Boxes

Wednesday Wisdom 😊

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Inspiration this week comes from a smattering of scriptures that help to remind me what “box” I belong in: Philippians 4:13, Joshua 1:9, Psalms 37: 3-4 and 23-24, Jeremiah 29: 11-14 and John 13: 34-35

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Karyn ran in her final cross country race last Friday at the Nebraska State Cross Country Championships, rocked her first half marathon Sunday morning in Lincoln, and then celebrated her 18th birthday on Monday! All of these things have me thinking of how much I love being a “mom”, and what I truly want my girls to understand as they step out into the world.

In the midst of the vast array of emotions that I have recently gone through, God has placed an important message on my heart to share. I’m going to put it in the form of a letter – from a veteran Mama – to her beautiful girls, the three that I was blessed to give birth to and also to the ones that God has brought into my life through church and athletics.

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Dear Girls,

Years ago, I promised myself that I would help to teach you how to be strong and mighty young women. I felt in my heart the need to inspire you to be courageous, and to train you to persevere through Grace. I believe that your faith is like a muscle, the more you build it up – the stronger it is. As your Mama and your coach, I tried to teach you how to hope, how to sacrifice and serve, how to put in the work to build strength, and how to trust that the Lord loves you and has a plan for your life.

Although my mama’s heart sometimes wished that your path would be without potholes, deep down I knew that God used everything – both the smooth roads and the bumpy ones – to mold and shape you as His child. I also learned that I had no place trying to remove those obstacles, that wasn’t my job. My job was to trust God and to love you and support you as you navigated the hard things. Don’t worry! You will persevere ❤️

I know that you can do all things through Christ who brings you strength. That your courage is not only fueled by the love of Christ, but it is commanded by the heavenly Father who gave you life. I believe that when you trust in the Lord and let Him use you to do good works, that you will prosper. I also believe that as He moves in your heart, you will see the world through His eyes and want what He wants. Sometimes this hurts, but don’t lose heart as there is joy to be found even in the hardest of times. I hope that you truly understand how much God loves you, and recognize that He delights in the details of your life as He leads your steps. I pray that you live like you are forgiven, choosing to believe that you are beloved, and that you are enough.

Do you fully understand that God’s love is unconditional and He will never give up on you? God promises that if you wholeheartedly seek, you will find Him in every moment. You never walk alone.

Finally, please know that the world will try to put you in boxes as it attempts to define you by what you look like and the things that you do. This is a trap! Do not give into that temptation! Instead, remember that you are defined by the God who created you, the Redeemer who died for you, and the Spirit that lives in your heart as you go through each day. “Earthly boxes” limit the God who calls you His own, and place limits on what He can do through you. The only box that you are meant to fit in is labeled, BELOVED CHILD OF GOD.

The “box” labeled beloved child of God holds unconditional love, mercy, tenderhearted forgiveness and all of the fruits of the Spirit. It is a refuge, a stronghold, a safe place for you to rest. It is a place where you can trust that you are held in the arms of Jesus. It is a place where you are valued, treasured, and comforted. It is a place of fellowship with other beloved children of God where you can find encouragement, camaraderie, and acceptance.

Choose this box! And, let it fuel you and strengthen you for the journey. I love you. God loves you. And, I know that together we make this beautiful thing called “Team Jesus”. In it, we find our purpose for life 😊

Love,

Mama, Anne, Coach Anne, Miss Anne, Lieutenant Anne…

P.S. Look up the referenced scriptures!

A Heart To Serve…

Wednesday Wisdom 🙂

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Inspiration this week comes from Matthew 20: 25-28 (also found in Mark 10),

Jesus called his disciples together and said to them, “You know that the rulers of this world lord it over their people, and officials flaunt their authority over those under them. But among you it will be different. Whoever wants to be a leader among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first among you must become your slave. For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

And also, 1John 3:11,

“This is the message that you have heard from the beginning: We should love one another.”

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2020 provided a strange year. A time when community, service, and safety all came together in a way that caused tremendous confusion for me. Amidst the Covid pandemic, I felt the conflict between “stay home/stay safe” and Jesus’ persistent call to serve others in love. What did God want me to do in this strange, new environment? It was clear to me that I was called to continue to serve, but what did that really mean?

My brain batted this question around repeatedly during the spring months as schools canceled and the overriding cultural message was stay home to flatten the curve. I prayed for wisdom, and I prayed for patience. I postponed swim team practice, and I worshiped via the internet on Sunday mornings. And, my heart cried as I watched our country disconnect from each other and our kids flounder as their daily support structure crumbled away. Our community felt the wrath of the disease in a multitude of different ways as those we loved were sickened or lost, and possibly all of us in some way struggled to gain insight as to how to love as a servant loves.

