And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God… Romans 8:28

To preface this, let me just say I grew up far from the church. So this is not the story of one protected by the guardrails God intended. I made several– dozens, actually– mistakes before I found the one man I was always meant for, my husband Ronnie Cecil.  But what I hope you get from what I share is this: if you, like me, have a less than pure past in the realm of love, God can still redeem your story. I adore Romans 8:28 because it has been so true in my own life: The Lord can truly work all the things for good…all things, including a divorce; including getting pregnant outside of marriage…

It was Christmas day, 2007. I sent him a poem. We were not close enough friends for me to share all that was on my heart, but in the poem I hoped he would here me saying: “I get you; I get where you’ve been.”

His Christmas letter, sent out in an email, confessed the pain of his divorce and the chaotic experience of wandering through life unsure of who you are. It also shared a hint of Spring returning- a deep gratitude for days spent less miserable than before.  I had never been divorced because I had never been married. But, I knew the dark pit he was talking about, because I had landed there too, my womb full of unexpected life by a man who had no intention of loving me or fathering the life within me. I also knew the glory, the relief, and the great gratitude of days not confined to pain and misery anymore.  Single motherhood is awkward, the way divorce is akward: no one knows how to talk to you about it, especially religious people. But in living life as a pariah, after you go through a season of incredible darkness and self-destruction, you gain a certain character strength, humility, and intimate awareness of your own deep brokenness, and the reality that despite all the muck and mire of your life, some beauty within still remains.

In our shared social imperfections we soon found comfort and freedom in a rekindled friendship. We also saw glimpses of God’s mercy.

The poem I sent was from T.S Eliot’s East Cocker, with the infamous last line that says, “In the end is my beginning.”  I didn’t know that T.S. Eliot was a Christian or that later I would become one too, or that what he was pointing to in his poem was the miracle of God’s redemptive work; that when we come to the end of ourselves, God can and does act to work all things for good.

I also was wonderfully unaware that indeed a new beginning was unfolding in both our lives: the beginning of us.

Flash back to 2004: We met on a blue-sky morning near a building made of adobe in Santa Fe, New Mexico. I was starting my year as a Grad student in the Eastern Classics Master’s program. My hair was strawberry blonde, and in a few shorts weeks I would experiment with dying it barbie doll white. I was 24, six years away from knowing God, ready to learn Sankskrit and drink a lot of beer with interesting, worldly, and good-looking people.

Ronnie was the husband of a girl he had met at church camp when he was 19 years old. He wasn’t a student at St. Johns, but his wife was, and all of us became part of the same dear circle of friends.

A year later, as soon as I had graduated, I moved to California. Ronnie and I gradually lost touch.  My life started to unravel when I found out I was pregnant and the father of the child was heavily into drugs. I didn’t know his life had begun to unravel too. The very first love of his life, his wife of 6 years, didn’t want to be married anymore.

Flash to 2007: When Ronnie and I reconnected, thanks to a rouge invite email from Linked-In, life had dramatically reshaped us both. He, who along with his wife used to drag me to church and read me the bible, had now lost his religion and his trust in God’s goodness and was desperately seeking to regain some faith while climbing the corporate ladder in Birmingham, England. The bottle blonde he once knew, the one who bubbled and bounced and lived for the party, had grown out her roots and was now managing life as a single mother in Portland, Oregon.

As imperfect people painfully aware of the folly of being human and hungry for God, we bonded. Immediately we knew each other as kindred spirits, both having been thrown crazy curve balls by life.

Despite the 4,287 miles of continent and ocean between us, our connection and friendship grew. We began to notice something dear in one another we had not noticed before, and then one day—on opposite sides of the globe—we both woke-up, utterly in love.

In the time between that poem I sent him in December of 2007, to his response of a simple ‘thank you’ 4 months later, in April of 2008, God was patiently preparing in each of our heart’s room for the other. Both of us had experienced the end of “life as we knew it”. In that great desert, in that Land Between, we walked side by side, unaware of how our paths were colliding. As if overnight, our lonely deserts merged and came to their end in each other, at the fertile soil of a shared, new beginning.

That Spring, the whirlwind began. Falling in love long distance was very literally a poetic experience: nearly every hour we spent awake and without one another, a love note was written. From May 2008 until September we exchanged more than 1,500 e-mails, hitting “send” 500 times a month, 125 times per week, 17.5 times per day. When we were married less than a year later at a bar in Kentucky, it seemed long overdue.

Even though married life started out quite unideal (we were poor, without family or community, thrust into a new house in a new state, suddenly parents trying our best to raise a 2 year old together, just beginning to learn each other’s intimacies and love languages, inching closer, but still far, from God) we were doing okay.

At the beginning of our marriage, we were consumed by the goodness of an abstract God through our burning love for one another. Both of us recognized personally we had been given amazing grace, but neither of us knew or lived to follow Jesus. For sure in the the way our hearts broke with gratitude for the redemptive love we now shared, we felt the power of redemption. But standing near the Lord of Redemption– even being immensely blessed by Him–is not the same as surrendering your life to Him. And a marriage without Jesus, even when two people are ridiculously in love and devoted to one another as we were, is not a marriage that stays strong for long.

As quickly as our love ignited, our marriage began to crumble. I say a deep thank you now for just how horrible our 1 year anniversary was. The conditions in our life in those days made our need for Jesus as newlyweds undeniably plain. Mercy it was that we could not lean entirely on our fairytale love to make it. Mercy it was that my husband’s start-up business failed magnificently and we could not afford the distraction of material comforts. Mercy it was we had no family to run home too and take shelter in. And mercy perhaps even it was that the depression I had struggled with on and off for years, began to return.  The hopelessness of our poverty, our loneliness, and my husband’s joblessness, compiled with my own darkness within, brought to light the biggest obstacle we faced in our relationship.

Neither of us knew the absolute, the protective, the all-things-are-possible love of God. We worshipped each other until we learned that human love in and of itself was never meant to be worshipped.

