Learning Along The Way

What Does the Mirror Show?

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I have inherited this beautiful mirror.  It is over 100 years old.  If you look closely you may notice the mirror itself has dark lines going across it horizontally; the silver on the back has worn off in places.

People have suggested I get a new mirror for the frame.  For some reason, I haven’t thought it necessary.

It reflects.

Isn’t that what a mirror is supposed to do?

As I look into it I imagine all the faces of family members that I have never met; wondering what they looked like,  what they were like.

What were the styles of their day?  What were the cares they wore?  Who was uppermost in their heart?

Lots of wondering. So I haven’t changed the glass.

As I consider why I haven’t changed the mirror I realize something else, something about this mirror that is similar to what I am experiencing in this season of Lent: the image is distorted.

I don’t see myself, my flaws, my bad habits, my petty annoyances or anything about me with any degree of accuracy while my mirror is distorting me.

But if I look long at the mirror of Scripture I see how much I need a makeover; to be made new by the work of the Holy Spirit.

This week of Lent is about doing without. Doing without the ways I hide from this work.  Doing without props that keep me hidden.

About fasting.  Less consumption/More compassion.

The mirror of Scripture has shown me my need for Christ.

As I look deeply, I don’t receive guilt or condemnation though. I receive compassion.  Forgiveness.  Grace.

What does the mirror you look at show you?

 

Return to Me

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I love this quote, this card.  It was given to me by a dear young friend who graciously said this “had my name on it”.

She sees me this way.  An honest person.

This season of Lent I am being confronted by my lack of honesty.

I face the easier things to confess and change and turn a blind eye to the deeper issues of my heart.

This early morning I saw a plea for me to get honest.  All the Way.

See if you can see it too:

“Yet even now, ” declares the Lord, “Return to Me with all your heart, and with fasting, weeping and mourning; and rend your heart and not your garments.”

I rend my garments when I make external changes that I see need to be made: changing my habits ‘to be healthier’, reading more, writing more, making time to be with people.

I do these things.

I.

Yet…

“even now, Return to Me with ALL YOUR HEART.”

With actions that demonstrate to Him my sincerity, my willingness to be humble and accept that I believe the lie that I am in charge of my life.

It’s not important what others think about me.  It’s important what God thinks about me.

“rend your heart and not your garments.”

Inward change is not my work.  My work is calling it like it is.

“Now return to the Lord your God, for He is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger, abounding in lovingkindness and relenting of evil.”

This is what I receive in return for admitting what is and agreeing with God about it all. Not a bad exchange, eh?

Return to Me.

He’s calling you too…

Living Without

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You may know people who are battling serious diseases whose source comes from the food they have been eating.

Celiac disease, Crohn’s disease, are two examples that come to mind.  Or you may know someone whose blood chemistry causes their doctor to say

“No more this, that or the other thing”.  Or you may know someone who lives with food allergies where ingesting a certain food is life threatening.

There has been quite an awareness raised about gluten and the connection to health problems such as: behavior in children, arthritis inflammation, digestive issues to name a few.

There is at least one magazine dedicated to recipes and information for those in the above categories.  It’s title? Living Without.

Ironically all this comes to mind along with a bigger idea of what it means to live without food.  The food that one needs to survive let alone thrive.

The media throws around statistics to get our attention but not often enough do we hear how many millions in our country are hungry.  When you think of starvation, be honest; images of developing countries with tin, cardboard and plywood walls come to mind..

This week of Lent is focused on the spiritual discipline of fasting.  I have been challenged to choose a meal daily, or one entire day, to fast.  Whatever my meal would cost could be put toward an agency who helps feed those without.  This sounds really awesome!

This challenges me. I can’t even write yet about the conviction I feel.

Do you fast?  What are your experiences?

Sunday Celebrations (Part 2)

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Sundays during Lent are times to remember.  Remember and Celebrate the gift of salvation achieved through Christ’s sacrifice and miracle of Resurrection.  So in my blogging today I am completing what was begun last week: the story of a new life direction.

In my post here we began following an imaginary creek; my story answering the really great question ‘Why “Learning Along the Way” is my business name’.  It’s time to share the rest of the story.

For the ten years from 1997 to 2007 I was a busy momma.  Privileged to be a stay at home Mom, raising two sons, homeschooling, volunteering, gardening, canning, attending sporting events, Cub Scouts, Boy Scouts, music lessons, AWANA and all the things one might imagine fills the life of a wife and mother.  Whew!  I’m tired reading this partial list!  It was a full ten years but not just full with time commitments.  It was a period of life full of learning, full of love as I watched two boys grow to men, and full of loss as I learned to let go.