Summer came and God made it possible to have local swim team practice. We also were able to meet again as a church family to worship each week and this brought a sense of community back that became a lifeline for me. In the fall, school reopened and Youth Group began again, and I learned to wear a mask. It felt strange, but God told me that above all else I needed to be a servant and to be a good neighbor. Leading in love meant sacrificing for others. When the kids that I coached asked me to mask up to protect them and to protect their season, I found clarity in God’s Word (Romans Chapters 12-15:6) and learned to make it work. As I wrote last week, in Our Covid Story, I still have more questions than answers. But, winter has brought some important revelations that have shaped my heart, my thoughts and my actions as we finished up 2020 and moved into 2021.

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The first revelation is it is okay to have a servant heart. This is a core part of who I am, and it is directly aligned with my heart for Jesus. I love our church dearly because being surrounded by a church family who is dedicated to serving provided a light to me as I stumbled around in the darkness of 2020. Our pastors reminded me weekly of Jesus’ call to disciple, and inspired me to find ways to intentionally respond to that call. I learned that although details were important, when your core is in Christ that it is okay to lessen your grip and just trust and follow.

The second revelation is that a pandemic does not lesson the need for service, it amplifies it. I’ve seen a loneliness, a sense of “being lost” in the eyes of many (myself included) over the last ten months. Some looked lost because they stopped looking for ways to serve, and some because their need to be served was so great. There is a tremendous physical, mental, and spiritual need as we move into 2021 and I pray that we will all respond when God asks us to move.

The third revelation is something that I’ve learned to cling to. Love is what “moves mountains”. It saves and it binds us together as a family. Goodness is rooted in love, and God is love. We can come up with impressive and detailed theories, but it really is simple. When we serve in love, then Jesus is able to move in and bring change because He is the ultimate display of God’s love. He is Grace, a Grace that is meant to be shared.

I don’t know what all 2021 will bring, but I pray that each of us will reconnect with community and obey Jesus’ command to love one another in service.

accepting Comfort…

Wednesday Wisdom 🙂

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Inspiration this week comes from the Gospel of Matthew 11: 28-30

“Then Jesus said, ‘Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light.'”

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Not a day passes when I do not need comfort. Whether small hurts build up to weigh down my heart, or a single large burden dominates my mind, I rarely go through a day when finding and accepting comfort is not important. In those moments of pain, my brain tempts me to look for logical answers despite the fact that my heart is very clearly needing the comfort of peace. The outcome of my daily experiences tends to be tied to which of two possible questions I choose to ask God: Do I ask “why” something is happening and get stuck at the very beginning, or do I accept the challenge and instead choose to ask “how” we can get through it together?

Jesus tells us repeatedly in the Gospels, “Take up your daily cross and follow me.” Often I find myself puzzled by that message, and trying to meld it together with the above passage from Matthew. What cross is my cross? And, what does it truly mean to take it up and follow him? Is the cross the yoke Jesus reverences in the above scripture? I found clarity on this as I read Henri J.M. Nouwen’s book, Following Jesus. Nouwen points out that Jesus says to “Take up your cross” – he doesn’t say, create a cross or to take up someone else’s. He suggests that our cross is our own pain, our own hurts, and that taking up our cross means that we have the courage to see that pain.

Perhaps as we answer Jesus’s call to pick up our pain, then we are able to yoke it to the healing presence of the cross. There we can accept the comfort and peace of a God that loves first and can sooth our hearts. 

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As I think back on my life, I remember all of the times that I said – “I’m tough. I can do this. I don’t need any help. I can suffer through it.” Do you ever tell yourself that? I’m figuring out that when I do this, I hide my burden and honestly try to hide from it. That makes it become heavier and heavier because it surrounds me at the same time that I deny that it exists. Perhaps being tough isn’t the point…God doesn’t want us to just suffer through it. He wants us to pick up our cross so that He can compassionately comfort us as we travel the journey together. When I acknowledge my pain and share it, then I am able to shift my focus. The pain is still there, but it moves to the background because I am surrounded by comforting love that breaks through the fear.

“Perfect love casts out all fear” – my good days are the ones that I lean into that 🙂 Our God is a God of unconditional love, not of fear. At the cross, he accepts our fear and our hurts, and exchanges them for love. That’s where we find rest in Jesus’ yoke, and it is where we come to accept the comfort that lightens our burdens. The pain doesn’t go away, the challenge remains, but we ask “how” instead of asking “why”. As we lift our eyes and ask “how”, we accept our cross and lean into our humble and gentle God who leads us in love.