Fear crept in that life was too much; that our love, our marriage, would eventually break under the relentless weight of being human. Deep down I feared that I was too much. The baggage of all my past brokenness– the sexual abuse that held my body in shame, the seasons of drug addiction and eating disorders that still terrorized my mind, my unshakable bent toward self-destruction– the residue of all of it began to show up at the door of our marriage and the lies the Enemy fed me on who I was and what I was worth, I believed. Instead of trusting in my husband and the vow he gave me to love me for better or for worse, I shut him out and pulled away.

The hardest part about marriage for me was not learning how to pour love out, but learning how to receive love being poured in; to let myself be loved not just for a theoretical brokenness, but for an actual brokenness. The learning how to let my husband sit with me when I am consumed by an inner ugliness, the darkest hallow: this was my needed education. We have been married now 2 and half years…and here I am still learning how not to resist him when he dares to pick the mess of me up and hold me in his arms.

To let go and let yourself be loved in the midst of stomaching a present and vulnerable brokenness, is extremely difficult. But God on the cross calls us to this. When we stand painfully undeserving in the presence of so much grace, our most natural reaction is to run. He begs us, though, to stay. As a woman deeply afraid of the scandalous love of God and the reflection of that love in her husband, I also wanted to run. But He and he has taught me to remain.

The hardest part of marriage, at first, was allowing myself to experience God’s love through my spouse. This, though, is now what I find to be the absolute best part of marriage. It is bewildering and magnifiscent to be someone’s wife and to experience daily the truth that we can never be perfect, but we can, in fact, be loved. This is the profound gift of matrimony and christianity: to arrive at the holy place of surrendering all to be rescued by someone who sees my flaws and wants me anyways….this is what I am learning it means to be both a child of God, and a wife.

My life today, two and half years into marriage is incredibly blessed. In February of 2010, my husband and I both gave our life to Christ.  Two Septembers ago my husband officially adopted my son Lucca, so he is now truly ours. This past September we learned we are pregnant with a baby girl, due January, 2012.  In one another my husband and I found amazing grace from God, and the story of His redemption in our lives continues to unfold…

My one piece of advice for you who are falling in love and dream of marriage is this… Seek, know, and let the gift of God’s love be real to you now. Stop trying to fix yourself into the perfect person and stop trying to hide your flaws. Accept that broken and lovable are two traits that are intimately yours as a human being. Jesus does not see them as mutually exclusive and neither should you.  Love your man in the fullness of his imperfection and let him love you in yours. All of it is made perfect at the foot of the cross.  Remember: No matter what your past history, all things can be made good, for those that love the Lord.

Morgan

Morgan Day Cecil and her growing family live in Portland, Oregon. She is a monthly contributor to Transformed Magazine, an online Christian’s women’s magazine. Right now some of her favorite things are ice-cream dates with her son and eating breakfast burritos with her husband. She is currently writing her first book, a guide for single moms on how to create a beautiful life. You can connect with her via Twitter and Facebook or (her new favorite) Pinterest.

souce

For some of us, the joy of the holidays is tempered by sorrow.

Someone somewhere has wounded us deeply, let us down, rejected and abused us. We’re staggering still under the shock of loss.

A relationship lost, a friend turned away, all the memories of a lifetime tainted by the shadows of bitterness.

And so we redouble our efforts. Cards and gifts and messages meant to soothe the brokenness. We try to understand, imagine what it must be like, living through all that awfulness. We justify the ugly words and hang on to any sign of hope.

But still, the silence stretches.

And after a while our hearts grow cold. My heart grows cold. Resentment sets in, a sort of callused indifference, It’s her problem, what do I care?

And then the holidays come, with pictures of families laughing, of gifts and memories, of celebrated histories and shared loves.

And it hurts all over again.

David— psalmist, father, shepherd, king— knew all about that deepest grief.

At times his anger spilled recklessly from his pen, “They repay me with evil for the good I do. I am sick with despair.” (Psalm 35:12)

At other times he graciously consented to yield his pain to the One who has the wherewithal to make things right. “Don’t be impatient for the LORD to act, travel steadily along His path. He will honor you…” (Psalm 37:34)

The one thing he didn’t do was pretend it didn’t hurt.

When someone hurts us deeply, we have a couple of choices: retaliate or retreat.

The retaliators get most of the bad press. They’re the insistent ones who go on the attack. Needing an explanation, they throw out a volley of accusations intended to knock some sense into the situation.

Others are more the retreating types. Loathe to expose themselves to more pain, they withdraw into the safety of silence. Indifference masks their mourning— coldness that could chill a glacier.

But for those of us who are honestly trying to be followers of Jesus, neither option is the way of the Kingdom. If we want Him fully involved in our lives, we’re going to have to make a different choice.

A difficult choice.

Because Jesus knows all about rejection and abandonment.

He knows about spitters and abusers and mean men and accusers. He knows what its like to be mocked and humiliated, underappreciated and cast aside.

And He chose a different way:

“This suffering is all part of what God has called you to.

Christ, who suffered for you, is your example.

Follow in His steps.

He never sinned, and he never deceived anyone.

He did not retaliate when he was insulted.

When He suffered, he did not threaten to get even.

He left His case in the hands of God, who always judges fairly.”

And He offers some advice to aching hearts who suffer in much the same way:

“ It is God’s will that your good lives should silence

those who make foolish accusations against you…

Show respect to everyone…

Love your Christian brothers and sisters…

Fear God…

Don’t repay evil for evil.

Don’t retaliate when people say unkind things about you…

Instead, pay them back with a blessing.”

I Peter 2,3

Pretty clear, isn’t it?

We PRAY…

Entrusting our pride and our problems and our aching hearts to God. He is neither powerless nor passive. Just as Jesus called out to His Father on the Cross, we cry out to Him in our loss. We give over our indignities to Him who judges righteously, laying all our shredded souls before the One whose love makes us whole.

We WAIT…

Because waiting is the way to trust. And trust is the way to faith. And faith pleases God.

By choosing to wait on God, we forfeit our right to retaliate, our right to act the way we feel, our right to savagely attack our attackers.

We BLESS…

It is the secret strategy of a beautiful woman, the potent weapon of a strong man, to bring a blessing where curses echo.

To smile a soft kiss of whispered love.

To give.

To help.

To reach forward.

To do it again.

