Fawn Grove Church of the Nazarene

Fawn Grove Church of the Nazarene- Pylesville, Maryland

You know how it feels when you climb into your favorite pair of warm, soft pajamas after a long, cold day? You know how it feels when you read a perfectly entertaining book curled up under a worn, favorite blanket with your pet snuggled in close to you? You know the feeling when you sit with a long time best friend and laugh together over shared private jokes over a warm cup of your favorite coffee?  After 20 years of not having a church to call home, that is how I feel when I walk into the doors of Fawn Grove Church of the Nazarene. It is so good to finally find a spiritual place to call my own and feel perfectly comfortable, warm, and content.

Thank you, Pastor Johnathon and Michele. We absolutely adore you both.

xo

Digging Through the Rubble

Rubble. Trash. Junk. Debris. Refuse. Waste. Litter.

We have lots of it around here.  There are piles and piles of debris from the construction happening at my home.  We all have junk, don't we?  Layers and layers of rubble that not only fill our homes (or yards or offices), but also refuse in our minds and hearts.  All of those things we can't let go?  Trash. All of those negative thoughts...wreckage.  All of those hurts that haven't healed...a minefield of garbage.  The accumulation of those wounds and emotional sores pile up just like the stinking, decaying garbage at the dump.

In an effort to clean up prior to hosting my son's graduation party here, we worked as a family cleaning up and loading a dumpster with construction refuse to be hauled away prior to the celebration. Doing this monotonous work (pick up trash, throw it in the dumpster, pick up trash, throw it in the dumpster) started me thinking about this past year and how tough it has been...my diagnosis with Lyme, my father's death, having to quite a job I loved, and so many other hurtful events.  As I picked through the layers of rotting wood, broken boards, twisted metal, and bent nails I began feeling like I was peeling back the layers of trash from this past year in my heart.

And then, the funniest thing happened.  I lifted a board and found the cutest toad.  Yep, a warty, round, fat greenish-brown blob of animal energy hiding there beneath all of those scraps.  It was like finding a treasure.  I stopped and showed my twins what I found and they were delighted.  We carried him/her (how DO you tell the difference between a male and female toad?) to a safe place and let him/her go.  I left the kids there to observe the toad and I went back to digging, lifting, throwing, and digging some more.

And guess what?  I found a second toad.  After much screeching of joy and delight now that Toad 1 had a friend, it dawned on me.  This peeling back of the onion-like layers of trash was helping peel back all the hurts of this past year.  If we keep on keeping on and look for the positive, the treasures in the pile of trash, we will find them.

Cleaning the yard was very cathartic for me.  Healing even.  Purifying.  Lifting the trash in my heart and throwing it out along with the construction litter became a soulful, thoughtful process and by the time I was finished, I felt lighter.  Tired, but lighter.

xo

P.S.  That Gatorade bottle was from one of the workers, not my family.  I don't allow them to drink that chemical ridden mess of a liquid.

The Random Encounter That Wasn't

Maryland Song Sparrow

Yesterday started out horribly.  It was one of those days where you really wished you had a re-do button.  You know the kind of day...as soon as your feet hit the ground from bed in the morning Murphy's Law kicks in, the kids get riled up and make bad choices, nothing goes right.  Heck, it even seems like the pets got in on the act and were not themselves.  I was grumpy, the kids were grumpy, the whole world just seemed off kilter.  Running errands with the kids, who were home from school due to ice, was the last thing I felt like doing, but it had to be tackled...so off we went.

*pause in my story for a not-so-random-thought*

It is interesting and fascinating to me how God knows me so clearly and knows what I need and when I need it even when I don't know myself.  His timing is always perfect and as I am getting older and since my illness, I have settled in to giving my will over to His and trusting that He has a plan for me and my life, even if I can't see it.  This giving control over to my Creator has not been an easy process for me as I am/was a control freak in every aspect of my life.  But that is a post for another day.

Back to yesterday...as I was grocery shopping with the kids yesterday, still seething with anger at them for grossly misbehaving earlier that morning,  a pop song came on over the store's sound system.  To keep my 7 year old twins occupied during our long shopping trip, my 15 year old daughter began to sing quietly and dance not-so-quietly to the beat.  I love how my teen daughter is so sure of herself and uninhibited even at this very awkward time of life.  Anyway, the twins saw her and joined in joyfully dancing along the aisles and smiling their fool heads off.  Their mood changed immediately and the air seemed to lighten all around me.  Soon I joined in and danced along pushing the cart and I am sure all 4 of us looked like fools acting like we had some semblance of rhythm.

As we came around the corner of the aisle, a woman walked by and caught us dancing.  She smiled a huge welcoming smile and said, "Well, aren't you all just having fun?"  It caught me off guard because not 30 seconds before, we were all grumpy and miserable.  It was true, though, in that moment yes, we were all having fun!

Later, we were at the self check out, I was scanning the groceries, my oldest daughter was bagging, and the twins were being quiet and good watching the packages cruise down the conveyer belt.  I was engrossed in my job of scanning when I heard from the next aisle over a woman's voice.   It was not the woman who had commented on our dancing earlier, it was someone different.

"Excuse me, Ma'am?"
"Yes?" I replied.
"I just wanted to tell you that you have an absolutely beautiful family."

Wow.
Just wow.
Her words hit me hard.
I realized that my anger from the morning had ruined my whole day up until that point and in that very second, her words brought me back to what is really important...my family and how beautiful they are.  Yes, the kids misbehave.  Yes, they make bad choices.  Yes, I get angry.  But through it all they are beautiful and I am so blessed to have 4 amazing children.

"Well, thank you!" I replied.  I smiled.  "I really needed to hear that today."
"I know." she stated.  Then she smiled, grabbed her groceries and left the store.

Huh, I thought.  That was a random encounter.  How did she know I needed to hear that today?

Perhaps it wasn't a random encounter after all.  Perhaps both the woman who said we looked happy and this woman were not coincidences.  Perhaps God knew I needed to refocus my brain and get rid of my anger and had sent them to me for just that purpose...to dissipate my anger and refocus on the beauty that was right there before me.

Thank you, God, for knowing me so well and knowing what I need before I do.  You truly are amazing.