This week I am leaning in. I am in the process of moving my older two girls into college – one in Indiana and the other in North Carolina. I’m traveling cross-country and leaving pieces of my heart behind with each of the girls. It’s hard. It hurts. But, I know that they are where God called them to be and I am accepting comfort from the abundant love that awaits me as I pick up those hurts and bring them to the cross.

 

A God of abundance…

Wednesday Wisdom 🙂

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Inspiration this week comes from the Gospel of John 1: 16-18:

“From his abundance we have all received one gracious blessing after another. For the law was given through Moses, but God’s unfailing love and faithfulness came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God. But the unique One, who is himself God, is near to the Father’s heart. He has revealed God to us.”

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Recently, I’ve been spending a lot of time praying and thinking about what it means to be loved by a God of abundance. Pondering this fuels me as our family navigates through the ever-changing world of 2020. Last spring I started asking God to help me to know Him better so that I could truly trust and believe that I am beloved by Him. Some deep part of my heart knew that I needed to better understand this and to cling to it as an anchor of faith. I asked, I prayed, and God moved. Over the past four months, God systematically supplied me with tools of discernment and moments of personal growth so that my heart could deepen in love. It’s allowed me to find peace regardless of circumstance.

I think it is interesting how God works – using a variety of people and bringing different facets of our lives together as a way to answer our prayers. He put a series of callings on my heart, and as I followed them I found the answers. From our girls Bible study on the book of Philippians, to our swim team family’s shared devotional lessons on the “fruits of the Spirit”, to the recommendation of two of Henri Nouwen’s books to read, to surrounding me with the love of family with all three of my girls home, to bringing Joseph back into our lives — God has clearly been moving in my heart and helping to answer my prayers to better understand His abundance.

People write books on how to follow Jesus in order to find peace. I suppose that maybe I could write one too 🙂 But today, what is on my heart finds its power in its simplicity. We may live in a world of scarcity, but our God is a God of abundance. His love never runs out, and it covers all of His children. We don’t have to worry that God does not have a place for us, Jesus took care of that. John 14: 1-2 recounts Jesus’ words, “Don’t let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, and trust also in me. There is more than enough room in my Father’s home. If this were not so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you?”

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Regardless of what the earthly world tells you, it is not a competition. There is enough for everyone. God’s love never gives up, it never runs out, and it has the capacity to fill our hearts if only we would allow it. When love comes alive, fear falls apart. When we follow out of love, then our focus is that love and it outshines everything else. We may have times when we feel pain, but it is not our focus. Instead, divine love brings a wave of peace and a gentle strength that moves past worldly troubles to bring the hope of tomorrow. That love is available now – today – this minute. It is eternal, but it begins on this earth the moment that we say “yes” and move into the comforting embrace of the Father. The more that we nestle into that embrace, the more Jesus fills our hearts with His sustaining love, and the Holy Spirit brings peace amidst the storm.

Megan comes out of quarantine tonight. We’ve had a time of joy, of togetherness, and of faith during this journey. It’s reminded our family to be grateful for what we have instead of worrying about what we don’t have. God blessed us by keeping her safe and free of sickness. He also blessed us with moments and memories that we will carry with us for the rest of our lives. Perhaps the list of what she “missed” is long, but there is a longer list of things that our family gained – medals that were placed on our hearts as we deepened in love and faith with each other and with our God of abundance.

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For those of you who enjoy reading, The Return of the Prodigal Son and Following Jesus by Henri J.M. Nouwen are wonderfully insightful books that have blessed me this summer. Ashley Grace has studied Henri Nouwen in her theology classes at Notre Dame, and our discipleship pastor encouraged me to read them as well.

A big “thank you” to all of you who are keeping our family in your prayers – you bless us with your loving hearts 😊

The 4th Runner…

Wednesday Wisdom 🙂

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Inspiration this week comes from 1John 4:12

“No one has ever seen God. But if we love each another, God lives in us and his love is brought to full expression in us.”

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The morning of August 6th dawned early as the Haymaker Cross Country team gathered for our first conditioning practice. As the sleepy high school students wandered in, it was not hard to notice that the number of boys outnumbered the girls. In Nebraska (for all classes of schools other than A – the largest schools), varsity teams run 6 athletes and score 4 with the optional 5th runner serving as the tie-breaker runner and both the 5th and 6th runners able to out-place those from other teams in order to raise team scores. The goal – if you are running as a team – is to get the lowest score possible with your top 4 runners.