And so for all of us who bear the burden of loved ones lost, let us together choose the way of the Cross.

Let us pray… entrusting our lost ones to Him.

Let us wait… for His Spirit to work and weave peace where sin has caused chaos.

And let us bless… whether we feel like it or not, leaving a waft of His beauty to soothe ravaged souls.

“That is what God wants you to do, and He will bless you for it.”

I Peter 3:9

From a heart who knows,

Diane

P.S. All this year I have watched a young woman choose this way of beauty in the aftermath of a tragedy thrust upon her by others. With wisdom she has navigated through turbulence that would have sunk most of us. She is wise. She is strong. She is beautiful.

I love you!

Today I’d like to introduce you to my friend, Joy Eggerichs. I met her many months ago in a little coffee shop on the eastside. Over oatmeal and scrambled eggs and way too many cups of coffee, Joy and her mother (Sarah) and me and my daughter (Elizabeth) enjoyed one of those rare moments of recognized alikeness. Something just clicked in that cozy corner of Portland and a friendship was born. Maybe it was Joy’s uninhibited laughter, along with her mom’s ladylike gestures and startling normalness. We talked about all the things women always talk about: boys and men and why we’re so proud of them and how they worry and perplex us.

And so today, I’ve asked Joy to tell her story. Its not finished yet— no “and they lived happily after” tagged on at the end. Instead you’ll hear a story just starting. A story of a woman who has decided to do her life well. And I think you’ll agree with me that Joy’s story is unfolding just the way the Father wants it… all mixed up with Joy’s quirky sense of humor (unicorns?) and solid rock faith in the rightness of God.

And since I know you’re going to love this, click on over to her fabulous blog to learn and laugh and see why I like her so much.

From my heart,

Diane

My Love Story: Waiting with a Purpose

Spoiler alert: this love story doesn’t end like the movies! Roger Ebert has vowed never to watch it again.

On that note…

I almost got married. I had said yes. My love story was written—or so it seemed.

When the final chapter of “us” came far more quickly than I had imagined, I went to a place of waiting and have remained ever since.

One might immediately think that I have been waiting for a husband this whole time. Sadly, that is not the case. After “we” ended, I couldn’t fathom becoming an “us” with anyone else. The idea repulsed me. And I knew it could never be the “we” of before.

My waiting is on the transformation of my heart.

Sometimes that kind of transformation feels like your heart is a ball of dough and God is a very large Italian man kneading your heart on a woodblock and throwing it up in the air. All the while, you fear that when the heart is perfectly prepared, baked, and ready, some man is going to come along and bite off that valve that allows you to breathe.

Transformation of the heart was scary because I had given my heart away and made a deep emotional commitment. I knew I had some work to do. I realized what “felt” like love was actually an unhealthy type of love. I couldn’t put into words the different styles of love I had experienced until I read C.S. Lewis’s Till We Have Faces. Before reading that, all I knew of the love from before was that it wasn’t right.

And I knew I wanted a different kind of love moving forward.

But even though I can look back and see the transformation God has done, feelings are strong and fear can creep in and say, “Joy, you will never know real, healthy love because of all the attachments you made to unhealthy love.”

This is when I have to stop and cling to truth. And remember I believe in a God who transforms and redeems.

But I want to know answers today! I don’t want to wait anymore! (Insert the stamping and pouting skills of Veruca Salt from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.) At the core of my temper tantrums, the true question of my heart is this:

Lord, will I be loved and able to love well?

Yes. Have patience. There is a purpose.

When I choose to listen and have patience, trusting in a bigger purpose, I find my view of waiting changes. It seems to me that an awareness of purpose constitutes some level of belief. And, as my belief grows, I realize waiting has more to do with my heart toward God than my heart toward a man.

Joy, do you really believe in my purpose for you?

Uhhh, I’m trying!

If I do, then my earthly love story is secondary to the perfect love from my heavenly father. And if I am in relationship with Him, the Lord, then I can have patience knowing that if an earthly love story happens (and I am believing it will), my healthy relationship with God will be the thing that transforms my ability to receive and give healthy love to a man.

Pain of a broken engagement caused me to question my relationship with this “Good God”—His timing, His love, and His purpose for me.

But Scripture talks about suffering. It gives me a heads-up that this will happen because of the brokenness that is in our world. So my desire is that my suffering or questions will not become an idol or obsession that keeps me from waiting well.

Because I know this type of waiting that I have described will be part of married life, too.

While the seasons of my life will change, the character of God will not. And, as I said before, I believe in a God who wants to transform and redeem. A God who will transform and redeem, when I ask. In sorrow, in joy, in wonder, and in wait, He is at work on our stories of love.

Waiting with a purpose,

Joy

“Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” –Romans 5

“The Lord redeems the life of his servants; none of those who take refuge in him will be condemned.” –Psalm 34

“Take heart, daughter; your faith has made you well.” –Jesus

“Do you believe that I am able to do this?” –Jesus

P.S. I wanted to throw something out to all the readers who might want to participate in my earthly love story. Just in case you know any men who may fit the bill, this is my very serious deal-breaker list. If he doesn’t fit these requirements then you can forget setting us up.

To hear more of my story click here.

PRINT AND KEEP WITH YOU AT ALL TIMES.

- Believer in unicorns

- Beard

- Slightly dirty looking (you know, the “I shower once a week” look)

- Taller than I am

- Passionate about something (God is a given)

- The ability to give me piggyback rides

- Willing to promise daily foot rubs in our wedding vows

- Orphan (so we can spend every Christmas in the Michigan snow with my parents)

Those are just a few things to get you started on your hunt for my new “us” or “we.”

Thanks!

RUTH SCHROEDEL COMER

May 10, 1925 – November 14, 2011

(Mom C, Phil and Matt)

Yesterday Phil’s mom died and for a long while we will grieve.

Her passing was not unexpected, in fact, we’d prayed for the Father to mercifully take her before the pain got too great.  Yet still, the searing agony of losing someone who loved each of us so well is staggering.

We are sad and we should be sad. No amount of convincing platitudes erases the fact that she’s gone from our lives. Even the Library of Congress sized mental files of love-filled memories won’t lessen this very real loss.

