Sir Oliver Wendell Holmes said, “Nothing is so common-place as to wish to be remarkable.”

Remarkable: worthy of attention, striking, astonishing, astounding, marvelous, wonderful, sensational, stunning, incredible.

I believe Sir Homes was so very WRONG…it is not common-place to wish to be remarkable. We are created remarkably! We all long to remain so. No child starts out thinking she is common-place or ordinary. When the lighting shines through her window she runs to the window and shouts, “look Mommy, God is taking my picture!” 

Children know they are miraculous beings from the beginning, until “we” tell them other wise. Every single human being begins as a single cell the size of a period at the end of a sentence…that cell builds a body of 100 trillion cells! One human body, one!

“You (God) alone created my inner being. You knitted me together inside my mother. I will give thanks to you because I have been so amazingly and miraculously made. Your works are a miracle and my soul is fully aware of this great and Holy thing you have done!”

Remarkable is not the same as Selfish or Prideful…Image bearer of God… Remarkable!

I have a dear friend who shared with me that a “study” has been done that states “…people our age post on Facebook  because they need to be validated.”

I disagree on some level but also appreciate the statement. I think the younger generation could perhaps be “trapped” into this form of validation much more than mine. Yet I had to ask myself why I write heartfelt post on Facebook. I suppose there is a need for validation although I do not get “my mattering” from such validation.

For me, honestly, writing my story on Facebook isn’t about validation as much as it is me “penning my memoirs as I go.” I enjoy writing. I believe that while we are in the daily battle (yes, I said battle because when you are “hurting hard” you are a warrior) of life and in the midst of hard times when we need encouragement or just to share a happy moment is not a cry for validation. I want to share things WHEN I am going through them and the dust hasn’t settled yet and uncertainty is flying at me like a bullet or perhaps I have had a great victory or a glimpse of Heavenly Joy…that is why I “do” Facebook.
The great Corrie ten Boom who survived a Nazi concentration camp for hiding Jewish people in her home says, “If God sends us on strong paths, we are provided strong shoes.” Some of us have needed seriously strong shoes in life. Some not as much perhaps but no one is untouched by “strong paths.”
You might say, I have NEVER suffered the ways Corrie ten Boom did. That is so true and a truth for which I thank God every day. However, I have known suffering and suffering in all forms cannot, should not be minimized. My battle with Rheumatoid Arthritis does not define me but it has been a “strong path” that has required God’s gift of “strong shoes.” A path that I have not traveled alone because of a husband filled with unselfish love. As well my two beautiful and sweet-hearted daughters, parents, brothers, friends, counselors, and even doctors who have lifted me up all along the way but let me be clear that my pain is mine alone. I need “strong shoes” daily.
So where is this post going? It is going to this…I want to be real about my frailty, my struggles, my doubts, my beliefs, my strengths so that if it connects me to another human being that may be in the midst of their own “bullet flying, dust choking battle” or in a season of “pure joy” they might feel like they can make it one more day in that hard place or that I celebrate their joy with them.
Of course, it is RIDICULOUS to say that Facebook post can provide much depth. This type of life support must be, has to be done relational and skin to skin in the long-term but what if just one word on one post helps someone reach out for help or not feel alone or they call me or message me? That is not for my validation…that is the joy of living friends!
So cheers to a Facebook post…May it validate you and me. May it play a very small part in helping all of us to carry on when we are sent on our “strong paths” …may those around us help us put on our “strong shoes” even when we cannot…

A Message from the Valley of Decision…

I saw her standing in the Valley of Decision and I reached for her hand gently.
I said, “I don’t know where you are coming from but I do know what you are running from.”
She said she had forgotten her loveliness and her might. She has forgotten the taste of new wine and sweet olive oil. Her trees would bear no more fruit. All of her gifts and talents had drained away. The “invented” normal had left her heart and soul gravely bruised…
I have seen it many times in sixty years. The exigencies the “inventor of lies” has put upon us. The accuser, the impostor of beauty and wisdom says, “We girls have to be skinny, smart, beautiful, witty, sexy, as well as Mother, wife, daughter, sister, friend, healer, cook, house keeper, and oh yes, we can never age, wrinkle, or grow soft muscles or gray hair…
Oh what a relief is found when we know these falsehoods cannot raze our joy! The Spring rain will wash you clean of shame and doubt and you will regain all you have lost! Young woman, daughter, widow, single Mother, or any Mother, any woman…Come to the Valley of Decision and lay down all the plates you are spinning. Hold with palms open upward any control you deem you have and you will realize that you are so far beyond what you believed. Choose Wisdom instead of control. Choose Wisdom which says, “You are the Pearl of Great Price!”
Stay in this Valley and decide to seek Wisdom… be healed, be whole, and dance before the Lord God without fear and then reach out your hand for the next woman you see and give her the Wisdom you have gained…it is a decision, it is truth or it is lies and you must choose…thousands upon thousands of women are waiting for your hand…

A bruised reed he will not break, and a fading candle he won’t snuff out. He’ll bring forth justice for the truth. Isaiah 42:3
Also, inspiration from Joel 3:14

I have four grandchildren. I secretly call them my little Bluebirds.  The newest one still remains in his Mother’s womb but he will be here in less than three weeks. The next youngest little bluebird arrived right before Christmas and she is growing strong and smiling. The third youngest is my three and a half- year old granddaughter and the oldest Bluebird is my six and a half year old a grandson.

I have learned from them, even the yet born grandson, that Wisdom is for the young!  Even my unborn grandson is woven into the wisdom of when HE is to enter the world. His parents don’t even know the time or day! That is wisdom. He will enter our world when he and God are ready!

I think if  “spirituality” has a sound it must be the voice of a child!  The stories that I have come to believe are the ones that occur in early evening  when the wind is still and I will come flying through their door and am allowed  to tuck them in bed and we will share a magic kiss and soar into the clear night sky like Bluebirds (Paul McCartney and Wings band song)…and we fly across the sea to a magic island or we go to an enchanted forest or visit Topper the Rabbit  who walks on two legs and has a fancy top hat and give us sweets and tea! Or we speak to The Holy God without theology but in total purity and trust! I can feel the Spirit of God enter the room on little tiny wings like a Bluebird…

I have come to see that what age teaches is not Wisdom but knowledge and knowledge cares nothing for me! With age I see if  allowed Wisdom is called something uninviting. A place where complacency, cynicism, and weariness can come to live.

I  rather choose to fly with my Bluebirds  in that place where just “being six”  is exciting and you just walk down the street singing at the top of your lungs just because you are six!!!  Or  soaring up into the heavens on the wings of a “nice” dragon is possible! And as all three-year old girls know it is so much more fun to turn all the lights out and use a flashlight even if it is the middle of the day! Oh and lets not forget the Wisdom of the newborn and infant…there isn’t one second where they do not trust the ones who hold them, feed them, and keep them safe and warm. 

Youth is the time in your life when you get to stand apart from the status quo and view almost everything in exaggeration! All is a wonder and I call that Wisdom. Oh yes I know there is a lot to be said for maturity but honestly it is NOT what Jesus called the Kingdom of Heaven! He said, “You must come like a child into God’s Kingdom.”

So, I tip my heart to all the Bluebirds in my life and to my first two Bluebirds, my daughters,  who taught me  when that time comes and The Holy Spirit slips through my door in the still night air  with that Holy Kiss I will fly like a Bluebird straight into the midnight air and head across the Sea…