In 2007 tragedy struck my life.  My mom became suddenly ill, was hospitalized and within two weeks passed away.  Nine months later, my dad committed suicide.  It was at this junction that the apple cart of my life was overturned.  I have written of this season before,  so I won’t take the time now but would love for you to have the full perspective if you’re interested.

After these big losses and forced letting go, I began working with a counselor for healing past hurts and a Life Coach for personal growth.  Two crucial, yet opposite, aspects of life being worked on simultaneously: looking back and looking forward.  It was an intense year and a half, but oh so fruitful.  Out of this time came the realization that a new chapter of my life was beginning.

I knew I didn’t want to simply “put my life back together”.  I wanted God to be the One to put my life together.  The apple cart filled with what He wanted in it.  I prayed.  I sought wise counsel.

I loved the process of being coached. It was action oriented and so uplifting!  I began coursework to become a life coach myself.  In one of the courses we were to come up with a name for our business as well as what we wanted to have as a niche, a corner of the coaching market if you will.  Those were big ideas!

I wanted my business to accurately reflect me.  I wanted my clients to get to know a little about their coach.  I recognized that my business was going to be best represented by what I am most passionate about: learning; learning how to live my life following Jesus and giving Him the credit, the glory.  Hence, Learning along the Way.  His Way.

We can live our life doing all we can to have safety and security.  We can be honest and moral people.  But are we living our life following?  Or living our life carefully to not make bad decisions or mistakes?  To manage damage control when carefully scripted lives unravel without reason?

The focus of ‘being in control’ is a very common focus for women.  There are lots of reasons for that desire; I won’t explore them now. But recognizing the desire and how it affects all of life is a step toward changing, learning along the Way.

I would love to talk with you about making those changes in your life; to coach you through transformation as you learn and grow in Christ.  It would be a holy privilege.

Won’t you take that next step in your journey?  Click over here to contact me.  The first session is complimentary!  What’s there to lose?

 

Of Water & Wheels: Reflections on Solitude

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Saturday is a day of looking back, reflecting on the week just ended.  It also is a day to look ahead to the coming week; to take stock of what was and what will be.

In the middle of both I find myself looking at what is.  I am like water.

In what way?  Left to my own devices, I seek my lowest level.  Like water.  It always will run downhill.

I mentioned this week that I am easily distracted.  Actually I distract myself.  Pondering and practicing the discipline of Solitude this week I have seen my habits in a new light, rather like a flood light into a dark room.  Revealing what was formerly tolerable in a dim light to be frayed and worn under bright light.  My habits of starting and not finishing, of having too many things vying for top priority, of saying Yes too many times and having little or “no time” to be alone.

Blegh.

I learned this week that although too much action can be the enemy of Solitude, when practiced at the discipline, one can experience Solitude while busy.  Richard Foster said it this way: “Solitude is more a state of mind and heart than it is a place.  There is a solitude of the heart that can be maintained at all times.”

Look at how two sisters made choices. When presented with a dinner guest, one got busy, the other sat with the guest.  One resented all the work, the other sat peacefully in the guest’s Presence.  Given that much information likely our Western minds would jump to the side of the busy sister who is taking care of the needs of the guest.  Ironically, that’s not where Jesus sided.  He chided the busy sister with these words: “Martha, Martha, you are worried and bothered by so many things; but Mary has chosen the better part and that will not be taken away from her.”  Mary’s priority was being with Jesus.  Martha’s priority was doing stuff.  Both are necessary.  But Mary has chosen the better part…

Being with Jesus prepares us to be with others.  Solitude in His Presence is refreshing to our souls; like what water is supposed to be to our bodies.

Yet we must take care of life and work.  We must be active.  In reading the Windows of the Soul by Ken Gire I encountered an idea that made perfect sense to me.

Be the still axis.

A wheel can spin wildly fast; going downhill like water, the revolutions are hard to count.  But at the center is the immovable axis which keeps the wheel able to do what it’s intended to do.

Anne Morrow Lindbergh suggests we strive “to be the still axis within the revolving wheel of relationships, obligations and activities.” 

Don’t do away with action; Be the still axis.

Looking at Solitude this week has been a blessing.  I have seen some of my habits for what they are: water going downhill.

I have also seen the possibility of learning to be still at the center even when there are many things to attend to.

I love this summary again by Anne Morrow Lindbergh: “The problem is not entirely in finding the room of one’s own, the time alone, difficult and necessary as that is.  The problem is more how to still the soul in the midst of its activities.”

What have you learned this first week of Lent?

 

Sitting with an Empty Chair

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Nearing the end of the first full week of Lent, I am blessed and challenged by this thought:

In the practice of Solitude is God’s invitation to “come sit with Me”.