We wanted her to live forever… and we know she does… but we want her here.

And so today we travel back to relish the woman we’ve lost: Mom, Grammy, Ruth, Mom C. My family pauses to remember, I pause to remember…

I first met the woman I came to call Mom C when I was the painfully shy girlfriend of her middle son. The day Phil took me home to meet his mom, I wore an off-white ensemble that made me feel as confident as I possibly could while meeting this one whose son revered her. We picked up Chinese food on the way, which promptly leaked brown greasy sauce all over my pants. I was mortified!

Ruth never even noticed.

Instead, she saw me for who I was: the woman her son loved. And on that basis alone, she took me into her heart and let me be myself.

For our wedding, Ruth did the flowers, gifting me with a fairy-tale like setting in which to pledge my heart to her son. When I walked into that warehouse turned wedding chapel, the beauty of her craftsmanship took my breath away! A “few roses” had become a bower of unbelievable artistry… just the first of many loving gifts to start our story together.

Over the years Ruth became my friend. I could say anything to her without fear of censure or disapproval. I trusted her to believe the best about me, even when she knew the worst. Her advice always made so much sense, even when she mixed it up with old wives tales and mid-west traditions.

I remember ignoring her advice when it came to my firstborn son and schedules. The “new research” favored demand feeding and let-the-baby-decide sleep arrangements. My mother teamed up with my mother-in-law to let me know they thought all I’d get for all that “new research” would be an appallingly demanding baby. They were right! It took months to undo the damage done with all that permissive nonsense… yet neither mother once gave me that I-told-you-so pursing of the lips. My mom and Mom C just loved me and laughed when I complained.

The boys (Jack, Phil, and Mark, along with husband, Bill) were her world. She loved them by feeding them delicious meat-laden meals and by baking cakes and pies and the best coffee cake I’ve ever tasted. She’d iron shirts on demand, made their beds way too late in their lives (!), and let their rock band practice in the family room. There she’d be, beaming at their music, opening the windows so her neighbors could hear, whipping up a batch of fudge to “give them energy”.

(Phil on the drums with his band)

How does a young bride compete with that?

Early on, I just jumped in and joined the worshipers-of-mom… and copied every recipe I could. She made it so easy to love her because she loved me regardless of the glaring evidence that I’d never possibly reach her level of revered womanhood. She’d just laugh her little chuckle as if to say, “Oh well, it doesn’t really matter much, does it?”

Mom C never had any daughters of her own; neither did she have a sister. So when the granddaughters came along, her innermost girliness came alive! She bought them frilly dresses and shiny shoes, and a pink satin penoir set that made little Elizabeth feel like a princess. She delighted in Rebekah’s thick thatch of curly dark hair, buying ribbons and trying everything to keep her not-so-girly granddaughter from pulling them out. My girls followed her around the house in their aprons, begging to “help” cook, making a mess and loving every minute of it.

Once when we came for a visit to their retirement home, she called me a week after we’d left to let me know that she’d finally washed Matt’s fingerprints off the mirrored door… she’d just loved seeing those little hands in her home.

(Mom C and John Mark)

Do you see why I loved her?

I know you’d find it hard to believe that a woman like this came from a terribly dysfunctional home. An alcoholic father who’d disappear for months at a time, a mother who got too sick to take care of her, spinster aunts who took over for a while… she never knew a safe, solid home life. Yet she would have scoffed at the idea of using her broken family as an excuse to be demanding or manipulative or even sad. Instead, she determined to build a family that would thrive on the love she dished out with all those homemade meals.

And she loved her “boys” (every one of them over 6 feet tall, and Ruth reaching barely over 5 feet!) no matter what. When they made mistakes, she just loved them. When they made life style choices that worried her, she just loved them. When they became successful, she loved them. And when they suffered she loved them still. It was her way, to love those boy-men no matter what.

Just a few friends and a smattering of family will be at Ruth’s graveside Monday morning. Yet the impact of her love lives on in uncountable lives. She changed a family by her love and then her family changed their families and now a new generation of families is growing up to change their own families… and isn’t that the way a whole world gets changed?

By one woman who chose to love… no matter what?

I miss you, Mom C

From my heart,

Diane

LOVE STORIES will resume on Tuesday this week with another story. Check back then!

I will boast only in the LORD;

Let all who are discouraged take heart.

Come let us tell of the LORD’s greatness;

Let us exalt His name together.

Psalm 34:2,3

NLT

Bekah was born to us on a wild November night I can never erase from my mind. Too early and too fast, she came rushing into our world like a hurricane on the loose. Instead of pink and lovely, her skin held the colors of a storm—dark and grey.

Doctors whisked her away while a nurse stayed behind to explain: “Her lungs are filled with fluid and she hasn’t been able to take a breathe… we’re taking her to the resuscitation room and calling in a Neonatologist.”

From that moment, her fragile life was bathed in prayer.

We prayed, our family prayed, friends prayed, our church prayed… that little struggling baby was placed so firmly in the Healer’s Hands that I can’t help but believe that He had a purpose to draw from the terror of that time.

For, ever since that inauspicious beginning, I have treasured my girl.

A bundle of joy-filled possibilities, Bekah brought sparkle and laughter into our way-too-intense Comer home. She kept her neat-freak older brother messed up just enough to lighten up, begging with those big brown eyes to enter his world of army men and mud.

I insisted on bows in her ponytails, though they seemed to slip out of their own volition. I ironed wrinkles out of dresses, and wiped all those muddy streaks off her delight-filled face. Sometimes I’d hear that whispered warning from her Father not to wash away His unique flair in her life. As if He was letting me in on a secret: She’s just the way I want her.

As she struggled into womanhood, she demanded the freedom to be different than me. Then she charmed us all by creating a kind of beauty that could be stamped all her own.

There were tense times when my worry collided with her crying need to be unique, to craft her own version of femininity. Yet somehow in all those years we developed a sort of mutual “I really like the way you are” mentality towards each other.

I want to be like her— with all her openness and vivacity and quick intelligence and remarkable insight.

I study the way she breaks from man-made molds and makes her own way of loveliness.

