.  I was the mom.  Why didn’t I know better? 

Who knew parenthood didn’t come with some kind of innate wisdom about things like sugar and bedtimes and running with scissors?  Vacillating between these poles of knowing exactly what to do and having no idea what to do is exhausting.  I’m hoping at some point there’s a happy medium of knowing most of what I’m supposed to know while pretending to know the rest.  In the meantime, who wants ice cream for dinner? 

Have you had moments where you somehow knew exactly what to do? What about moments when you messed things up without even realizing it? 

Things were quiet. Too quiet.

Image courtesy of iStock photo

I sat in a circle of 10 people who had no idea what to say.  The uneasy silence came during a meeting of our small group that had been together for several months.  Usually we were a talkative bunch. I had to struggle to keep people on topic because we enjoyed each other’s company so much. Right now… not so much.

We had just been reflecting on Biblical passages about servanthood.  The study seemed obvious enough, nothing too revolutionary, just familiar passages about serving the least of these among us.

But now Kathy, a member of the group, was taking things too far.  She was taking the lesson personally.

“You know, I think I’ve been disobedient to God.” She said.

That got our attention. Kathy was the most gracious, meek, and kind person in the group by far. None of us had pictured her as a hardened sinner.  Especially at our weekly potluck dinneres with her green been casserole in hand.

“I’m not sure I’ve been doing what the Bible says.” She was staring at a spot in the wall over our heads, careful not to make eye contact.  “I used to really love to serve other people, but in the last few years, well, I guess ever since the kids were little, it seems like all of my time and attention has gone to my own family. I haven’t really taken time to look around and see how other people are struggling, what their needs are, and how I can help. And now that the kids are grown I haven’t changed that pattern at all.”  She got a little quieter. “I think Jesus is sad. I think he wishes I would look outside myself and stop being so selfish.”

The room was dead quiet.  People were clearly uneasy, shifting around in their seats and glancing at me as the leader of the group, wondering what I would do to fix this awkward moment.

We were uncomfortable with Kathy being uncomfortable.  Finally, someone who couldn’t take it anymore and broke the ice.

“But Kathy, you do so many wonderful things for your own family.”

Another person jumped in:

“I agree! You’re such a loving person, I’m sure Jesus understands that your attention is on the needs in your own family. Just look at what great kids you’ve raised!”

The group was nodding and smiling, reassuring Kathy that she wasn’t a monster, just a stay-at-home mom turned empty-nester with plenty of responsibilities and grandchildren on her plate. Surely she measured higher than we did on the obedience scale – and there was clearly nothing wrong with the rest of us, right?

Surely Jesus didn’t mean she had to look outside of her own family to serve?  Surely he wouldn’t want what she was reading in the Bible to make her uncomfortable?  If it did, surely it was our job to make her comfortable again, right?

Small group FAIL.

What had been a moment of holy discomfort, of true conviction, got turned into an “I’m OK, you’re OK” session in just a few seconds.  God had been speaking to Kathy through those Scriptures, gently convicting her.  He was using His Word to show her an area of her life that he wanted her to change. Once this tiny little flame of conviction got started, she shyly trusted her group, and they poured a big bucket of ice water on it to save her from the burn.  I think that little flame of conviction was about to develop (and I hope it still did) into a calling, a burden, a desire to reach out to someone and serve them in Jesus’ name.

But we silenced it. All in the name of being comfortable.

Why are Christians so uncomfortable with being uncomfortable? Why do we need to reassure each other all the time that we’re just fine the way we are?

When God convicts us, it doesn’t mean He’s squashing our self esteem.  There’s a huge difference between conviction and condemnation.  One is a voice from the Spirit. One is a voice from the serpent.  One voice prods us gently towards the ways God wants to help us change.  The other tells us how worthless we are and that we are incapable of change.
Conviction is the first step of transformation into something better, something more like Jesus.

Transformation often requires that we become so uncomfortable with where we are that we want to move.

But we have to be OK with being uncomfortable first.

Have you ever been in a conversation where an uncomfortable moment leads to a good thing?

In honor of the 2011 Texas Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church
that ended today.

One of the gifts that women give each other at the birth of a baby is called a diaper cake.  It’s a bunch of diapers rolled up and stacked to resemble a multi-tiered wedding cake and then decorated with ribbons and baby toys.  Because nothing says “Congratulations” like something that looks edible but will actually contain poop in the not-so-distant future.

A few weeks after I returned from maternity leave last year a diaper cake appeared in my office one day as a gift.  Unlike the cakes I’ve seen covered with rattles and pacis, this one was topped off with a … (Wait for it)…

With a Cross and Flame. The symbol of the United Methodist Church.  Now a non-edible dessert made of poop holders was sitting right there in my office as a shining beacon of my denomination and chosen calling.  The thing that made this gift even more astounding was that it was anonymous. No one claimed responsibility for the creation of something that summed up my new life of motherhood/pastorhood/daily obsession with someone else’s poop. (How many times can you use the word poop in one post before they kick you off the internet?)

Not to be deterred, I called our Director of Facilities and had him pull up the security footage of the front desk during the hours the “cake” was delivered.  Several staff members gathered in his office in front of our expensive security equipment (I’m sure we purchased it for just such an occasion) and we began trying to figure out who the culprit might have been. It was a lot like CSI.

Law and Order UMC

When we got to the exact frame, the young couple who carried the “cake” in was a bit blurry, and as much as I squinted at the screen I couldn’t identify them.  No one else recognized them either.  I thought about collecting DNA and fingerprints and sending them off to the crime lab, but wasn’t sure they would consider this as high a priority as I did.