Solitude does take practice.  It is noisy in the world.  I make it noisy by adding commitments and tasks that take up my time for solitude.  I excuse away the call to “Come away by yourself and rest” because I am busy doing things…for Jesus right?

He doesn’t need me to do anything.  He wants me to be with Him.  Simply be.

Alone with Him. In Solitude. *sigh* The Creator and Sustainer of Life wants me to be with Him.  That is all.  Just be.

I am blessed and challenged.

The challenge comes in the letting go of my routine, my to do list, my false source and sense of value.  The challenge is to accept that time alone with God, just hanging out with Him, is of primary value.

That Solitude is valuable.  That Solitude, time apart from the world, is valuable to God.

Solitude takes practice.  For me, years of practice. (I am a slow learner).  I first came in contact with the idea of spending time alone with God without an agenda, without my never ending prayer request list, 5 years after I began walking with Christ.  In 1986.  This idea of just meeting with Jesus came through the form of a tiny booklet, My Heart Christ’s Home, by Robert Boyd Munger.  It is an allegory using the illustration of your life and heart as Christ’s new home based on the Truth that Christ lives in us when we have accepted Him as Savior and Lord.

If you’ve never read it, I highly recommend it!

This empty chair is symbolic for me.  There is another one, to the right of it, where I sit.  Every morning when I am home, I get up, get my coffee and sit in my chair to have coffee with Jesus.  My google calendar says that “Coffee with Jesus” as a marked off hour at the beginning of each day.  I love my time sitting with an empty chair.  Just hanging out with Jesus is getting easier; not always asking “please fix this broken relationship” or “please change me in this attitude” but simply enjoying the silence and focusing on the reality of His Presence.

Solitude takes practice.  This season of Lent is the perfect time to practice slowing down, making space in your day, your mind, your heart, to be alone with Jesus.

Are you avoiding this?  What is keeping you from sitting?

Hush.  Listen well. The Chair is not Empty.

 

How Noisy is Your Life?

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Today was an opportunity to deepen community and connect with a group of women in a different setting; my home.  This group meets weekly at our church down in the “dungeon” of the church’s basement where the “Student Ministries” meet.  Rather bleak visually.  But the upside of that is there is not a lot to distract me from the women: two rectangle tables and the chairs we need for our group.  Not much on the walls to look at, not much clutter in the room itself.  So the point of our gathering is to discuss what we’ve studied in the past week.

Today’s gathering was a bit more open and social.  It was nice to hear from the women about interests and experiences.  At one point one of them asked a question for each of us: “What do you collect?”

Now this was a great question to learn about each other.  What do we find value in?  What is cute?

So here’s one of mine…

How does this relate to this week of Lent for me?

I have been pondering what keeps me from experiencing solitude.  This morning my little book asked me to consider this question: “What is the greatest source of “noise” in your life?”  I realized between the topic of what do I collect and what is the greatest source of noise (think distraction) the answer came in the prayer in Mornings with Tozer

“Dear Lord, Help me make the transition from wanting more and more “things” to being satisfied–and overjoyed–with only Your presence in my life.”

My stuff is the greatest source of “noise”.  Cleaning, organizing, maintaining, decluttering, yada, yada, yada.

The things of my life distract me from enjoying just being.  Just peacefully being with God.

My life is too noisy.  It’s time to do some purging!

 

“I Want to be Alone”

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I have reflected on solitude before many times. I have written down some of those reflections; you can read a reflective post from last May here.

This week began with the good intention of blogging about my journey through this season of Lent daily.  As I typed the words “good intention” I heard in my head the saying “The road to Hell is paved with good intentions” so I had to stop and research (google it) the origin of the quote.  We can thank Bernard of Clairvaux, the earliest known speaker of the saying that wags a proverbial finger in my direction.  Can you say: easily distracted?  Or “squirrel” in the Disney-speak from “Up”?

This picture is a perfect example.  I looked through my photos for an image that was peaceful.  Or at least reminded me of feeling peaceful. This was taken in Dec. of 2009 at Hume Lake. Seeing the picture reminded me of that Christmas with our sons still at home. Then I had to look at the rest of the photos in that folder.

Yes. I am easily distracted.  I allow my circumstances to distract me from my plan. When I do purpose to be alone my inner life is a battle between ideas and on what to focus my competing thoughts.  It is hard to get still in my body and then still in my head.

When I do finally settle down to quiet my mind and focus on God, another battle starts.  Competing ideas, items for a to do list, calendar obligations all bubble to the front of my thoughts.

Thankfully being still is a discipline, something that is learned.  Not something that comes naturally.