I watch to see why she has so many friends, and I learn as she leans into other’s lives and gives all she has without restriction. She loves her not-quite-right-in-the-head neighbor, thinks the Satanists who live in her building are “really nice”, is fascinated by everyone and lets them know it.

And for reasons that I cannot quite understand, she wants to be like me.

No, no, not the conservative, let’s-not-rock-the-boat, people-might-be-looking me. But the me who’s changing and growing and emerging while holding tightly to my Father’s hand. The one who traded the silver civic for a vintage red Mercedes, ventured out of my safe shell and learned to dance, Haitian style.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if every mother who holds a baby to her breast could catch just the barest glimpse of the person that child is to become?

How would it change the way we love— the way we discipline and correct and decide when to say yes and when to hold the line?

If I had known my son would emerge as a leader to his generation, would I have taken heart when he challenged my cherished-but-not-quite-biblical notions of right and wrong?

If I had known my daughter would flourish in a world of creative go-getters, would I have given her more freedom to explore the edges of my safe world?

I don’t know… and my story is full of “I wish I hads”, but I’d love to pass on to every woman a few things I do know, a few tidbits of wisdom I’ve learned along this journey of loving…

• Every child is a uniquely crafted individual made in the image of God. We know this, but find it so hard to believe. Our culture insists on sameness, on rigid boundaries that keep beauty confined. While behavior must be carefully kept in check, creativity and personality and giftedness should be fully explored and encouraged to thrive.

• Mothers who intentionally set out to discover their child’s uniqueness will be like kids at Christmas. Instead of rolling their eyes at the embarrassing antics of out-of-control children, there are mothers who are so fully present that they are molding their child’s life, polishing the jewels so they sparkle and shine. These moms are having a blast! Instead of whining and complaining and criticizing their kids, they’re delighting in those few short years in which they have a chance to make a difference.

• There will always be critics. Always! Having the wherewithal to graciously ignore them is a sign of emotional maturity in a woman. It’s not my job to defend my children or to explain away their idiosyncrasies. I never set out to raise perfect people— my hope and my prayer and my aim was always to raise men and women who love God with passion and have the heart to love people on purpose. The fact that they stumble a little in the process is just the way of humanity.

• Heap approval on your children… even when they’re no longer kids. Be generous with encouragement. Make your mom space a safe place within which your children can revel in the limelight. Coax from them the accolades and accomplishments that would sound like boasting anywhere else. There’s no such thing as bragging to mom. Tell them what you like about them. Admire them.  Respect your sons and lavish love on your daughters. Keep doing this as long as you’re alive.

• When they’re really little be really tough… so that when they get older you can be really gentle. The mistake too many moms make is that they do just the opposite. We overlook those irritating habits in the early years: temper tantrums and rudeness and bad attitudes. Then when all that ugliness grows up, we try to stomp it out of them! What if instead, we were to diligently discipline during those exhaustingly intense younger years? What if we denied out own pleasures long enough to do what needs doing in order to present our children as well behaved, self-controlled young adults? Might that not change everything?

• Remember your goal. It’s not to raise super stars, nor to insist on perfection. Your child will not be The Best at much of anything, no matter how hard you push.  He needn’t be exposed to every sport or every “opportunity”. You are not obligated to remove all obstacles in her path, nor must you absorb your life in developing every potential. As followers of Jesus, our goal is the same as His, that our children would “…love the LORD your God with all your heart,all your soul, and all your mind…” Only God can make that happen, but you’re the primary tool He has to create that kind of passion in your child’s heart.

• Saturate your child in prayer. Prayer is the most powerful weapon in a mother’s arsenal. To leave it locked in the gun case when the enemy is prowling around, taking shots at your child’s soul is ludicrous! To think that we can worry our way through every problem is ridiculous!  James 1:5 holds God’s irrevocable promise to parents: “If any man lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives generously…” We have the wisdom of God at our fingertips! Just by asking and     waiting with faith-filled anticipation for His answer, we are promised what no book, or seminar, or parenting magazine can hope to offer— wisdom from God.

• Get over yourself. I know it sounds a little harsh, but remembering that this whole mothering thing is not about me is imperative. My children are not supposed to fulfill me. I am not supposed to need them. They are not meant to be a reflection of my worth. Instead, they are unique individuals made in the image of God and I have the honor to nurture that image in different ways for as long as I live.

Not needing my son is the greatest gift this mom can give a man who is needed by so many.

Not needing my daughter allows her to thrive and soar and develop as a woman and as a mother in her own right.

Not needing my son who is in college gives him freedom to figure out who he is and what he wants.

Not needing my daughter who lives far away allows her to fully embrace her husband’s vision for a different kind of       life— a life far from my safe suburbanite world.

They need to know and be assured that I don’t need them to make me happy. I am happy.

• Do not fear failure. When you are praying that your children will love God with all their hearts, minds, souls, and strength, and that they will follow hard after Christ, you are almost guaranteeing some missteps. I have never in my life met a passionate Jesus follower who has not been humbled into dependence by personal failure. Failure can be terrifying for a mother, but it is often the gateway into that intimate, grateful relationship that makes a man truly godly. Instead of fearing failure, we ought to lead our children to the Redeemer, whose specialty is picking us up out of that miry pit we dig ourselves into, and setting our feet on the Solid Rock. Could David ever have become a “man after God’s own heart” without the humiliation of discovery? Wasn’t it Elizabeth’s barrenness that caused her to raise a son willing to stand against the tide? Could Peter have written the words that encourage and inspire us had he not failed so miserably? For your son or daughter to follow in the footsteps of the heroes of our faith, they must meet God in their own brokenness.

That little girl who rushed into my arms with so much drama is a woman now. She is beautiful and smart and creative and overflowing with love.

She and her husband inhabit a culture alien to me. They have purposed to bring the Redeemer into that world, to present Jesus to a people who are searching for meaning and worth.

God’s plan for Bekah is different than His use of me. I get the distinct feeling that He’s having fun with her! That He delights in our differences, that He needs us to be different.

And so, with all of you, I wish my daughter a Happy Birthday.