To the outsider, Cross Country is pretty much an individual sport. To the runner, it is very clearly a team sport. In addition to scoring as a team, there’s nothing more lonely than standing at the starting line without any teammates, and possibly nothing harder than motivating yourself to race through the discomfort of the 4th and 5th kilometer without the knowledge that your teammates are with you.

The individuals make up the team — but the team brings the individuals together to accomplish something greater than they can do alone.

In those early weeks of conditioning, I prayed each day for God to bring our three girls a fourth runner. By conventional standards, three runners did not give them a team. Our girls could compete as “individuals”, but could not compete as a team. I knew how important it was to them to go to state together. It is possible for individuals to qualify to run at state, but it is also highly improbable for one school to get three athletes qualified that way as only the top 15 runners in each district earn the right to compete at state.

The days went by and the same three girls showed up for practice each day.  As I watched them love each other – support each other – and work so very hard together, I had an epiphany. There may have only been three of them, but they were a team. They loved, they leaned, and they shared through each moment. They did all of the things that good teams do. Honestly, they weren’t just teammates – they were sisters of the heart. It was not only remarkable, but also beautiful.

At that point, I stopped praying for a fourth runner. Instead, I started thanking God for bringing the three of them together and asked for Jesus to bring them courage. I prayed for Him to fill a different gap – not a physical one, but an emotional one. They didn’t need a fourth runner, they needed to believe that they were a team so that Jesus could carry them.

Almost two month later, the three girls huddled up near the starting line at the District Championships – preparing for the defining race of their season. I reminded them that God brought them together as a team. That He loved them and that I did too. They just needed to pack their Holy Sass and GET IT DONE!

They finished 2nd, 12th and 15th. Karyn – my youngest – was our third runner racing right on the heals of her sister Megan. 100 yards before the finish line, Karyn tripped and fell. I don’t know how many people saw her fall, but I can tell you that those of us that did had a moment of panic. But, Jesus filled the gap. She came up racing and managed to claim the 15th spot despite the fall.

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I’ve learned a lot of lessons this season. So did the girls. But, I think what struck me the most was how much God shown through them. 1John 4:12 reminds us that none of us have ever seen God, but when we love one another He is expressed through us.

We know Him when we love, and others also get to know Him as we love. 

Throughout the season, the girls often gathered in prayer and opened their hearts to abide in Jesus. You couldn’t ever see Him, but you could see Him in them. As they honored Him, He blessed them. As a coach – and a mom – I’m not sure that I’ve ever seen anything more beautiful. I prayed for a 4th runner, and Jesus delivered.

Friday, the girls will compete together at the Nebraska Class C State Cross Country Championships. I don’t know exactly what the race will bring, but I do know that Jesus will once again be with them. As they hold His hand, He will hold their hearts. Together, they’ll run.

As they do, they create the light that illuminates God’s expression of love in their hearts.

Scars…

Wednesday Wisdom 🙂

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Inspiration this week comes from the Book of Psalms 50: 14-15

“Make thankfulness your sacrifice to God, and keep the vows you made to the Most High. Then call on me when you are in trouble, and I will rescue you, and you will give me glory.”

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My body makes scar tissue like a true champion. I think it is likely due to my auto-immune challenges, but it could simply be that my personality dictates that I never seem to do anything halfway 😉 With my leg recovery, I’ve found that scar tissue is not particularly friendly. In the last six months, Doc’s had to manipulate my ankle twice to break up the accumulated scar tissue and the 3rd round of surgery also required him to remove the 10 screw plate hardware which my awesome scar tissue had attached to my peroneal tendon. Metal plates aren’t the best partners for tendons as that causes pain and rubbing damage with every walking step.

The good news is that my bone has healed nicely, and the tendon debridement procedure should hopefully allow the tendon to heal properly now that the hardware is no longer attached to it. I’m back to mastering my skills with crutches and very thankful that this round of “non-weight bearing” will occur without the winter and spring ice that plagued Nebraska this year. I am also thankful that I can now move forward in the journey of physical healing.

2019 has done an effective job of adding scars to my life. Some have been physical and some emotional, but they’ve all affective my perspective as well as my daily life. Right after I fell on the ice and shattered my leg, I told my favorite farmer that “God choses interesting ways to grow us.” Six months later, I can report that this certainly is the case 🙂

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My scars do not make me unique – Life is full of things that can scar us. Whether physical or emotional, I’ve come to realize that the magnitude of the scars’ negative power is directly related to the attitude that I chose to bring to the pain. I can let it define and damage me — trading healthy tissue for thick and hardened ones — or I can be thankful for the opportunity to experience life in a different way. I have learned that although sometimes the days are hard, that the journey can be filled with beautiful blessings when I choose to face it with a grateful and open heart.