Whew! That’s a relief.  Because stillness is learned that means I am capable of learning how to be still; internally as well as externally.

The challenge is both out and in. But I’ve heard that anything worth having is worth working for (another saying to google–your turn!)

Tonight I am sitting still.

Tomorrow I will start by being still…and focusing on One image.  Like this photo…

Sunday Celebrations (part 1)

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During the season of Lent, Sundays are not counted as part of the 40 days.  Sundays are celebrations of the Resurrection, of new life.  Since I am committed to write (and post) daily during this season, I am going to share a story today and next Sunday that some of you may not know.

Someone asked why I had chosen Learning Along the Way as my business name; it’s certainly a mouthful!  The reason is not a short answer, unless I just say ‘it’s meaningful to me’ which isn’t much of an answer.  I decided the answer to why “Learning Along The Way” would best come as the name itself, in a story learned along the way.

Like a narrow creek through the woods joining into a river, this story has a beginning, takes some turns, meanders a bit, disappears for awhile and pops up again just before pouring into its purpose of joining the river.  I hope like a leaf on the surface you are carried along, enjoying the journey.

Sixteen years ago our family attended Mount Hermon’s Family Camp for the first time.  The keynote speaker was musician and author, John Fischer.  One of the days John shared his testimony and that included knowing Paul Stookey, of Peter, Paul and Mary fame.  This was exciting to me for two reasons:

I started playing the guitar in 1969 because of music like Peter, Paul and Mary;  and during my college years I had been asked on many occasions to play guitar and sing in the weddings of friends and the song requested again and again? The Wedding Song by Paul Stookey.   I asked John if he still had contact with Paul and he did.  I told him my excitement about his connection and he kindly gave me Paul’s email address. When we got home from the wonderful week of Family Camp I wrote an email to Paul Stookey, thanking him for his faith and writing such a great, worshipful song.

That was the extent of it. Me being me.  An encourager. No expectations.

What happened a week later surprised me and profoundly impacted my life.

He wrote me back.

Personally.  Specifically encouraging me.  And he signed his email

Yours in the Mystery,  Paul

What stood out to me in his closing was the concept of Mystery regarding knowing and following Christ.  As a mom at home with a toddler and a school age son, I had the daily gift of naptime for my quiet time each afternoon.  God used the afternoons in the fall of 1997 to open my ears to hear His voice personally through His Word in ways I had not experienced before.  I studied and grew in my faith and knowledge of God more that year than any other to that point.

During those afternoons as the shadows lengthened, the air crisp with changing season,  I asked the Lord if I might have a closing signature for my email; one that would point to Him without screaming I AM A CHRISTIAN and potentially closing off conversations with some who needed wooing and subtlety.  So I prayed and let it sit.  Not long after asking I was reading in Acts about ‘the Way’ and it occurred to me what my email signature could be.

Yours along the Way,  Lisa

So that was it.  My email signature with a meaning greater than ‘sincerely’.  And the first part of my story of the origin of my business name, Learning Along the Way. This story is like a journey from creek to river.  I will pick up next Sunday but ten years into the future from this point in the story.

Life is a journey.  Each one is somewhere along the way.  Join me here and we can journey together, learning along the Way.

Learning in Lent

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This is the cover of the book I am reading during this season of Lent.  I bought it because I love the title.  I love the concept.  I loved it so much I ordered multiple copies with specific “Formation Friends” in mind; women who I know to be on the path desiring a closer, deeper walk with Jesus.

It’s short.  It’s simple.  But it’s deep and piercing.

On Day 4 of Lent and the first Saturday in Lent a pattern is established: reflect on what I have learned and experienced in the previous week.  One of today’s questions: ‘How has your connection with yourself, with others, deepened because of your intentional work with this discipline?’

Hmmm. This isn’t an easy answer.  I sit quietly considering my response.  Then it bubbles up: this book deepened my connection with others.  I have heard from several of the women to whom I gave a copy, that this little book is the answer to their prayer asking God for what they should do this Lent.

Now that is humbling.  To have prayed for the names of who to give the book to, ‘who Lord would be blessed to receive this?’ And then to have them say, this is an answer to their prayers!  That’s humbling.

But also confirming.  Having them tell me the book was an answer to their prayer means that I actually listened to the Holy Spirit and obeyed. Now that’s encouraging.

This first few days of Lent the discipline of Confession, of less guilt and more grace, has been the focus.

My internal repeated lie of not doing enough is being replaced. With Truth.  Be still and know that I AM God.

Less is More.

By the way, Renovare just made this book available digitally here.  So if you want your own copy but you think it’s too late, it’s not!

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