I will celebrate this date for as long as I live. I am so grateful that God chose to shake up my world on that November day so long ago, so incredibly honored to have your life in mine.

Rebekah Ruth (Comer) Opperman, I am thrilled with the woman you are and excited to see the woman you will become.

I love you, Bekah!

Mom

When I was asked to share my love story with all of you, I had to chuckle, because ours is not a typical one.

I’d always asked God for a crazy story with my husband, one that could not be explained any other way except that it was orchestrated by God. Well, that’s just what we got. Thank you Lord!

I met Nick on January 22nd, 2008. He was a fairly new member of the Christian rock band Kutless, and had recently been frequenting Portland for band rehearsals and studio time. I had been friends with Dave, their bass player, and his wife Megan for a few years and that night they decided to invite me over. There were a few people in addition to the four of us, and throughout that night my attraction for Nick started to develop. He was tall, blonde and handsome (my rendition of the cliche phrase), and absolutely hilarious.

This draw to him mattered very little, as I found out later that Nick was already taken by a girl in California, and had been for over 4 years. His visit went on and we had evening after evening of group activities. Something was different with this guy. We connected like I hadn’t with anyone before, but there was that road block- a girlfriend back home. I allowed myself to be attracted to someone who wasn’t available.  Towards the end of his visit however, I found out that Nick had been praying about his relationship and was days away from breaking things off.

I patiently waited for things to take place, and slowly but surely I was being pursued by this handsome man from California. We dated for about 2 1/2 months, with a couple visits from sunny California to rainy Portland, OR. April came around and things just didn’t feel right. We took a day to pray, and ended up deciding that this just wasn’t working. There was no particular reason, it just didn’t feel “right.”

Over the course of the next year and a half Nick and I stayed friends, with an occasional text or email, but that was about it. At least on my end. In October of 2009 I received an email from him saying that he had been thinking about me and he couldn’t shake the thought of me. He so sweetly asked if it would be ok if we got to know each other again, even if it was just as friends. Basically, he’d take what he could get. I definitely took the email with flattery, but immediately got weirded out and anxious about the whole thing, which could only lead to one thing, avoidance. Poor guy. I never really revisited the idea, and even avoided coffee dates with him that next week when he was in town.

After some hurt feelings (I’m such a jerk), life went on, and thoughts of each other lingered off and on, but no real feelings on my end were surfacing. Until March 2010. I had recently been getting involved with Solid Rock’s high school youth group, and was on a Spring Break retreat in Sunriver. One of the leaders, Jake Fisher, pulled me aside one day and said he had a song for me to listen to. It was Nick’s new song that he’d posted on his website as a free download. It was called, “Love Can Change Your Mind.” Admittedly, I had stuffed Nick way into the back of my mind, and hadn’t allowed myself to think about him for a LONG time. I sat listening and wondered, “this couldn’t possibly be about me, could it?” This song about some ghost of the past that was haunting him. A chorus that said “why can’t you just believe? You know we’re just wasting time! You can say that everything we had was blind, but love can change your mind.” Then the bridge line played and it hit me… it was indeed about me. He sang… “From sunny California, headed north to Portland grey, said ‘I’ll be waitin’ for ya,’ but there’s nothin’ left to say.”

He was waiting for me? He still cared about me? Wow. I had a lot to think about.

I went to dinner with my best friend and roommate Chloe later that week, and we spent most of the time analyzing what all of this meant. I didn’t think I liked Nick anymore. I thought that was a memory of the past, but then she asked me a question that ended up changing my mind and opening the door again. “So … why not Nick?” I actually had no clue. Not a single answer to that question. There was no reason why Nick wasn’t the guy.

And so the story began. I wrote an email, he wrote back, I wrote back, calls were made, and finally we were dating again.

We spent 10 months dating between Portland and Nashville. This included around 24 roundtrips, and an approximate total of $8,000 spent on airfare.

After all of the travel, and many days spent apart, we were so blessed to be engaged on February 22nd, 2011, married on June 10th, and moved to Nashville, TN on June 23rd. Life is sweet!

Getting to know each other in marriage has by far been my favorite season of our relationship. It is not a cake walk. It has not been easy moving across the country, away from my family, but goodness gracious it has been WONDERFUL.

I married a man who waited for me, who pursued me, and continues to pursue me as his wife. Nick is a godly man who’s learning every day what it means to lead me and lay down his life, and he’s doing a great job. I have never met such a hard working man. He has been so gracious as he’s learned my flaws. I’m pretty sure he’s learned a new flaw of mine everyday, and with every single thing learned, he covers me.

For those of you waiting for Mr. Right, please don’t settle for anything less than this. These godly husbands DO exist, and they are worth every day spent single. I pinch myself sometimes as I look over at Nick and wonder how I became so blessed. My only answer for that question is God. That’s what I asked for from the beginning.

Thank you God for writing my love story.

Thank you for reading.

Allison

If you get a chance, take a listen to the love song that Nick wrote for me that got me hooked for good!

LOVE CAN CHANGE YOUR MIND

The clear blue California sky mocked me as I fumbled to close the doctor’s office door behind me. How could the sun shine cheerfully on such a day as this? How dare the people bustling past me smile and laugh? How cruel a joke that life goes on—for mine stopped with the doctor’s one word: deafness.

“Young lady, you are going deaf.”

Deaf… deaf…deaf…

He was wrong… had to be wrong! A 26 year-old mother does not go deaf. That is for wrinkled old men, not a vibrant young woman with a family and a future.

I hadn’t wanted to go to the doctor in the first place. There was nothing wrong with my ears. The problem was, people mumbled so much. Telephones weren’t as clear as they used to be. And with the noise level in a house with a preschooler and a toddler and a new baby… well, who could hear above all that?

I had almost talked myself out of going but forged ahead to please my husband and family who had been urging me to see a specialist for some time. Confident that the doctor would just give me a pill and make this all go away, I left my newborn nursing baby at home with her dad and kept my appointment. Several hours and countless tests later I drove numbly home, the doctor’s grim diagnosis ringing in my failing ears.

“Diane, you have a severe hearing loss in both ears. We’ll do some tests, but my guess is that it is a neural sensorial hearing loss, probably progressive. It will get worse. You need hearing aids now… deaf later.”