There is a rainbow to every experience. God puts his blessing on your heart when you chose to be thankful. Sometimes that thankfulness involves a sacrifice – that’s not a bad thing, as it brings honor to your faith and deepens your relationship with the Lord. I’ve found that as I go deeper, His presence never fails me. I do not always get answers, but I do find comfort and peace even in the midst of pain.

The other day at our summer Bible study, my favorite blonde cowgirl made a statement that brought joy and peace to this mama’s heart. She shared:

“I need to lean on God during the easy times and be faithfully thankful then, because you never know when things are going to get hard. And when it does get hard, I need God and if I don’t learn to reach for him during the good times then I will be afraid to reach in times of trouble.”

Megan was not immune from the pain and scars that 2019 brought to our family. She didn’t break her leg, but there were many times when “Broseph” – what the girls called Joe (brother Joseph) – broke her heart. But, when the pain came, she bravely reached for God because she wears her faith like a shield — and Jesus filled her heart and carried her through. She allowed the scars to deepen her love and soften her heart instead of hardening it.

I’ve never been more proud of her than at the NE State Track Championships this year. Less than 4 days after Broseph packed his bags and left our family, she packed her faith and shared Jesus’ love with everyone that crossed her path. She opened her heart  – trading fear for faith.  It made her vulnerable but it also made her mighty. And, I know that she vaulted with harmony because she’d given it to Jesus and he held her with care.

Together, our family has learned to ask God to hold our hearts. That action requires trust, but it leaves us with a sense of peace and gratefulness and creates an entirely new dimension to our faith journey.

I Am They captures it well with one of my favorite Christian songs:

Intentionally reaching for those that “fall through the cracks”…

Wednesday Wisdom 🙂

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Inspiration for today’s post comes from the Parable of the Lost Sheep in Matthew 18.

If a man has 100 sheep, and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the 99 on the mountains and go in search of the 1 that went astray?

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Do you remember a time in your youth when you felt as though you fell through the cracks? Perhaps you got lost in a sea of faces in school — wondering if your classmates or teachers even knew you were there. Or, maybe you showed up for sports practice everyday longing for support and inspiration, but left feeling invisible. 

I think that honest reflection brings each one of us a memory of feeling lost.

A time when it seemed that we were invisible.

A moment when we craved acceptance but our hearts felt alone and hollow.

As a coach, I try to intentionally reach for the kids that feel as though they fall through the cracks. I have a goal of finishing every practice having offered at least one happy thought or word of inspiration to each of my swimmers. I have high expectations for my athletes, but there is a sea of love that sits right underneath the discipline that I ask for as we travel the journey together. I aspire to seek out each swimmer – in a positive way – every single day.

If they gain nothing else from practice that day, at least they will go home feeling like they matter.

This year, our team began a new tradition of sharing both a character lesson and a daily devotion before diving into the water for practice. I have 40 regular swim team practices during the summer months — 40 chances to help the 42 athletes realize that true strength comes when we simultaneously radiate kindness while also displaying personal toughness and tenacity through athletic competition. I love this new tradition as it starts our time together as a team centering our hearts on God and focusing our minds on ways to pack our faith to compete with grace.

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The Parable of the Lost Sheep reminds me that God is always seeking us. Understanding that He is longing for a loving relationship with us helps to battle the lonely feelings and empty hearts that may threaten our daily peace. The more time that I spend with teenagers, the more I believe that this message plays a critical role in the mental wellbeing of our kids.

We live in a broken world. The news reminds us daily of suicides and school shootings. Additionally, current culture entices our kids away from faith and family, and into the the disturbing world of cyberspace. My favorite farmer and I have spent countless hours talking about how we can help to change the reality of teenage life in 2018. Many of our discussions result in an impasse where we are left with more questions and very few answers. But a lack of easy answers is no reason to not engage.

Start with what you can impact.

This is what I tell myself daily. What child can I help today? Who feels lost?

I am reminded of a mantra that I learned many years ago as a member of the Daughter’s of the King.

I cannot do everything, but I can do something. What I can do, I ought to do. What I ought to do, by the grace of God I will do. Lord, what will you have me do?

This summer I am trying my best to live out these words. To listen to God and help to bring his love to the athletes that come to me for guidance. Together we can create a culture where everyone has a place and no one feels alone. As we huddle up each day at the start of practice we seal the cracks ensuring that no one will fall through…