I was stunned. It had never entered my mind that I might be going deaf. Fluid in the ears maybe, perhaps a virus. I had had a mild case of pneumonia a few months before and thought a simple medication would clear up the subtle muffling. But deafness? I was utterly unprepared and absolutely terrified.

I went home, told my husband and family, held my children, and wept. Looking at them, knowing I would not be able to hear them as they grew up, I was engulfed in grief. How can a mother not hear?

Too soon, I dried my tears, stuffed the bewilderment deep down inside and plastered a smile on my face. The doctor had to be wrong.

Life was good. God had blessed me. Everything would be just fine.

And it was. My life was good. It always had been. I’d grown up in a wonderfully loving family, married the man of my dreams—a pastor, a spiritual giant. I had three healthy, happy children and countless friends in a great church. Yes, life was good and God was blessing me. After all, I followed the rules didn’t I? Wasn’t that the way life was supposed to work? I do my part by being very, very good and disciplined and as perfect-as-possible. Then God would do His part. All those promises about His blessing me and taking care of me. It was a done deal. Deafness was most certainly not a part of the package.

Yet despite all that goodness in my life, a nagging emptiness had started me longing for something more. I couldn’t put my finger on it, couldn’t articulate what was amiss, but all that goodness just didn’t seem to be enough. I had everything I’d ever dreamed of having, was doing exactly what I wanted to be doing, yet faced each day with a sort of empty dread.

Try as I might, I couldn’t feel anything but weary from the work of it all.

Ever since I had given my life to Christ as a young teenager, I had tried to emulate certain wise and godly women. If I could just copy their lives, I thought, then someday I’d be a super Christian too. One of these women was Muriel Cook. She was beautiful in every way. Meeting with me every week for a year, she dished out wisdom on a silver platter. With her Bible open, she’d mix the Scriptures with real life while I scrambled to write it all down.

One afternoon she came to our meeting with tears streaking down her carefully made-up face. She had been weeping over her own sinfulness. I was shocked into silence. This woman seemed to me the epitome of perfection. If she was such a sinner, what did that say of me?

Another women stood next to me in the choir. She was a simple woman, not attractive by any means. Her grey streaked hair pulled back in a ponytail did nothing to soften the deep lines on her face. Yet whenever we sang a song about the Cross, or the Savior, or of His washing of our sins, her face transformed into a glowing beauty, the crevices flowing with streams of grateful tears.

Why? What was it that moved her heart while mine was left cold? I had always known that Jesus had died for me. Yet His death did not tear at my heart. Why could I not weep at the Cross?

I began, tentatively at first, to pray about this emptiness. I wasn’t exactly sure what I was praying for. I just knew that I wanted what these women had. I wanted to know God like that, to experience Him intimately. Over time my longing intensified. Whatever it was, whatever it took, I wanted it.

As the months passed after my initial diagnosis, the dullness of my hearing became more and more evident. Each time it reared its ugly head I pushed it down, plastered my smile in place and went on. Tests were ordered. MRI’s, CAT scans, blood tests, bone tests. I switched doctors. I tried harder. Yet all the facts led to one inevitable, inescapable conclusion. I was losing my hearing… and fast.

It is difficult to describe what it is like to lose one’s hearing.

At first it was the little things. I couldn’t hear the kitchen telephone ringing from down the hall and when I finally heard it, I couldn’t tell who was on the other line. All voices sounded about the same to me. I could not tell the difference between Lynn and Kim and the gym. Once I carried on a full fifteen minutes with Stacey only to discover I was talking to Lucy!

Being hearing impaired involves an enormous amount of frustration. I can hear, I just cannot always understand what I hear. It is frustrating to want to talk to someone, to want to get to know someone, but be afraid to enter into a conversation that I will not understand. Sometimes I work so hard to wring out every intelligible bit of sound from the roar that meets my ears that I go home completely wrung out from the effort.

It is frustrating to have a well-meaning person say, “But you do so well, nobody would ever know!” What they don’t realize is how much I miss, how often I bluff, how tense I get in a conversation when I hope I am nodding my head the right way. Or how stupid I feel when I see that dread look in their eyes that means I have just blundered badly.

But it was at home that the pain was the greatest.

When my baby cried in the night and I didn’t hear.

When my little girl wrapped her dimpled arms around my neck and whispered sweet secrets—that I couldn’t hear.

Or when my son told me all about his first stay away at camp, chattering excitedly on our way home about nicknames and new friends and fun games… and I knew I was missing all the but the main parts.

Oh the pain! I didn’t mind as much not hearing birds or crickets or alarm clocks or buzzers. Let the cookies burn in the oven for all I care! But those lovely, intimate, important words—I wanted to hear. I longed to hear. The thought of being cut off, isolated and alone in my silent world terrified me.

I began to sink into a deep depression. I had never experienced such sadness before. Me, the middle child, steady-eddie, never too high, never very low, just cheer up and everything will be fine. But not now. This was darkness. I couldn’t just cheer up. I was overwhelmed with fear, with anger, and most of all with self-pity. My God had turned His back on me. How could He? Why would He? I felt unloved, rejected, abandoned. I had absolutely no doubt that He was able to heal me. My faith in His ability never wavered. The fact that He did not heal me despite my desperate pleadings shook my faith in His goodness to its very foundations.

God was supposed to bless me for obeying Him, for following the rules.

Isn’t that how it works? I do the right thing. He does the right thing. I fulfill the condition. He fulfills the promise.

I was a proper pastor’s wife. I sacrificed so much for Him. How dare He do this to me?

My fear turned to anger. Deep within my heart I railed against God. I thought Him unfair, uncaring, cold—even mean.

I prayed and felt silence.

I read my Bible and saw only the Jesus of righteous wrath.

I went to church and wept.

My family reached out in tender love but I rejected every effort. My husband tried to help me in that exuberant way of his, saying all the wrong things as he watched me crumble within myself. At least it isn’t cancer. There isn’t pain. Ah, come on, its not so bad.

Every word grated against soul as I sank ever deeper.

I wrapped myself in a cloak of self-pity and firmly shut everyone out.

For the first time in my charmed life I faced something truly difficult and I failed miserably. My tidy world collapsed. I was reduced to a self-pitying, sniveling mess.

But does the Father ever turn His back on us? Does He ever throw up His mighty hands in disgust?

No! Never!

No sin is so bad, no thought so wicked, no person so vile as to turn Him away. This Savior who hung on the Cross for us did it not while we were flawlessly following the rules. He suffered there while we were sinners. Seeing the black bottom of our hearts He pursues us, relentlessly loving us with a love that will never let us go.

On a blustery Sunday evening in February, I reluctantly asked the elders of my church to pray for me. I was embarrassed by my need. Ashamed to say that God had not answered my pleadings for healing. Would He listen better to theirs? These men were friends, colleagues of my husband. Could I admit my simmering rage? Would they see the blackness that plagued my soul?

In a chilly room with cinderblock walls and windows obscured by ambered glass, I sat on a plastic chair surrounded by these elders. They were a motley assortment of men. One was a retired bank executive, another a construction worker. One man coached the high school wrestling team; another had risen to vice-president of a gas company. Each and every one of them loved God with passion and integrity.

Oh how these men prayed! These dignified, conservative men beseeched the Father on my behalf. They anointed my head with oil and prayed for healing. They laughed and they wept and they praised God together for over an hour as I soaked my blouse with my tears.

And as they prayed, the darkness began to lift. Like a darkened sky on a stormy day when the sun suddenly and unexpectedly breaks through with a stream of brilliant light, so my heart was flooded with light. The coldness of the room and of my soul warmed and filled until I abandoned myself to the beauty of that light. Everything else faded from my mind; the voices of the elders as they prayed, my own embarrassed fidgeting, my intense discomfort at the honesty of the moment—all were forgotten as I was enveloped by the warmth of what I knew was God.

And in that moment I heard His Voice.

“It’s okay, Diane. It’s okay.”

Over and over again like a song soothing my spirit I heard His words as clear as if He was speaking into my ear. “It’s okay”.

I knew exactly what He was saying to me in that suspended moment in time. He wasn’t going to heal me. My ears would fail. Deafness would define my future. And somehow, in some way I could never fathom, He had made it okay. Not just bearable, but really, honestly okay and right.

And suddenly it was! With my heart dancing and face glowing I wiped my tears and fled that room as fast as I could. What had happened in there? Dare I tell anyone? How in the world could I possibly describe what I had just seen and heard? And what did it mean?

Filled with wonder and a fair amount of fear, I went home, tucked my kids into bed and collapsed in exhaustion. The next morning found me wide awake before anyone else stirred. I had to sort this out. Needed to fit it in somewhere to my conservative theology that didn’t welcome supernatural experiences as a legitimate means to truth.

That’s when I heard that Voice again. Just as clear as the night before, but now with a hint of that firm tone I had infrequently heard as a girl with my dad.

“Alright Diane, this is where the rubber meets the road. You’ve listened to the best preachers, been to fabulous seminars, read great books. Will you entrust your deafness to Me?”

And in that early quiet, He turned me to Psalm 40, which has become the song of my heart,

“I waited patiently

and He inclined to me, and heard my cry.

He brought me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay;

And he set my feet upon a rock making my footsteps firm.

And He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to God;

Many will see and fear,

And will trust in the LORD.”

Psalm 40:1-3

I left that encounter with God a changed woman. For the first time in my life, I had heard from God. Actually heard! His no left me filled with more peace and joy than I had ever experienced in my life.

In those months that followed the doctor’s first mention of the “D-word”, I had struggled with the issue of faith. Well-meaning people exhorted me to “have faith”. God would surely heal me and put my life back to what I wanted it to be if I only had enough faith. I searched the Scriptures to see if it was true and came away seeing that God is a god who heals—sometimes. It took absolutely no stretch of faith for me to believe that God could heal. What shook me to the core was that He didn’t .

Paul asked God to heal him of his ailment three times? Like Paul, I begged, pleaded and demanded healing, but I pleaded hundreds of times. Somehow, it seemed, if I could just drum up enough of this emotion called faith, then God would be obligated to grant me healing.

I had no idea how wrong I was.

God is not a Father who demands pitiful begging. He cherishes His children. In fact, the Bible paints a picture of a Father who longs to heap good gifts on His kids.

Faith, real faith came for me the moment I believed that God is a good God who purposely allowed this affliction to be a part of my reality. His lovingkindness has actually allowed my hearing to fail. Like David, who exclaimed with wonder in his voice, that “It was good for me that I was afflicted.” (Psalm 119:71), I began to see this as His premium plan for my life—really. This is His plan for my joy. Faith began to grow when, confronted by His holiness, I fell on my face and surrendered my deepest dread to Him.

My own faith failed the test—completely. I fell flat on my spiritual face. The truth is that He picked me up out of the pit of destruction I was digging myself into, cleaned all the mud and muck off my heart, and placed me firmly back where I belonged—on the solid rock of His faithfulness.

And then, wonder of wonders, He put a new song in my mouth. This song is all about Him. My own goodness is not enough to weather the storms and turbulence of real life, but His is! And I will sing and speak and write about His faithfulness everyday for the rest of my life.

Now, more than two decades later, I am completely deaf. Only the faintest rumble of sound penetrates the wall of silence. Relationships are hard; social gatherings painful.

This journey towards deafness has been long and difficult. Isolation, loneliness, separation, and misunderstanding have been my constant companions.

It hurts not to hear.

Yet the Father continually heaps great spoonfuls of grace on my heart. He speaks and I listen as never before. His comfort is palatable. His peace beyond figuring out. I would not trade this precious intimacy He has offered me for the best hearing in the world. God is good, though the path to His heart is oft-times strewn with pain.

Everyday as I struggle and strain to hear through my deafness, I learn a little bit more about listening to Him.

In my silent world God speaks.

I hear Him now. His voice is beautiful, rich, powerful and kind.

His words convict me in a way that makes me feel clean again and sometimes His words bring me to my knees.

His words fill me with joy and hope, for I know that…

He speaks in the silence.

From my heart,

Diane